VideoMay 31, 2009Win in China screening - Tuesday in NYCReminder (earlier notice here): If you're in New York this Tuesday evening, June 2, consider checking out the screening at the Asia Society of a new documentary on the Chinese reality TV show for budding entrepreneurs, Win in China. Screening details here; my 2007 article about the show here.  March 15, 2009For the Netflix list: 'Smartest Guys in the Room'In case you missed this the first time around (as I did), highly recommended: Alex Gibney's 2005 documentary on Enron, The Smartest Guys in the Room. Apart from its original, intrinsic interest in telling the sordid tale of Skilling, Fastow, Lay, et al, the film has surprising new resonance now.On the one hand, the sums involved in this previous-world-record-scandal now seem quaintly small. Enron was a $60 billion (or whatever) corporation that went bust. Ooooooohh, say it isn't so! That is practically a rounding-error financial disaster now, except when achieved by a single person like Madoff. But the fundamental dynamics of the fraud are very, very similar to what we've heard about from a dozen other institutions in the past year. And -- the part that really got my attention -- the second-tier villains in the Enron story, the enablers and blind-eye-turners for the active fraud Enron had underway, included many that have emerged in full villainy since then, Merrill Lynch, Citibank, and boosterish business journalists prominent among them. Also: if you happened to be living in California during the Enron-intensified Worth seeing a first time -- or a second or third, with the new eyes of 2009. Alex Gibney, the director, is known to the world as last-year's Oscar winner for Taxi to the Dark Side and within the Atlantic as the brother of our colleague James Gibney. January 28, 2009A project I'm proud ofAttentive viewers of this site and readers of the latest issue of the magazine will have noticed ads for a new series of DVD's called On the Frontlines: Doing Business in China. Here is the back story. I have a certain forelock-tugging reluctance to sell, sell, sell when it comes to my own personal products and projects. Just ask my publishers! But about team efforts I feel no such diffidence. On the contrary: I think this magazine is great, and I'll say so as often as I can to anyone I can. And I think that this video series, which is the product of many peoples' labor and creativity, is very, very good and worth a serious look.
A video journalist named Bob Schapiro, with his associates Dovar Chen and others, had worked for years getting on-camera interviews with many Chinese officials, industrialists, workers, analysts, etc about the current situation of the country. About two years ago I met them in Shanghai, when they were continuing their reporting and I was one of their B-roll interviewees. Later, as they put the series together, I saw some of the early cuts and was genuinely impressed with what they'd been able to see and record and present on screen. I happily accepted an offer to be involved in further shaping of the series and to be one of the on-camera hosts (along with the young journalist and performer Emily Chang). Joe Nocera, my long-time friend from the Washington Monthly and Texas Monthly who is now the king of the business journalists, eventually joined the project to provide talk-show type analysis after each segment, in on-camera discussions with me. What I particularly like about the series is that it shows people, places, and things -- inside factories, inside Chinese companies, workers from remote areas -- that are hard for most Westerners to see, and that finally leave a different impression if you actually see them as opposed to reading about them (even in the best magazines). It also shows you a little bit of the hosts: mainly, you're seeing real Chinese people in action. This is very much a team effort. I'll have more to say about it periodically. The Atlantic is a partner in presenting it, and I have the same enthusiasm for it as for other projects under our label. The main site is here; a few previews and trailers are here. If you enter a "member code" Atl-Fallows there is a $50 discount. What a deal! Seriously, I learned things about parts of China I hadn't seen by working on the project, and I think others will find it informative too. December 6, 2008Non-politics, non-tech, non-China: Istanbul!Twice during our past two and a half years of living in China, my wife and I have made vacation trips to Turkey. I had not been before and now really regret that fact.My brief travel article in the new issue of the Atlantic, here, offers a vignette that may convey part of what I found so intriguing about Istanbul. This slide show, with the Atlantic's slickest new video-effect tools by Jennie Rothenberg Gritz, has more of the Ottoman empire look. Go see for yourself -- I mean, not just via the articles but with a trip to Turkey. 
