At a country club just off the M25 some of the biggest noises in the new media world are gathering to share big thoughts about the future.

YouTube founder on web videoSend your feedback Watch in the News Player

In the car park, Porsches and Mercedes rub shoulders with Range Rovers and, inside, the founders of YouTube and Bebo mingle with the bosses of Orange, BSkyB and Google.

It is Google that has brought all these powerful people together. It is a measure of the respect - and fear - that the megalith of the new media world inspires that it can summon such a collection of movers and shakers to Hertfordshire.

They are spending two days debating everything from serial entrepreneurship to new technology in the developing world. But just as importantly they are here to network.

Next big thing

In one corner, Environment Secretary David Miliband is updating his blog after addressing the conference.

In another, lastminute.com founder Brent Hoberman - a veteran of the first dotcom bubble - is chatting to Tariq Krim, founder of Netvibes, a web 2.0 start-up.

The event is called Zeitgeist. So what can we learn about the spirit of the times from this gathering?

Well, it's clear that the big old media businesses in attendance - BSkyB, Germany's Axel Springer group and, yes, the BBC - are desperate to work out where the next new idea is going to come from.

So they are very keen to hear what the likes of YouTube co-founder Chad Hurley have to say.

When I catch the jet-lagged video-sharing pioneer and ask him what'll be the next big thing, he laughs and says: "I know, but I can't tell you."

Not surprising really. After all, the big idea he thought up just two years ago has made him unimaginably rich.

Today, he tells the Zeitgeist gathering, six hours of new content is uploaded by YouTube users every single minute, and more than 100 million people are viewing the videos.

The secret to his success? Putting the right technology out there to meet an unfulfilled need - sharing videos online.

"We needed it to be a no-brainer to upload," he explains.

The other innovation was to let users make the decision about what was worth watching.

"We allowed the community to tell us what was entertaining them."

But Chad Hurley is now keen to see traditional media companies using YouTube as a platform.

He seems unfazed by the fact that those old media businesses seem more inclined to sue YouTube rather than play ball. But he can afford to be relaxed after selling the business to Google last year.

Massive server farms

The virtual world of Second Life - and its potential as a marketing tool - is another business which generates a buzz at any new media event.

It is mentioned in just about every presentation at Zeitgeist - despite the fact that its active users are far fewer in number than those playing online games.

But Robin Harper, from Second Life's developer Linden Lab, reveals that many users are now spending 80 hours a week living and working in this virtual world, and last month its economy generated $45 million in real hard cash.

"A virtual world can help you communicate with your customers," she tells the conference.

The most powerful player talking here was Google's own boss Eric Schmidt.

He flew in for a "fireside chat" and revealed that he is worried about the perception that Google is the new Microsoft - but sure that they are very different businesses. "The next movie is not the same as the last movie," he insisted.

He also admitted he was puzzled that nobody had managed to imitate Google's AdSense technology and is convinced that the future is all about mobiles and cloud computing, where all the world's data is stored on massive server farms.

Like everyone else at this conference, Mr Schmidt is betting huge sums on where the web will head next.

But if YouTube is anything to go by, the future is probably being built right now by a couple of young men in a garage.
]]> http://grhomeboy.wordpress.com/?p=9354 Thu, 27 Mar 2008 22:39:49 +0000 grhomeboy http://grhomeboy.wordpress.com/?p=9354 Travel guides to Greece, first published in 1930 by Eleftheroudakis, now reissued in a collector’s set.

  Views of Athens change rapidly, as travel guides published since 2000 demonstrate.

I enjoy reading what people say about my city. Some visitors, like Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek, like what he sees as the city’s “confusion,” while others, like American composer Jonathan Nossiter, who loved the old Zonar’s cafe, see it as a “treasury of aesthetic pleasures.”

Let’s go back to 1930: I’m looking at fresh reprints of the little travel guides that Eleftheroudakis published then. A collector’s set in a handsome box, it could furnish ample material for 10 dissertations.

Tourism had begun in the mid-19 century during the reign of King Otto. But given the lack of infrastructure, Athens remained an exotic destination until the 1960s. However, these guides are written in Greek. Travelers used to come from Alexandria and Istanbul, and other urban centers with Greek communities.

An image comes to mind, the sole aerial photograph in “Neoklassiki architektoniki stin Ellada” (Neoclassical Architecture in Greece), a volume published by Emporiki Bank in 1967. Taken in 1932, the photograph reveals harmony and European style in the tiled roofs of Panepistimiou, Stadiou and Academias streets. That’s the sight that greeted travelers who visited with this guide in hand.

They probably would have dropped in at the Eleftheroudakis bookstore on the corner of Stadiou and Karageorgi Servias streets. Had it not been demolished in 1962, it would have appeared in new guidebooks as a remnant of glorious old urban Europe.

Was it a beautiful city then? Some parts must have been, but the atmosphere in 1930 was unique. Athens not only boasted antiquities and clear air, but also the first sparks of modernism, which Henry Miller noted in “The Colossus of Maroussi.”

As Kevin Andrews pointed out in his perceptive work “Athens” (1967), the harder the city tries to look modern, the more primitive it looks in its essential truth. It’s all relative, of course – the periodical Diaplasi ton Paidon referred on March 18, 1906, to “mediocre neighborhood houses,” which we later idealized – and a guide book is simply a tool.

Related Links > http://www.books.gr

Singer Maria Farandouri, joined by Zacharias Karounis and accompanied by an eight-piece orchestra, will sing at the Athens Concert Hall on Thursday, while actors Eva Kotamanidou and Nikos Bousdoukos will read excerpts at an evening of Greek political poetry set to music. International Poetry Day falls this Friday, March 21, but the celebrations start today.

