culture
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Report: Dr. Dre to Sell Beats Electronics to Apple
Tech giant Apple is in negotiations to buy Beats Electronics—the company founded by rapper Dr. Dre and record producer Jimmy Iovine that produces the über-popular Beats by Dre headphones—for $3.2 billion, according to several reports. Reports from the Financial Times, Bloomberg, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal all confirm the negotiations, and…
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93-Year-Old Woman Shot Dead by Texas Police
Residents of the small town of Hearne, Texas, are demanding the immediate firing of a police officer who shot and killed a 93-year-old woman. Authorities say Officer Stephen Stem shot 93-year-old Pearlie Golden on Tuesday after responding to a call from her nephew that Golden was threatening him with a gun, KBTX-TV reports. According to…
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Nigeria Offers $310,000 Reward for Return of Girls Feared Taken Across Border
Nigeria’s government is offering about $310,000 for information leading to the return of more than 200 schoolgirls abducted by Islamist militants as the country acknowledges increased international assistance to help find the girls, CNN reports. During a World Economic Forum speech Thursday, President Goodluck Jonathan opined that the global outcry inspired by the kidnappings would be the…
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Downbeat Diplomacy for Black Musicians at International Jazz Day
During the grand finale of the third annual International Jazz Day concert—held last week in Osaka, Japan—more than 35 jazz musicians stretched across an elaborate stage in Osaka Castle Park and performed John Lennon’s 1971 anthem, “Imagine.” Most of them hailed from the U.S., but the lineup also included the South African guitarist and singer…
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Why We Need More Black Women as News Decision-Makers
Juxtaposed with news coverage in recent weeks about the horrifying abduction of hundreds of Nigerian schoolgirls is the sheer volume of national media attention devoted to Donald Sterling’s garden-variety racist rants—a positioning that seems, frankly, absurd. The girls’ story is thankfully starting to get traction, but too often in mainstream media, coverage of critical news…
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Global Citizens Are Driving the Search for Nigeria’s Abducted Girls
With the kidnapping of Nigerian schoolgirls dominating the headlines, what has gone largely unnoticed is that some of the world’s most powerful women in fields such as media, business, fashion and politics recently convened in Nigeria for a conference intended to empower global leaders. Attendees and speakers at the third annual WIE Africa Symposium (“WIE” stands for…
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Maryland Teenager Raped in High School
A 17-year-old high school student was arrested and charged with raping his 15-year-old schoolmate in the hallway of their Salisbury, Md., high school during classes, CBS News reports. According to the news site, Jocori Scarborough was taken into custody on Tuesday but was released later after posting $100,000 bail. The preliminary hearing is scheduled for…
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Arson Suspected at Ex-Tennis Pro James Blake’s Florida Home; 4 Dead
The bodies of a family of four were uncovered Wednesday in a Florida home that was being rented out by former pro tennis player James Blake, CNN reports. The two adults and two teenagers were found in their three respective bedrooms—but identifying the group will take several days. Two of the dead had trauma to…
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Do We Really Want Another Sterling as a Clippers Owner?
If the NBA really wants to get tough on racism and dish out lifetime bans and make a stand against bigotry, then the only recourse it has is to move the franchise out of Sterling control—and not just Donald Sterling’s but the entire Sterling clan’s. On Thursday his wife, Shelly Sterling, announced that she wants to take…
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Monica Lewinsky in Vanity Fair: The 5 Most Fascinating Revelations
I’m a nerd and a journalist. Even if I were not the latter, I would still be the former, and that means, even if I were not writing this story for publication, I still would have cut my Wednesday night short to sit not so patiently until midnight with my iPhone, waiting for Vanity Fair…