> But even more, why be so rude to your own guests? What writer or actor is going to go to the 92nd Street Y for a public interview knowing that the next day, the institution might say, “We realize that was a totally boring discussion and are happy to give you your money back”? > > This is what makes the world boring, quite frankly: the absolute refusal to risk that anything might be disappointing, and the accompanying conviction that if you are disappointed, you’ve been wronged. It’s the entitlement of the incurious, and it does nothing good for anyone. Linda Holmes basically echoes [my sentiments from earlier today](http://jcieplinski.posterous.com/the-stupid-is-spreadingeven-as-far-as-new-yor), only much more eloquently.

This notion of risk avoidance in our entertainment is very disturbing. It has to potential of completely destroying some forms of performance. You have to take a chance as an audience, or artists won’t ever be able to innovate.

My guess is this probably stems from the depressed state of America’s modern middle class. Going out for a night of entertainment is a pretty expensive proposition for today’s “in-debt-up-to-our-ears” middle class professionals. We’re also burnt out from working 80-hour weeks for no overtime pay. So when we do go out to escape, we want something safe and familiar. We want guarantees. And the more the entertainment industry tries to give us that safe and familiar guarantee, the more we are robbed of any truly new experiences. All art gets watered down to the least common denominator. The safe and familiar gets to be a smaller and smaller range of options over time.

This is how Reality TV happened.

Artists and venues and entertainment executives should be FIGHTING this entitlement of the incurious, but instead many seem to be capitulating, betraying each other to gain our favor. And that’s definitely not a good thing. When the general audience gets to rule over which art is worthy or not worthy, that’s the beginning of the end.

> [Google](http://topics.sfgate.com/topics/Google), stepping up competition with Amazon.com, will open an online store for electronic versions of books in the [United States](http://topics.sfgate.com/topics/United_States) this year and internationally in 2011, according to a person familiar with the company’s plans. > > The Mountain View company is working with book publishers to sell hundreds of thousands of e-books, said the person, who asked not to be identified because details of the project haven’t been made public. > > Google intends to use its position as the world’s most popular search engine to erode Amazon’s dominance of e-books, while Apple harnesses the iPad tablet and iTunes online store to make its own inroads. The competition means Amazon’s share of digital books will decline to 35 percent over the next five years from 90 percent in early 2010, Credit Suisse Group AG estimated in February. Three things. First, is there anything Google isn’t trying to get its paws into these days? How many products are they going to fail at before they hit on another success?

Second, look at how that last sentence I just quoted states that Amazon will go from 90% to 35% in e-book sales. It’s stated there as if it were definitely going to happen, just because some analyst group suggested it back in February. How about some follow-up on what’s actually happened since February? So far, Apple’s iBooks is the only serious competitor to Amazon in the e-book market, and by all indications, Apple is doing fine with iBooks, but not really threatening Amazon at all. So where’s the 35% part come in? Are we supposed to believe that Google will set up a bookstore and AUTOMATICALLY a huge chunk of Amazon customers will just flock to Google? As long as Google doesn’t block Amazon’s Kindle app from Android devices (wouldn’t THAT be ironic?) I don’t see why anyone would choose Google’s bookstore over Amazon’s anytime soon.

Last, does anyone remember back in the good old days, when Google claimed it was scanning all those books to promote the free spread of information? They were creating a digital library, so people could read whatever they wanted for free. Google was so nice, after all. It would never do evil.

Now they’re setting up a bookstore for profit. Which would be just fine. It really would. But once Google Books goes live, and you do a search on an author or a book title, what are the chances that the first link that pops up is going to be an Amazon link?

Keep tainting those search results, Google.

> So this latest report, in which Gene apparently just polled the families living on his block, seems beyond disingenuous. The margin of error on a group of 65 people is so high that it makes the results of the iPad vs. Galaxy Tab study all but meaningless, and further demonstrates the insidious, dangerous power of some analysts and their fantasy football stock manipulations. The moral of the story? Next time you see the names Gene and Munster in the same sentence, don’t just take the news with a grain of salt — use the whole shaker. This is what I mean by lazy statistics. Topolsky was absolutely right to point out this incredibly dubious poll by Gene Munster. It’s far from the first time this particular analyst has pulled stats out of his behind, too. But several other news agencies are repeating this statistic as if it were established fact.

Readers of my blog will no doubt know that I personally prefer the iPad to any Android device. But I don’t need a fake poll to reinforce that notion.

The moral, once again, is be wary whenever you hear someone citing ANY poll—even the ones that support what you already believe to be true. Especially those that reinforce your already established beliefs, in fact. Ask the important follow-up questions. Who conducted the poll? Whom did the poll ask? What was the poll question? Etc.

Personally, I think if you did a real poll asking a true sample of people which device they prefer, the iPad or the Galaxy Tab, 85% of the respondents would most likely say “What’s a Galaxy Tab?”

But no one is conducting that poll.

> Frankly, you would think that an audience in New York, at the 92nd Street Y, would be interested in hearing about art and artists,” Ms. Solomon added in an e-mail. “I had no idea that the Y programmers wanted me to talk to Steve instead on what it’s like to host the Oscars or appear in ‘It’s Complicated’ with Alec Baldwin. I think the Y, which is supposedly a champion of the arts, has behaved very crassly and is reinforcing the most philistine aspects of a culture that values celebrity and award shows over art. Wow. Is New York starting to become infected with the stupid virus, too? You can call Solomon and Steve Martin snobs if you want; I think they have a good point. The man just wrote a book about art. Usually, you go to hear a guy talk, you want to hear about his latest work. He’s on a speaking tour because he wants to promote his new book. The fact that the 92nd Street Y publicly humiliated them to score cheap points with its idiot audience is not a good sign.

What respected presenter is going to want to speak there after this? One thing a venue should NEVER, EVER do is betray its performers. That’s a hard rule you don’t ever want to break. You have a problem with the people you hired to perform, you smile, keep your mouth shut, and then you never ask them back. It’s that simple. If individuals in the audience complain, quietly offer those individuals a refund. Sending out a public email and refunding everyone is even insulting to the audience members who were enjoying the talk before you butted in and told them they should be asking about Alec Baldwin movies.

We saw a similar example of this earlier this year, when the TED organization “apologized” for Sarah Silverman’s presentation. Immensely disappointing to see that. I didn’t even particularly like her presentation, but I was appalled by how the organization reacted. Don’t hire a comedian and then tell the audience that you didn’t find her funny. That just makes you look like an idiot and a Benedict Arnold.

I’m sure the 92nd Street Y can get Britney Spears for next Saturday’s lecture.

I try to hold out hope that America still has some people who value ideas and who want to be challenged a little. I think there are plenty of us all over the country, but more and more the ignorant majority is bullying us into submission. We run to places like New York and San Francisco precisely to find shelter from this mentality.

“What it was like to host the oscars?” You have to be kidding me.