Stoa tou Vivliou [Books Arcade] and PoeticaNet have put together a lively mix of discussion, poetry set to music and a video, curated by poet Iosif Ventouras. First up are Professors Dimitris Dimiroulos and Elisavet Arseniou, exploring the subject of poetry in the information age. Then the hip-hop group Enemy will present songs from their latest album and collide with living poems. Participants include poet and media artist Dimosthenis Agrafiotis and American poet Heather Raikes, who will talk about her work in a video made for the event. That’s at 8 p.m. today, at the Stoa tou Vivliou, 5 Pesmazoglou Street, Athens, tel 210 3253989.

The European Translation Center (EKEMEL), Ikaros Publishers and Patakis bookstore are saluting International Poetry Day with a presentation of Alexandros Issaris’s book “Kato apo tosa vlefara: Simeioseis gia ton Rilke” (Under So Many Eyelids: Notes on Rilke), published last year by Ikaros. The speakers are literary critic Vangelis Hatzivassileiou, writer Yiannis Efstathiadis and the author, who is also a poet and translator. Actress Mayia Lyberopoulou will read extracts from the book. Tomorrow, Patakis bookstore, 65 Academias Street, Athens, tel 210 3811850, at 7 p.m.

Poems will liven up time spent at bus and tram stops and metro stations and on board public transport as of Wednesday and until April 22. It’s the latest edition of a successful promotion by the National Book Center of Greece (EKEBI). Poet and academic Nasos Vagenas chose the poems and six young students and graduates of the Athens School of Fine Arts produced the colorful posters.

Verses by Nobel laureate Odysseas Elytis feature on a phone card to be issued on International Poetry Day. In a follow-up to another campaign by EKEBI and telecoms provider OTE, there will be a new phone card with different verses every month till December. This year’s selections will be from political poems.

Greek political poetry set to music is the theme of an evening at the Athens Concert Hall on Thursday. Maria Farandouri and Zacharias Karounis, accompanied by an eight-piece orchestra, will sing, and actors Eva Kotamanidou and Nikos Bousdoukos will read. Giorgos Papadakis has selected and orchestrated excerpts from Euripides, as well as pieces by Yiannis Ritsos, Odysseas Elytis, Nikos Gatsos and Iakovos Kambanellis and others, with music by composers such Eleni Karaindrou, Manos Hadjidakis, Mikis Theodorakis and Thanos Mikroutsikos. Vassilis Nikolaidis will conduct.

Poet Nikiforos Vrettakos is the subject of a tribute starting 5.30 p.m. at the Benaki Museum on International Poetry Day. Academics Eratosthennis Kapsomenou, Vincenzo Rotolo, Vangelis Athanassopoulos, poet Titos Patrikios and Vrettakos Archive director Eleni Tzinieri-Tzanetakou will speak, followed by the first public screening of Athanasia Drakopoulou’s film “Periousaka Stihiea” at 8.30 p.m. at the Benaki Museum Pireos Annex, 138 Pireos Street and Andronikou Street, Athens, tel 210 3453111.

An exhibition of first editions, and documents for the Nikiforos Vrettakos Archive opens Friday and runs to April 20 at the main branch of the Benaki Museum, 1 Koumbari Street, Kolonaki, Athens, tel 210 3671000.

Culture Minister Michalis Liapis to speak.

The Benaki Museum, 1 Koumbari Street, Athens, tel 210 3671000.

  A page from Lord Byron’s notebook from his first visit to Greece in 1809. In his speech on Wednesday Pispinis underlined the decisive role that Lord Byron played in shaping European opinion of post-revolutionary Greece.

A very special evening took place at the Greek Embassy in London on Wednesday, at a private viewing of the “Lord Byron and the John Murray Archive” collection. Jointly organized by Greek Ambassador Vassilis Pispinis and Lady Balfour of Burleigh, trustee of the National Library of Scotland and Chairman of the Campaign for the John Murray Archive, the event featured manuscripts written by the hand of, or related to Lord Byron.

The documents are part of the John Murray Archive which has now been acquired by the National Library of Scotland. In his address, Ambassador Pispinis noted: “Lord Byron’s passionate association with Greece is one of the pivotal links which bring together our two countries. The treasures on show this evening bear witness to the poet’s love for Greece, its culture, its language and, especially, its people. These documents also attest to the fact that Byron established a pattern in the relationship between Greece and Britain, which has endured, in peace and war. Through his personality, his genuine interest and his poetry, he also shaped the way his continental contemporaries saw Greece. Before Byron, Europeans looked at Greece almost uniquely from a classical perspective, as an object of antiquity. Byron radically changed that perception. Through his verses he wrote while in Greece, he revealed to the world a picture of a country full of passion and color, still very much alive, a country peopled by contemporary living beings deserving better than the fate which was theirs.”

The private viewing included a notebook belonging to Lord Byron with words and phrases written in Greek, his last diary, “Cephalonia Journal, 1823-1824” as well as an excerpt from his unfinished poem, “Aristomenes, Canto First.”

Once upon a time there were three friends. Actually there were two friends and a couple. Michalis Katzourakis, Freddy Karabot and Agni Katzouraki met in Athens in the late 1950s and left their mark on the golden era of Greek graphic design.

Their posters, for the nascent Greek tourist industry, logos, and advertisements ushered in sweeping changes in the field. Fans of modernism, they introduced a fresh minimalist look that was also very Greek. With direct and indirect allusions to antiquity, the Byzantine tradition and folk art, suffused with humor, they created an internationally recognizable Greek look and were the forerunners of an attractive, modern Greek style.

