I know I just did a roundup of some of the interesting discussions surrounding the Convergence Culture Consortium, but I have to double back around and point you all toward a few new conversations that have caught my eye this week. With the somewhat heated discussion that has occurred over on Grant McCracken's blog with Chris Anderson, coupled with C3 alum Ivan Askwith's latest appearance in Slate, there's been plenty to cover.
First, though, from C3 Consulting Researcher Aswin Punathambekar: a great piece detailing one of the earliest examples of the convergence of film and television in Bombay cinema.
Punathambekar writes about Showtheme!, a popular television program that served as one of the earliest examples of sponsored programming on Doordarshan using film content by using popular film scenes and songs built around a particular weekly theme. The piece is primarily a recording of the reflections of Manjoo Singh, who was host of the show.
Meanwhile, Ivan Askwith, who is now with Big Spaceship, wrote < ahref="http://www.slate.com/id/2176117/">a piece in Slate which was posted earlier this afternoon, entitled "Apple vs. Everyone." In it, Askwith points out three potential outcomes to the current standoff between Apple and the networks.
Finally, a debate that has gotten very interesting over at Grant McCracken's blog between McCracken and Wired's Chris Anderson, proponent of the Long Tail. The discussion starts here, with Anderson responding to McCracken's post in the comments. The followup is here and here.
I point to the series both because of some fascinating conversation about the adequacy of the Long Tail (and, now that I've written that, I realize that there are not-so-phallic undertones to that statement I didn't originally intend), but also a discussion about critical discourse and the nature of rhetoric in debate amongst scholars and critics, in the new landscape of the blogosphere.