August 22, 2008Media note (updated)Late Thursday night, Beijing time, I did an interview about the Olympics for the Lehrer News Hour show that I think will be shown early Thursday night US time. This was foreign-correspondentry from Ye Olden Days: hearing a question over the telephone, carefully putting down the telephone so it's out of camera frame, and then answering the question into the camera -- and those recorded answers being FTPd to the US to be spliced with the questions. OK, semi-olden days. Basic theme: Zhongguo Jia You! Aoyun Hui Jia You!* Update: Apparently not shown Thursday. Maybe Friday? Que sera sera. ** Updated update: The segment did run on Friday. Info here, with link to streaming video here. October 19, 2007Media watch: C-Span Sunday morningYou've heard about the gala feature-packed 150th Anniversary issue of the Atlantic Monthly! See it discussed, in real time and with exciting viewer call-ins, on C-Span's Washington Journal this coming Sunday morning, Oct 21, 9:15-10 am. (Assuming I can get up by then.) October 17, 2007More Google Zeitgeist on YouTubeIt turns out that quite a few sessions from last week's "Google Zeitgeist" conference are available via YouTube, here. The session that starts up when you hit that page is a conversation between Tom Brokaw, of NBC, and his friend Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia and very much a non-digital-age guy. (Chouinard says that his fingers have never touched a keyboard.) Clip starts with a brief setup of their discussion, by me. The other interviews and clips are linked from that page. October 16, 2007What I was doing last week: interview with Larry Page and Sergey BrinThe Google founders, at the "Zeitgeist 2007" conference on the Google campus: July 6, 2007Video link: Lehrer News Hour interview about ShenzhenJust before leaving China last month, I showed up in the pre-dawn haze (referring to my state of mind, not the weather) at the Shanghai Media Group TV studios for an interview with Jeff Brown, of the Lehrer News Hour, about the nature of Chinese factory life. Streaming video is here; RealAudio here; MP3 here; transcript here. March 28, 2007Colbert interview linksHere is the main index page for recent Colbert interviews, and here is a direct link to the one I did with him (or he did on me, or whatever) last night. Another direct link: here. March 16, 2007Improbable but true: Colbert Report appearance March 27Or at least, improbable but currently scheduled. First trip to the US in six months coming up soon. If current plans hold, it will include an appearance on the Colbert Report on March 27. We'll see. I just hope that my latest unfortunate made-in-China haircut, an unintended Tintin-style (but for the middle aged) fauxhawk has come closer to growing out by then. November 15, 2006China slideshow at the Atlantic, plus SlateA narration of daily life in Shanghai and Beijing here, at the Atlantic's site. Of course accompanied by my wife Deb's "Diarist" this week in Slate. October 22, 2006Interview with Sir Richard Dearlove at AspenSir Richard Dearlove was the former head of British secret intelligence, and a central figure in the famed "Downing Street Memorandum," reporting eons before Bob Woodward that the intelligence had been "fixed" for the plan to invade Iraq. Here is a .WMV file of my interview with him and Shashi Tharoor at Aspen. It is notable especially for his argument about why the U.S. was destroying itself by cutting legal and ethical corners in the Global War on Terror -- as described at the time here. October 21, 2006Interview with Bill Clinton at AspenThis was at the "Aspen Ideas Festival," co-sponsored by the Atlantic, in July. Hour-long video, availabile in MP3 here and in a variety of other formats here (at bottom of page). It was the interview I described on the Atlantic's Aspen blog. Interview with Michael Dell at Google ZeitgeistDell has released a video of the interview I conducted with its founder and CEO at Google's recent Zeitgeist conference, here. My main personal impressions of him: mensch-like, good sense of humor, and although he traveled with what appear to be bodyguards, much less air of a big shot than a lot of other big shots. April 19, 2006Guest Hosting on the Charlie Rose Show - Tom FriedmanTom Friedman of the New York Times with Guest Host James Fallows of The Atlantic Monthly. Charlie Rose show, April 19, 2006. On Google Video. March 31, 2006Guest Hosting on the Charlie Rose Show - IraqGuest Host James Fallows talks about lessons learned in Vietnam and the U.S. Military strategy with Lt. Col. John Nagl, U.S. Army Lt. Col. Lewis Sorley, U.S. Army (Retired) Lt. Col. Conrad Crane, U.S. Army (Retired) on the Charlie Rose Show. (On Google Video.) July 4, 2005UC Berkeley ConversationsJim Fallows, National Correspondent of The Atlantic Monthly, joins Conversations host Harry Kreisler for a discussion of foreign policy decisions in the administration of President George W. Bush. Fallows talks about the factors shaping the choices made, the resulting opportunity costs, and alternative strategies in the war on terrorism. (On Google Video.) September 30, 2004Iraq, Osama, and the Global War on TerrorJames Fallows and Peter Bergen dissect the Bush Administrations approach to Global War on Terror in a 2004 panel for the New America Foundation. (On Google Video.) |
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