Their contribution, little known outside their field, is now coming to the attention of a broader public, thanks to a new book «Design Routes» in progress, and an exhibition that will be held at the Benaki Museum early next year.

In 1957, National Technical University of Athens professor Panos Moliotis introduced Karabot, a graduate of Chelsea and St Martin's School of Art in London, to Katzourakis, a graduate of Paul Colin's school of graphic arts in Paris, who had also done a brief stint at Greka, a leading advertising firm. A year later, Karabot recommended Katzourakis to the publicity office of the Greek Tourism Organization (GNTO), where the former was already working.

In 1961, Katzourakis won the second prize at the International Advertising Poster Exhibition in Leghorn in Italy. In July the following year, he rang Karabot and said: «K and K.» This time they had won the first and second prize at Leghorn, among 1,300 posters from 40 countries. Katzourakis took first prize for his poster «Daktyliolithos» and Karabot second for «Greece: Reflections of an Island» both published by GNTO. That year Picasso won a prize in the same exhibition for his poster, «Cote d'Azur».

Soon afterward the pair founded their own promotion and advertising firm, K & K. «Our logo had one K in black and the other in red, so we got along well with everyone,» recalls Karabot. They brought in two more friends as colleagues, Dimitris Tsopelas with vast experience in publishing and graphic arts, and Panayis Kanavos for exhibition and indoor and outdoor installations.

«Our endeavor,» explains Katzourakis, «was to take posters beyond detailed illustration to acquire a vital visual function by linking a spare visual element with a clear message.» They introduced concept to Greek advertising.

At that time terracotta and blue dominated posters on the subject of Greece. «We designed posters with photographs of ancient sculptures in clear, bright colors, using a lot of red which was very daring at the time.»

Also at the time, he explained, there was a lot of personal contact with firms. «We spoke directly to employers, presidents and managers. They had chosen us, they trusted us and we could work with complete freedom. Now, to get a proposal through, it has to go past dozens of people, marketing…»

The initiative for the book came from designer Dimitris Arvanitis, a fervent admirer of the two Greek design gurus. «My involvement in the book was a debt to my roots, our roots. For more than a year I gained experience by observing their approach to every problem of visual communication they had to solve.»

It wasn't easy. Arvanitis had to scour archives for newspaper cuttings, and logos stowed away in files. They look «as fresh as if they had been drawn yesterday,» he notes. «Posters that take your breath away. Difficult work in its simplicity, which remind you that simple isn't easy. I admire their work, much of it done 40 years ago. And I'm amazed at their daring, innovative ideas and designs.» He sees their emergence in the early 1960s as signaling the beginning of the development of design into a new art.

Among the discoveries was Agni Katzouraki: «What I hadn't realized was her talent and separate existence in design. Now that the files and the signatures on the work are being classified, what has been revealed to me is her extraordinary illustrative maturity. Logos, illustrations, books, full of freshness and brilliance, are the maestro's legacy to young graphic artists who must, and I am sure will, soon discover them.»

The venture lasted 13 years. In 1975, Katzourakis bowed out. «By the end, we were signing a packet of letters a day, marketing came into our lives in a big way, and what came out was, after much analysis, often not right» Katzourakis concludes: «We lost our zeal, because up until then we'd been a group of friends who did creative work while having fun». That group left Greece a characteristic trademark that is still recognizable half a century later.

The seventh, and final, volume of the British schoolboy’s adventures, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows", is now available in a Greek translation three months after the release of the original in English. An Ancient Greek translation of the first Harry Potter book was released in 2004 in the UK.

As prices are sky-rocketing even on our own little dry patch, people will inevitably look for innovative solutions to their housing problems. And if you want to stay close to the centre of town, where maybe not all is happening, but at least something more is going on than in the sleepy suburbs, increasingly your sole option will be to go ‘up’.

“So why not a loft?” ask the authors. Why not indeed? “Buying a loft means opting for a form of housing that is full of authentic charm, volume, perspective, light and free space”, they argue, and a quick glance through the magnificent photographs in this volume is persuasion enough.

You may not even have to forego the notion of a garden, they passionately argue, as most lofts have spacious terraces that require far less maintenance than a real garden. If you fancy yourself as a city slicker, you clearly won’t have much gardening time on your hands between working, entertaining and embarking on foreign trips to all the covetable destinations mentioned above.

The only drawback, the Tectum publishing team readily admits, is that lofts are usually located in old industrial or run-down districts that are only just coming back to life. Yes, but that’s why you can afford all that space in the first place, remember?

So back to all that space: it is massive, seamless, exciting to look at. Materials and textures are on a vast scale so they make a huge impact. Clever lighting solutions designate separate areas even when all the rooms run into and out of each other.

Fireplaces, plants, staircases, dining tables, sofas and other furniture take on architectural qualities as they stand alone, statement-like, against vast expanses of white walls and concrete or wooden floors.

Even children’s bedrooms are laid out in the same sparse spirit, and you can just imagine the happy havoc that may be wrought by a three-year-old let loose on a tricycle in a space as generous as this. Ingenious storage solutions, bathrooms and heating systems are also part of the package.

The only thing we might quibble with is the cost. Allegedly in Antwerp, where the publishing company has its headquarters, all these wondrous conversions can be yours, including the fees of a very competent architect, for an average of 600 euros per square metre. Really? So we are living in the wrong place after all.

Loft Concept is published by Tectum and is available from Moufflon Bookshops, Cyprus.

Related Links > http://www.moufflon.com.cy

Alexakis, 63, was born in Athens and came to France at the age of 17. He writes in both Greek and French. In 1995 he won another prize, the Prix Medicis, for his novel "La Langue Maternelle" (Mother Tongue).

