L’exception culturelle: just when you thought it was safe…
Seen from outside France, the country’s “cultural exception” – which protects its art, music and movie industries in trade negotiations – is like a long-running film franchise.
In the new sequel – Exception Culturelle 3D, if you will – Pierre Lescure, author of a government-commissioned report, has given the story a great new twist by suggesting a tax on smartphones, tablets, gaming consoles and e-readers to fund French cultural output. Read more
Oh, @WarrenBuffett, not you too
If you’re on Twitter, you’ll know by now that Warren Buffett is – to quote his first and (at time of writing) his only tweet – “in the house“.
His appearance on the social media service is apparently linked to a Fortune forum in which the Sage of Omaha is due to participate. It has already garnered him (again, at time of writing) 40,000 followers and prompted some Twitter wit from his bridge partner, Bill Gates. Read more
SEC’s ruling won’t make many Facebook friends
The digerati are having fun with the Securities and Exchange Commission’s ruling that US companies can use social media to distribute market-sensitive information such as earnings reports. “Facebook Flap Forces SEC Into 21st Century,” says Forbes.
Not so fast. The US regulator’s decision to drop its inquiry into Reed Hastings, Netflix’s chief executive, who boasted about new viewing figures on his personal Facebook page, is only an incremental advance into the new millennium. It makes sense for the SEC to acknowledge the growing use of social media (I’m guessing more people saw Mr Hastings’ Facebook post than have viewed any regulatory announcement in corporate history), but I don’t think the decision will prompt fearful CEOs to tweet their earnings much more than they do already – and, even if it does, it won’t make much difference to investors. Read more
Pascal Soriot, AstraZeneca’s new chief executive, has just laid out a new strategy to “focus, accelerate and transform” the pharmaceutical company. Mark Thompson, newly arrived at the helm of The New York Times Company, has promised to “concentrate [the group’s] strategic focus” on the core business, putting The Boston Globe up for sale and rebranding the venerable International Herald Tribune. Read more
Infuriated by Fleet Street’s tabloids, the House of Lords this week nodded through a law to curb the British press. It authorised a Royal Charter that defines how self-regulation will work after the Leveson inquiry into phone hacking. Read more
And the Oscar goes to … crowd-funded films
Sean Fine and Andrea Nix Fine won Oscar for best documentary short. Getty Images
This Oscars had many surprises, including the winner of the best actress award tripping over her dress on the way to collect it. But one interesting innovation was that for the first time, an Oscar went to a crowd-funded film.
Inocente, winner of the best short documentary award, was funded through Kickstarter, the crowd-funding platform on which creative projects solicit donations. The film raised $52,527 in this way.
Inocente was one of three Kickstarter-funded films nominated for Oscars this year, all in the low-cost short film categories. Read more
Greetings from Davos, the annual shindig of world leaders and chief executives in a valley by a Swiss mountain. Or perhaps the site of a global conspiracy of the power elite. Or perhaps the place where a Swiss professor imposes his quaint euro-views on “stakeholder capitalism” on US corporations. Or perhaps one giant cocktail party. Read more
Sony ends Japanese takeover of US economy
Sony sells its New York HQ. Getty Images
Sony’s sale of its New York headquarters, 550 Madison Avenue, is one of those moments that have deep symbolism, whatever the substance. It is a neat reversal of Mitsubishi Estate’s purchase of the Rockefeller Center in 1989, which led to an outbreak of concern that the US had lost its edge.
The second event that promoted the idea that the surging Japanese economy was enabling a US takeover was Sony’s purchase of Columbia Pictures in the same year, for $3.4bn. Sony still owns the Hollywood studio, although its problems with its electronics operations have weighed the whole down. Read more
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John Gapper is an associate editor and the chief business commentator of the FT.
He has worked for the FT since 1987, covering labour relations, banking and the media. He is co-author, with Nicholas Denton, of 'All That Glitters', an account of the collapse of Barings in 1995.
Andrew Hill is an associate editor and the management editor of the FT. He is a former City editor, financial editor, comment and analysis editor, New York bureau chief, foreign news editor and correspondent in Brussels and Milan.
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