Articles 2011
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U.S. Universities Feast on Federal Student Aid
Bloomberg View, December 07, 2011
The public is in a foul mood over increasing college costs and student debt burdens. Talk of a “higher education bubble” is common on the contrarian right, while the Occupy Wall Street crowd is calling for a strike in which in which ex-students refuse to pay off their loans.
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Amazon E-Library Is Publishing’s Profit Model
Bloomberg View, November 12, 2011
Amazon.com Inc. is at it again. To the consternation of much of the book industry, the online giant is again offering digital titles for less than major publishers think books are worth. And this time, the price is zero.
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Web Bone-Marrow Bounty Takes on Paid-Donor Ban
Bloomberg View, October 09, 2011
When Amit Gupta told his friends a few weeks ago that he had acute leukemia and needed a bone- marrow transplant, the word spread quickly.
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Superheroes Rise From Camp to Art
Bloomberg View, October 05, 2011
The newest banner in the window of the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh features a strikingly realistic portrait of Superman. Unfazed as bullets bounce from his chest, neck and forehead, the Man of Steel wears a calm, resolute expression, made all the more convincing by the creases and fine lines of early middle age.
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Harvard Pledge Values ‘Kindness’ Over Learning
Bloomberg View, September 14, 2011
When the members of the class of 2015 arrived at Harvard College this fall, they encountered a novel bit of moral education. Their dorm proctors -- the grad students who live with freshmen to provide guidance and enforce discipline -- invited each student to sign a pledge developed by the Freshman Dean’s Office.
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How Steve Jobs Made Business Cool Again
Bloomberg View, August 25, 2011
To understand the cultural significance of Steve Jobs, you have to go back in time: to before the iPad or iPhone or iTunes, before Apple Inc.’s comeback products made candy-colored plastics and iAnything cool, before Jobs got kicked out of Apple, even before the Macintosh hurled a sledgehammer at Big Brother.
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Want to Be the Next Apple? Lose the Bafflegab
Bloomberg View, August 17, 2011
Everybody, it seems, wants to be like Apple Inc. Google Inc. is buying Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc., many observers say, so it can integrate hardware and software to be like Apple (and to enlarge its patent pool).Last week, Joel Ewanick, the global chief marketing officer at General Motors, declared that “it’s time to clearly differentiate our brand and align closer to a true global brand like Apple.” Translation: We want to be like Apple.
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Obama’s Glamour Can’t Fix His Charisma Deficit
Bloomberg View, August 03, 2011
One thing is clear in the aftermath of the debt-limit debate: U.S. President Barack Obama has lost his glamour. The alluring icon of hope and change has become just another pol, derided by his supporters as well as his opponents. As one headline succinctly put it: “Obama succumbs to the ways of Washington.”
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Branding Medici-Style, No Need for Tiger
Bloomberg View, July 20, 2011
Florentine authorities and residents were appalled when the cast of MTV’s “Jersey Shore” invaded the Tuscan capital for the show’s fourth season, which will debut Aug. 4. What were Snooki and The Situation doing associating themselves with the refined city of Dante and Botticelli (not to mention Ferragamo)? Even New Jersey won’t claim these louts.
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Too Many Public Works Built on Rosy Scenarios
Bloomberg View, July 06, 2011
“Infrastructure” may be one of the least glamorous words in the English language, but with the right touch the concrete and steel of roads, bridges, tunnels, dams and railroads can look as alluring as a movie star. Witness the sleekly seductive illustrations produced for today’s California High-Speed Rail Authority or the midcentury pictures of effortlessly flowing superhighways, a genre that reached its apotheosis in Walt Disney’s “Magic Highway U.S.A.” in 1958.