"Ap. J.C" tells the story of a young researcher looking into the history of the monks of Mount Athos in northern Greece.

Greece is present at the Frankfurt Book Fair, which started yesterday. The Panhellenic Federation of Publishers and Booksellers (POEB) is representing the Greek book trade with a collective stand, while 13 Greek publishers have their own stands. Speaking to the press last week in Athens, the new administration of POEB explained their policy for promoting Greek books more effectively at book fairs. Instead of simply asking publishers for “books for Frankfurt,” as in the past, POEB’s librarians have made a selection of books that are likely to interest foreign rights buyers. In the future, they will take only books published in the previous 12 months.

The National Book Center of Greece (EKEBI) is using part of the POEB stand at Frankfurt to promote the Thessaloniki Book Fair by actively schmoozing with makers and shakers in the book world.

One strong card that Greek publishers can now play when selling foreign rights is the news that the Culture Ministry’s long moribund program for supporting translations of Greek books has at last been reactivated.

Frankfurt Book Fair, a subsidiary of the German Publishers & Book Sellers’ Association is the world’s largest book fair, attracting more than 7,000 exhibitors from over 100 countries.

Happy Village > SOS Children’s Villages Greece and Starbucks celebrate their fifth anniversaries with the launch of Eugene Trivizas’s latest book “To horio tis haras” [Happy Village], published by Papadopoulos, at Starbucks in Kolonaki on October 17 at 12.20 p.m. Starbucks Coffee, 12 Skoufa Street, Kolonaki, Athens, tel 210 2816134.

Paul Valery > The Paul Valery University of Montpellier, the French Archaeological School of Athens and the European Translation Center (EKEMEL) are holding a two-day international conference on “Paul Valery, Greece, Europe” next week, October 18-19. Valery’s work, which included philosophical dialogues based on the Platonic model, had a deep connection with Greece. Speakers from Greece and abroad will explore Valery’s connections with poetry, modern Greece and Sikelianos. Starting 9.30 a.m. Thursday, and 10 a.m. Friday. French Archaeological School, 6 Didotou Street, Athens, tel 210 3679902-2.

Adventure of writing > Writer Zefi Kolia will appear at the Nikaia Cultural Center at 8 p.m. on October 15 to talk about her books and the adventure of writing. Fellow-writer Christos Christopoulos will read extracts from Kolia’s work. At Nikaia City Hall, 10 P. Tsaldari Street, Nikaia, tel 210 4278100.

Dragon-mania > Theater games will be part of the fun at noon this Saturday at the Evripidis ston Stoa Bookstore, when popular children’s writer Philippos Mandilaras presents his book “Dracomania” (Dragonmania), published by Patakis. At the Evripidis ston Stoa Bookstore, 11 A. Papandreou Avenue, Athens, tel 210 6800647.

The Australian-born scholar of ancient and modern Greek life, literature and music is adjunct associate professor in the departments of classics and comparative literature at Cornell University and works as a freelance writer, poet and translator. Following her studies in Australia, Holst-Warhaft came to Greece, where she worked as a musician and journalist during the 1970s. She also played harpsichord in the orchestras of Mikis Theodorakis, Dionysis Savvopoulos and Mariza Koch.

Koch will be at Ianos bookstore to open the event with a recital of poems she has set to music, while poet Katerina Anghelaki-Rooke and author Iakovos Kampanellis will discuss the book and its author. The event begins at 6 p. m. and attendance is free of charge.

Tomorrow at Eleftheroudakis Bookstore, 17 Panepistimiou Street, Athens, Pascal Bruckner, the prolific French writer of the nouveaux philosophes school, and author of “Temptation of Innocence” and “Bitter Moon”, which was made into a film by Roman Polanski in 1992, will be signing the Greek editions of his books from 5-7 p. m.

Israeli poet Rami Saari will also be in town this week for the presentation of his poetry collection “Under the Feet of the Rain”, published in Greek by Oxy, at Patakis bookstore, 65 Academias Street, Athens, at 7 p. m. tomorrow.

Saari studied and taught Semitic and Uralic languages at the Universities of Helsinki, Budapest and Jerusalem and got his PhD in linguistics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. By January 2006 Saari had published seven books and translated more than 40 books, both prose and poetry, from Albanian, Estonian, Finnish, Greek, Hungarian, Portuguese and Spanish into Hebrew. He has been awarded the Prime Minister’s Prize for Literature twice (1996, 2003), and the Tchernikhovsky Prize for his translations (2006).

On Tuesday, October 9, Benaki Museum Director Angelos Delivorias, writer Philippos Drakontaidis and Athens University professor Giorgos Maniatis will present A-I. D. Metaxas’s new book “Ypainiktika Portreta” (Suggestive Portraits: The Imperceptible Depiction of Authority). The presentation will begin at 8 p. m. at the Benaki Museum, 1 Koumbari Street and Vasilissis Sofias Avenue, Kolonaki, Athens.

I hope for nothing

I am free...

Greek celebrated author Nikos Kazantzakis  (1883-1957)*

Greece's Ministry of Culture has declared Year 2007 as "Nikos Kazantzakis Year". It has also declared 2007 as "Maria Callas Year", "Nikos Engonopoulos Year" and "Dionisios Solomos Year".

Siberia during the Russian Revolution is the setting for James Meek’s latest novel, “The People’s Act of Love,” winner of the 2006 Scottish Arts Council Book of the Year Award and the 2006 Ondaatje Prize.

