I just learned today that Laura Ziskin passed away a few weeks ago. I was really saddened to learn that her fight with cancer came to an end this way. Laura was among the warmest and most impressive people I have ever met. She was always there for the OneVoice Movement, she was always there as a professional, she was always there as a truly warm human being. On behalf of the OneVoice Movement, we will be planting a tree in her honor in Israel, and we will commemorate her during an official delegation of OneVoice leaders to the Mideast on the last week of October.
Here are a couple of links to obituaries – in The New York Times, in the Guardian, and in the LA Times – that share some of Laura’s professional accomplishments as producer of all the Spider-man movies and other blockbusters like Pretty Woman and the Oscar contender As Good as It Gets.
But no words can in any way appropriately express the humanity and elegance that characterized everything Laura did.
Promising Poll Shows Common Ground
Published under Mideast Negotiations, OneVoice Movement, United States Aug 03, 2011A recent Gallup poll announced in Haaretz shows that 81% of Muslim Americans and 78% of Jewish Americans are aligned in wanting an independent Palestinian state to coexist with an Israeli state, showing that there is support in American communities for a two-state solution.
Spotted by Daniel Lubetzky, by Adeena Schlussel
Two years ago, an unlikely winner was selected to receive the King Faisal International Prize in Medicine, often referred to as the “Arab Nobel Prize.” As the Haaretz article conveys, Stanford Professor, Ronald Levy, is an American Jew married to an Israeli woman, and did not expect to have much chance in the competition. Upon winning the prize, Levy and his family (with their Israeli passports) were flown to Saudi Arabia to have dinner with Saudi King Abdullah where they were met with royal treatment. This story is a beautiful depiction of humans appreciating each other despite their divergent backgrounds and shows how much progress can be made when differences is are overlooked.
Spotted by Daniel Lubetzky, by Adeena Schlussel
“I am neither an optimist nor pessimist, but a possibilist.”
– Max Lerner
The Revolutionary Future of Printing
Published under Innovation, Science and Technology Jul 25, 2011Check out this amazing video that showcases 3D printing technology:
I believe in luck: how else can you explain the success of those you dislike?
-Jean Cocteau
Energetic Vitamin Water Ad
Published under Advertising (good vs misleading), Innovation Jul 18, 2011Vitamin Water is running a creative ad campaign that is bursting with energy. Situated at bus stops across the country, Vitamin Water ads contain USB ports in which people can charge their phones while waiting for the bus. The ad sends a clear message: Vitamin Water is your source for all of your energy needs.
By Adeena Schlussel, spotted by Daniel Lubetzky.
Although this product claims to be sugar free, it has corn syrup as its third ingredient, after water and palm oil (along with many other artificial sweeteners). Because of the way regulations are, the small amount of corn syrup contained in this product can legally be disregarded, making the product “sugar free.” Although this is technically legal, it is dishonest, unethical and and perversion of the law. To advertise this corn-based sweetener which adds sugar to drinks as “sugar free,” is silly.
It is so perplexing that some people care only about power and zero about what positive things they could do with that power.
I am increasingly repulsed by the News Corp organization and think it represents everything that is wrong with our world. It is less its FOX News channel ultra-conservatism than its sensationalist irresponsible news outlets; from the way they exploit people with all their tabloids and the whole ordeal of hacking phones of missing children (http://nyti.ms/ncfID8), to the way they libel people (like calling the woman who sued DSK a prostitute in the NY Post, who is now suing them, http://nyti.ms/rjJG9C) or, prior to turning tables, attacking all French people with embarrassing stereotypes when they were indicting Strauss-Kahn.
I am so perplexed and people that just seem to have no values or morals and accumulate wealth and power as if that is the end, rather than the means to a more productive end.