Weekend Digest: The ‘In Your Face’ Edition

For our weekend business and political readers:

FILM CAPITAL OF THE WORLD NO LONGER
Forbes reports California has fallen to fourth in the most popular places worldwide to shoot a film.

Fifteen years ago 64% of the top 25 live-action movies were filmed in California. In 2013 only 8% were filmed here.

What state and other countries have overtaken California as more popular places to shoot a movie and why is this happening?

Forbes says, “most filmmakers are based in Los Angeles and they would prefer to stay close to their families on shoots that can last several months,” but deals away from home “are just too good to pass up.”

Click on this link to for the feature story.

A SMART HOME WITH PERSONALITY
Fast Company examines the growing trend of smart homes with personalities, but warns: what if you don’t like your home’s personality?

What if your toaster didn’t like you and decided to move on? As companies start to add more personality to the smart objects we live with, one interaction designer is considering how a product’s own programmed desires could shape us, rather than the other way around.

It’s called Addicted Products and the designer is Simone Rebaudengo. With his scheme a “network” of toasters goes to “host” families. “Each toaster wants to be used, and if it’s not, the toaster complains and tells the network that it wants to go somewhere else.”

Why would anyone want a complaining toaster? Well Rebaudengo has an ingenious reason for his crabby network of appliances, that when tested has made owners see the light on what they are actually really using.

If you want to see the light on exactly how this works, go to this link.

WHY DO PEOPLE BECOME SELF-EMPLOYED LATER IN LIFE?
Bloomberg Businessweek asks: When Americans go into business for themselves later in life, is it because they want to or because they have to?

And do the answers differ from men and women, who have different levels of savings, other sources of retirement income, and appetites for risk?

Amid the surge in older Americans becoming entrepreneurs, Angel Curl is probing these questions. An assistant professor at the University of Missouri School of Social Work researching work and retirement, she’s among the first to examine how gender differences motivate older people to choose self-employment.

Bloomberg Businessweek spoke to her and you can find some answers to her research by clicking this link.

IS YOUR BOSS TOO NICE?
Harvard Business Review says, “It can be pleasant to work for someone who is kind and thoughtful but there’s a difference between bosses who are pleasant to work for and those who avoid conflict at all costs.”

Managers in the latter category don’t give tough feedback, shy away from going to bat for their teams, and give in too easily to demands. If this sounds like your boss, your career may be at risk.

Working for a manager who is conflict-adverse can have deleterious effects on your performance and your career. Linda Hill, the Wallace Brett Donham Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School, says that many of these bosses aren’t aware of the effect they’re having on their direct reports.

“My experience with leaders like this is that they don’t know they’re behaving that way,” she says. Here’s how to mitigate the potential damage of a boss who is too nice.

Go to this link for her expert advice.

WENDY AND THE PRESIDENT
Wendy Davis, the Democratic nominee for Texas Governor, is planning an appearance with President Obama next month, but is that good political advice in this deeply conservative state?

Texas state Sen. Wendy Davis (D) isn’t going to run away from President Obama when he visits the Lone Star State next month, despite running for governor in a deeply conservative part of the country.

Obama is scheduled to be in Austin on April 10 to give a keynote speech at a civil rights summit.

“I’m definitely planning on being at the celebration,” Davis responded, adding, “I’m excited about greeting our president there and our former presidents, who I think are also planning to be there.”

Will she campaign with the president especially since a poll from last year, “showed that Hispanics, one of the main demographic groups Democrats are focused on as they look to turn Texas purple in the coming years, give Obama high marks”?

For full analysis and more on this evolving story click on this link.

MORE TEXAS POLITICS
The nation’s first round of 2014 primaries was held this past Tuesday in Texas. And although the New York Times says “There was no Ted Cruz coming out of nowhere in a blaze of Tea Party fervor to upend the establishment in a marquee race…the story of the Texas primaries was that anyone thinking the Tea Party had run its course should think again.”

While establishment candidates in some of the top races were successful, Texas Republicans continued to tilt ever further right. In the night’s most competitive race, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst won only 28 percent of the vote in his re-election big to get into a runoff with a conservative talk radio host, State Senator Dan Patrick, who earned 41 percent of the vote.

The Times reports, “Four of the five candidates in judicial and legislative races who had been endorsed by Mr. Cruz were victorious on Tuesday, and one earned enough votes to force a runoff in May for an open seat in the State Senate.”

For more on the Tea Party in Texas and how the parties’ other candidates may fare across the country, click on this link.

HOW COSTLY IS AN OBAMA-HUG TO A CONSERVATIVE CANDIDATE?
Republican New Jersey Governor Chris Christie should know. He spoke to the Conservative Political Action Conference at its kickoff this past week and though he has plenty of trouble on his plate from the disastrous George Washington Bridge-closing scandal, there was another issue possibly lingering on this group’s mind.

Bloomberg Newsweek says the “CPAC is to right-wing Republican activists what Comic Con is to comic book collectors and sci-fi enthusiasts.”

So what was all the scrutinizing regarding Christie about other than Bridge-gate?

The second, arguably more problematic issue was Christie’s palling around with Barack Obama in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy during the final weeks of the 2012 presidential campaign–an act of apostasy that many CPAC-style conservatives blame for costing Mitt Romney the election.

So how was Christie received and how did his remarks go over?

Go to this link to find out.

PREZ IMPRESSIONIST MEETS THE REAL GUY
There he was delivering an impassioned speech in the White House and he sounded and looked a lot like the nation’s leader, but on second-take his talent is not of being the president but looking and sounding like him. A lot like him.

His name is Iman Crosson and a recent face-to-face at the White House between him and the real President Obama has become another YouTube sensation.

“Either I can get to work or you can. You can take a lunch break, and I can take an hour. Fill in for you. But listen, I’m just happy to be here, happy to shake your hand,” Iman Crosson, known as Alphacat, told the president in the video, mimicking Obama’s voice and mannerisms.

Obama laughed and as he shook Crosson’s hand, gave him a tip on improving his impression.

Check it out at this link.

IN YOUR FACE!
That rather uncouth statement can have several meanings, but in this case we report on someone who truly means it, literally.

“Headshots” is a series from photographer Kaija Straumanis is which a variety of objects are thrown at her head. It is silly, but oddly inspiring.

Viewed together, they are either a lesson of perseverance in a world that seems constantly out to get each of us, or simply a long look at a woman who gets hit in the head a lot.

“Or does she?”, asks Fast Company. Hmm, the plot thickens.

To see the shots and to get the real story behind them, “hit” this link.

NATURE’S SUPER FOOD
Nature Knows says, “After reading this you’ll never look at a banana in the same way again.”

Why may you ask?  Well here’s a sampler:

Bananas contain three natural sugars – sucrose, fructose and glucose combined with fiber. A banana gives an instant, sustained and substantial boost of energy. Research has proven that just two bananas provide enough energy for a strenuous 90-minute workout. No wonder the banana is the number one fruit with the world’s leading athletes. But energy isn’t the only way a banana can help us keep fit. It can also help overcome or prevent a substantial number of illnesses and conditions, making it a must to add to our daily diet.

And there’s more. Lots more.

Go on and “peel” back to this link for the scoop.