In that harsh, remote landscape, a singular cast plays out the extremes of human emotion and belief. A Jewish lieutenant in a Czech legion stranded by the fortunes of war, a sect of Christians who seek purity through castration, a woman who flouts convention in the pursuit of love, and a man who claims to have escaped both a prison camp and a would-be cannibal, encounter what the author calls “life’s absolute tests.”

Meek, author of three novels and two collections of short stories, also worked as a reporter for 20 years, winning awards for his articles on places such as Guantanamo Bay and Iraq. He contributes to the Guardian, the London Review of Books and Granta.

Meek is currently visiting Greece as the guest of the British Council and his Greek publishers Ellinika Grammata.

Meet James Meek today at the British Council in Thessaloniki, 9 Ethnikis Amynas Street, at 7.30p.m., and tomorrow in Athens, 17 Kolonaki Square, Kolonaki, at 8 p. m.

Early on in the history of cinema, there were trends and schools of thought that were not always aimed at the same group of people. Just like today, a large chunk of cinematic output is destined for mass urban consumption, while artistically oriented films are doomed to be shown at just a limited number of theaters.

The Premiere Nights Athens International Film Festival, which ends on Sunday, addresses this issue with a tribute to grindhouse. The term does not describe a particular genre of film, but a very specific category of movie theaters that mushroomed throughout the United States in the 1960s and well into the 80s. Nestled in the seedy neighborhoods of America’s cities, grindhouse theaters reflected the faded, filthy death of the glamorous theaters of the 30s and 40s.

The repertory at America’s grindhouse theaters was surprisingly broad: shocking pseudo-documentaries and wannabe snuff movies, topless starlets and hardcore porn, exotic cannibalistic banquets, rioting women’s prisons and Nazi S&M orgies, zombies and bloodsucking beauties, spaghetti westerns and angry nuns. All day and night, prostitutes, junkies, pimps, homeless people, voyeurs or just lonely Joes with a bent for the weird would pay the meager fee and choose these repugnant theaters as shelter to conduct shady deals or as a refuge from demanding spouses and nosy neighbors.

In the Greek equivalent of grindhouse theaters the selection was somewhat more limited: westerns, war movies, thrillers, martial arts adventures and adult movies. The customers, however, were the same, according to Giorgos Lazaridis in his book “Flash Back: A Life of Cinema” (Livanis Publications), who describes Greek grindhouse theaters as “hangouts for bums, professional idlers, improvised shelter for homeless passers-by, schools for thugs, an easy hideaway for truants from every high school in Athens.”

One big difference between Greek and American theaters is that pornographic movies did not make their way into Greek theaters until the early 70s, according to Dimitris Fyssas, who wrote “X-Rated: Programs of Athenian Sex Cinemas” (Delfini Publications). He describes how in the early years, projectionists would simply splice in a few scenes of pornography during the screening of a regular movie, with the audience below knowing very well, and anticipating, what was to come.

Rising property values in downtown areas, the widespread introduction of television and later video players into people’s homes drove most of these movie house owners to despair. In an effort to secure their financial survival, those two three-minute clips became increasingly longer. But the audiences wanted more sex, and mainstream fare was gradually supplanted by a strictly pornographic program.

Grindhouse, or to use the Greek term “laika” or popular, theaters are a thing of the past in Athens, but Fyssas disagrees: “The multiplex, as far as I’m concerned, is a modern version of grindhouse. That’s where you find movies to help you pass the time of day, movies the entire family can enjoy. These are not necessarily my choice of preference, but I have to give them credit for reviving a feeling that was almost lost.”

The natural heirs of laika theaters are those that play X-rated fare only. From 35 theaters in the 1980s, their numbers have now dwindled to five and this is not so paltry if one considers how easy it is to watch these movies at home nowadays. According to a theater owner, the clientele falls into three categories: immigrants, older men and people hoping for more intimate encounters under the cover of darkness.

The Star, on Aghiou Constantinou Street, is the king of its flock. And if it didn’t play pornographic films it would also probably be one of the most popular and charming cinemas in downtown Athens. Designed by Zach Mose, it began as a family theater with an interesting art deco facade, but the decline of the areas in and around Omonia Square in the 1970s left the owner with little choice. At first they played westerns, martial arts adventures and erotic films.

There are another four such cinemas. The Averof on Lykourgou Street is a historical cinema built in the late 1950s. Hard as it may be to imagine today, it used to be a lot like the grand Attikon cinema of Stadiou Street in its heyday, with elegant balconies and boxes. The clientele was exclusively families who knew that the owner always had his eye out for entertaining Greek movies. The Averof’s decline went hand-in-hand with the decline of commercial Greek cinema.

The Cosmopolite, built in the interwar years near Omonia Square, has retained its architectural charm. Paradoxically, the crisis of the 1980s gave birth to two more theaters. The Athinaikon, behind Athens City Hall, was a purpose-built theater, named after another theater with the same name further down that closed. The Orfeo, in Attikis Square, the only cinema of this type that is not in downtown Athens, opened in 2003 in the place of a small manufacturing business.

Related Links > http://www.aiff.gr

As the publishing season opens, there has been a decrease in the amount of Greek fiction, according to statistics from the National Book Center of Greece (EKEBI). It is partly because of an excess of titles in previous years, partly because the big names in the field have recently published books. But it is also due to a preference among Greek publishers for foreign fictions, both classics in new translations and contemporary works. Another factor that plays a part is the rising interest in non-fiction, essays, studies, history and politics.

EKEBI’s figures show that in 2006, even though fiction represented the greatest number of titles, there was a fall of 5.9 percent over 2005 and 2.1 percent over 2001.

Translations represented 44 percent of the total output in 2005 (out of a total of 9,209 titles), but a higher percent of fiction titles. In 2006, for instance, 47.9 percent of fiction titles published in Greece were translations.

In their latest books, many of the leading names in Greek fiction, including Pavlos Matessis, Vassilis Alexakis, Manos Eleftheriou, Dimitris Mingas and Mitsos Kasoulas, have embarked on mystery and detective fiction. Primarily, however, they have focused on the past, the years of childhood and youth, in a journey into self-knowledge.

Few new titles deal with contemporary society and problems. Among newly published writers there is a special interest in urban settings, inner quests, and historical fiction.

Greek publishers offer a broad range of foreign fiction in translation. Apart from new translations of foreign classics, such as Dostoevsky, Celine, Forster, Hemingway, Gorki, Camus, Nabokov, Eliot and Chekhov, there are novels by leading contemporary writers who come to grips with the world and the societies they live in.

Philip Roth’s political fantasy “The Plot Against America” and Jonathan Coe’s portrayal of 1940-50s English society “The Rain Before It Falls” are both published in Greece by Polis. Antonio Tabucchi, John M. Coetzee, Jose Saramago, John Updike, Yasmina Khadra, John Banville and Orhan Kemal are some of the highly regarded writers that Greek publishers have chosen to translate.

Peter Bergsma, Director of Translators’ House Amsterdam, Francoise Cartano, Director of the International College of Literary Translators in Arles, France, and Francoise Wuilmart, Director of the European College of Literary Translators in Seneffe, Belgium, will address the meeting and a discussion will follow. Simultaneous translation will be provided. At the Leonidas Zervas Hall, National Research Center, 48 Vasileos Constantinou Avenue, Athens, at 7 p.m. Information > call EKEMEL at 210 3639350.

New branch > Metaichmio publishers invite you for a drink to celebrate the opening of their new branch in Thessaloniki, at 81 Olympou Street, today from 6-10 p.m. The bookstore will run a series of meetings for primary (Friday) and secondary school teachers (Saturday) to meet the authors of the new schoolbooks and supplementary titles from Metaichmio. For information call 2310 250075.

Launch > Today at 8 p.m. I. Sideris publishers and the Ianos Bookstore present Giorgos Mylonas’s book “www.ELENI-ONEIRA.GR” www.eleni-dreams.gr. Culture Ministry General Secretary Christos Zachopoulous, director Nikos Koundouros and journalist Antonis Prekas will speak, At Ianos Bookstore, 24 Stadiou Street, Athens, tel 210 3217917.

Recycling > On Saturday at 12.30 p.m., at Ianos Bookstore, Costas Magos, author of “Skoupidistan” (Trashville) and “To dasos tis xylinis xystras” (The Forest of the Wooden Sharpener), both published by Patakis, will lead children aged 5-12 and visitors into the magical world of recycling, with constructions made of discarded bottles, plastic and wood. At Ianos Bookstore, 24 Stadiou Street, Athens, tel 210 3217917.

Music and poetry > Celebrate International Tourism Day with music and poetry dedicated to C.P. Cavafy in the Roman Forum today at 9 p.m. RSVP 210 9333522, hatta@hatta.gr.

The Catalan Cinema Institute, an independent company that has made many prize-winning films, television series and theater productions, has a tradition of adapting novels for the screen, including works by Manuel Vazquez Montalban and Eduardo Mendoza. The company likes Mingas’s book for what it saw as a direct, frank account of the rapid political changes that have taken place in Europe over the past 30 years.

Talk about creativity and you are probably bound to wander into arts, crafts, architecture and fashion. Talk about business and you’ll be focusing on numbers, competitors and marketing. If you think the two have nothing in common, then you should probably pay attention and get your hands on Dimis Michaelides’ book, The Art of Innovation, billed as the world’s first management art book. It has been praised as ‘the Bible for 21st century CEOs’ and ‘a book that will inspire change in individuals, teams and organisations.’

“Despite years of academic research on the topic of corporate innovation as well as thousands of books on the subject, there are still too many misconceptions on how to promote innovation in organisations,” says Constantinos Markides of the London Business School in the book’s preface. “Prominent among these is the belief that innovation is all about coming up with new ideas. It’s not. Coming up with new ideas is obviously necessary and important but innovation is much more than that. It’s the implementation of these ideas in the market to satisfy customer needs in an economical way that ultimately creates value.”

The point is that over and above the ability to come up with new ideas, innovative organisations have something else. And it is this ‘something else’ that Michaelides has managed to identify. “Having worked for large organisations such as the World Bank, Zeneca and the Popular Bank Group, lived in Paris, London and Washington, among other places, and been a creativity leader, a consultant and a business speaker, I believe that designing work and life in organisations is an art and the synthesis of the twelve key points in the book is crucial because each one, while important in itself, is incomplete if it stands alone,” he says.

The book is about innovation and how to make it an integral part of an organisation. “In times past, creative ideas and the innovations they generated were the domain of just a small number of exceptional individuals,” says Dimis. “In the business world, it was not until the 20th century that the joys of discovery and profit led to the establishment of research and development departments, dedicated to inventing new products, and marketing departments, devoted to finding new ways of matching products and markets.”

Dimis believes that on the way, we discovered that all human beings are creative and that innovation is as much about R&D and marketing, technology and processes as it is about production and selling, service and operations, data and information, management and motivation.

What is most remarkable about The Art of Innovation as a book is its ability to combine art and business through symbols, quotes and original, high-quality artwork, presented in an eye-catching graphic layout. Colours are abundant and almost every page makes a statement of its own. “There were two reasons as to why I wanted this book to include art,” says Dimis. “First of all, aesthetically, it is pleasing unlike many business books that all focus on text. The way it is structured also means that one can begin reading from any given point without losing the main picture through a very unusual angle and with a very original frame of reference, which we know promotes creative thinking.”

Speaking in more local terms, Dimis explained that innovation is risky and this is an area into which many business in Cyprus do not dare enter. “We are in danger of remaining in a stage of knowledge and analytical thinking, which is something we are taught at university but that’s not all. Innovation can be dangerous, leading to losses, bankruptcy, breakdown and disappointment but it can also be rewarding, leading to profit, progress, joy, efficiency, motivation and wealth,” Dimis explains. “Look at Greek Cypriot Sir Stelios Hadjioannou, the EasyJet entrepreneur! I’m guessing he used innovation!”

The Art of Innovation will be launched on Friday in the presence of Dimis Michaelides, Constantinos Markides and the book’s artist Umit Inatci, whose series of 16 paintings will be exhibited for the first time. Friday September 28, 2007. At 7.30pm. Journalists’ House, 12 RIK Avenue, Nicosia. Tel 22 446090. It is available at all bookshops. Dimis’ company Performa Consulting also provides workshops for companies. info@performa.net or call 22 315930.

The book was first published in 1995 by Kastaniotis and is now in its 51st edition. It has been translated into English and German.

Director Olga Malea’s film “Proti fora nonos” (First Time Godfather) is based on the story “Oi Agioi Pantes” (All Saints), where the California-born eldest son of a political family goes to Crete to act as godfather to the child of a local party cadre and aspiring parliamentary deputy. He becomes a godfather for the first time to show everyone, above all his father, that he is a worthy son. His foreign appearance and shaky Greek, the local customs and the trials he undergoes to prove himself all make for a tragicomic scenes with a political dimension and existential angst.

The film, starring Antonis Kafetzopoulos, Eleni Katsani, Tex Pardue and Giorgos Kimoulis, premieres October 4.

Without any prior relation to the history of tobacco, Camillo Nollas began to shoot the tobacco factories in Agrinio in 2003. The creative process later led him upnorth to towns such as Drama, Kavala and Xanthi. The suite of images that resulted from a long period of work consists the content of the book "Tobacco Factories" published by Kastaniotis Editions. Under the same title, the exhibition in Drama features this work.

It's worth mentioning that Nollas' book is shortlisted for the award for the best photographic book of the year 2007 that is being awarded by this year's Kythera Photographic Encounters, in Kythera island.

Central Library of Drama, 5 Aghias Varvaras Street, Drama, tel 25210 47575.

Related Links >
http://www.dramafilmfestival.gr

http://www.thmphoto.gr

http://www.photokythera.com/pages/english.html

With a new and improved display area featuring circular stalls, the 36th Book Festival will be opening today at its usual spot on the Dionysiou Areopagitou pedestrian walkway in central Athens, at the foothill of the Acropolis. The event is organized by the League of Athens Book Publishers and sponsored by the Ministry of Culture and the City of Athens.

This is the second fair held this year by the organizers, and is dedicated to Maria Callas, Nikos Engonopoulos, Nikos Kazantzakis and Dionysios Solomos. The area dedicated to these artists, however, has been limited to just one stall, where visitors can find posters and other material from the archives of the ERT state broadcasting company. Throughout the duration of the 36th Book Festival, the organizers have also prepared specific displays on Alzheimer’s disease, the urban environment and transport, as well as children’s literature, while they have also set up a special stall, in collaboration with the Greek Mensa society, where visitors can take an IQ test.

There will, however, be very few events held on the sidelines of this year’s Book Festival, such as round-table discussions on literature and writers, with activities limited just to the stall areas.

Nevertheless, from today through September 30, visitors to Dionysiou Areopagitou pedestrian, from the entrance to the Herod Atticus Theater all the way to Thiseion, will find the most recent book releases at around 240 stalls, inviting the public for a stroll that may prove to be as beneficial as it is delightful.

The survey noted that the small size of most enterprises in the business offered flexibility and specialization but also created problems such as reduced liquidity.

The Greek book publishing market is wide open, with larger enterprises in the sector enjoying only limited market share. A total of 730 publishers were active in the Greek market in 2006, up from 374 in 1996. ICAP stressed, however, that larger enterprises were increasingly strengthening their position in the market at the expense of small and medium-size publishers.

Book prices grew by 4.5 percent in the 1995 - 2006 period and the number of new book titles rose by 9.0 percent in 2006 compared with 2005. ICAP said the market's value grew by 8.8 percent in 2005 and by 8.9 percent in 2006.

For much of my adult life my ideal holiday was to load up my Morris Traveller with camping equipment and drive around France. I have some French both in my blood and in my temperament, and it's the country I love best. I usually kept off the péage and stuck to the N roads, because then you can stop to eat in village restaurants, and for sight seeing and walking. "Le camping sauvage" is illegal in France, but in fact nobody really gives a damn, as long as you don't make a mess, don't stay too long, and ask permission if anyone is about. France is much bigger than Britain, and much less densely populated, so it's easier to disappear into the woods and fields, and put up a tent. If the weather gets too appalling, there are plenty of little hotels where one can seek asylum. One of the nicest things to do is have a destination, but to get there and back slowly, so that you have a couple of days al fresco after having spent 10 days in a place like St Remy de Provence, or Arcachon. Back in the 80s my girlfriend Caroline put up with these holidays for a while, and I like to delude myself that she enjoyed them, but there came a time when she said "Please can we do something other than drive around France in the Morris?" and I said "OK, you come up with something."

On the bus from the airport in Cephalonia, the tour guide kept mentioning the earthquake in 1953. It didn't take long to realise that the islanders are still obsessed with that dreadful catastrophe that destroyed all the architecture that they had inherited from the Venetians. By this time I felt that I had come to the end of my Latin American period, because the next volume would have been about a dictator, but lately all the republics, with the exception of Cuba, had suddenly democratised and made the project anachronistically pointless.

It was savagely hot in Cephalonia. Caroline sat with a wet towel wrapped around her head, and I got sunstroke as usual. I quite enjoy the hot and cold shivers, but not the diarrhoea and the stinging. We had hired a motorcycle, and I spent a lot of time riding about just admiring the scenery. It was back then that I realised that Greek communists don't love their country, because they cover even the beauty spots with their hideous red graffiti. I passed a pine marten, squashed in the road, and that gave me the character of Psipsina. I watched a lovely young woman waiting in the cafe next door to ours in the main square of Argostoli, and she became Pelagia. There was a man who herded his goats past our valley every evening, and he became Alekos. The most important thing was hearing that the Italians had invaded during the war, and that in the main they had got on reasonably well with the locals. They had no theories about racial superiority, and the worst thing said about them was that they were chicken thieves. They behaved exactly according to stereotype, which of course means singing, flirting, footballing, and playing guitars, mandolins and accordions. My father was in the Italian campaign, and has the same kind of memories. Cephalonia was already very Italianate anyway; the local music consisting of cantades whose tunes are Italian, but whose words are Greek. The Germans, by contrast, were arbitrary and brutal, and liked to march about to brass bands. The junk shops of Greece are still full of their flugelhorns and tubas. There was only one romance between a German and a Greek on Cephalonia, and she had to leave after the war, but there were plenty of Italian/Greek ones. Since there has always been a literature of romance "across the barricades", it seemed a good idea to add to it.

When I got home I wrote to the Historical and Cultural Museum of Argostoli, which was run by a woman called Helen Cosmetatos. She was so formidable that during the war even the Germans were frightened of her. She sent me a long reading list, and the period of research began. I had had Greek neighbours before I moved to Earlsfield, so I used to pop over to Raynes Park to ask them important things such as "How do you say 'fuck off' in Greek?" Once I had a truly extraordinary stroke of luck when someone turned up at their house who had been in the earthquake.

I immersed myself in everything Greek and Italian. I pillaged Charing Cross Road for old history books and memoirs, I made Greek food, listened to the music, read the writers. I read all of Kazantzakis, for example, and discovered to my amazement that the Greeks had by far the best modern poets and composers. I am still completely in love with them. I bought a superb mandolin in Portugal, and learned to play the things that Corelli would have played. I used to gloat about how much Corelli would have loved that mandolin.

The book was a pleasure to write, and I wrote it at exactly the right time in my life. It has a young man's energy, but the balance of someone on the cusp of middle age. I had recently been able to give up teaching, and was exhilarated by that supreme and longed-for liberation. I had yet to experience any weariness with the literary world, and was full of the wonder of being a published author. Caroline was a complete sweetheart and everything was still going well with us. The book was framed around some hellish events, but when I look at it now it seems to glow with the kind of light that overpowered me when I first went to Cephalonia. It isn't my masterpiece, because that's what the subsequent novel Birds Without Wings is, but it is the book that entirely reconfigured my life. People often irritate me by saying "I loved your book", as if I had never written any other, and they never can remember the title correctly. My favourite is Captain Gorilla's Mandarin.

The ceremony took place along Stassinos Avenue facing the Venetian Walls, close to Nicosia's Eleftheria Square. It was attended by the poet’s family, MPs and many admirers of Montis’ work, which includes, besides poetry, drama and prose. The bronze sculpture is the work of artist Giorgos Mavrogenis and was commissioned by the Photos Photiades Scientific and Cultural Foundation.

Foundation Chairman Photos Photiades, a long-time friend of the poet, announced that an unpublished poem of Montis would be inscribed on an impressive rock in Paphos. "This aged rock set against the nature-blessed sun-kissed land of Aphrodite we considered to be the most fitting and worthy platform for the monument of our great poet," Photiades said in his speech during the unveiling. He explained that Montis had written the poem specifically for the particular landscape. Photiades invited the state to undertake a more active role in promoting the important literary work of Costas Montis in the international sphere, pledging the Foundation’s support in this effort.

In congratulating the Foundation for its initiative to honour Montis, President Papadopoulos said that unveiling a monument to a poet was different from any other ceremony, because "the true poet speaks God’s language and makes every day of the week a Sunday." He said that Montis was a poet who "never bothered words unless he had something to say" and who always struggled to charge them with meaning and transcending significance. He added that Montis was able through his poetry to express not only himself but also his countryman and every man, the unchanging man who loves and suffers by the twists of fortune and is moved by the simple joys of life. "Costas Montis the poet was fortunate enough to write in Greek and unfortunate to need to be translated into foreign languages in order to be recognised and vindicated as a great contemporary poet," the President said.

He dwelt in particular on Montis’ poetry inspired by the freedom struggle of the Cypriot people and on his verses written after the Turkish invasion of the island, which have been put to music and are widely sung. President Papadopoulos concluded by saying that Greek Cypriots would follow Montis’ eternal word so as not to lose their way.

Philologist and author Andreas Pastellas outlined the work of the poet and a choir performed songs based on his lyrics. Speaking on behalf of the family, the poet’s son, Theodoulos Montis, thanked the Leventis Foundation and the Photos Photiades Foundation for the interest they have shown in the work of Costas Montis and expressed the wish that the state would follow suit.