The Dot Org Blowback: Pressure is mounting regarding the commercial sale of the .org domains. Here is an article about protesters in Los Angeles directed at the ICANN Board. As mentioned in last month’s ‘Maiden Voyages’, such a sale would be a blow against freedom of speech as corporate interests tend to minimize costs and hassle by appealing to the lowest common denominator of public sensibility.
An Ironic Blow for Victims of Child Sexual Abuse: Readers are probably aware of the UK police’s interest in the Debbie Dreschler images posted on Pigtails. Clearly these images were not meant as titillation but a way of expressing a kind of terror these children have experienced. But now even written descriptions of this trauma is being treated as child pornography as in the prosecution of Quebec author Yvan Godbout. This is nowhere near where we should be drawing a line in the sand!
Parenting in the Spotlight: The problem with being a celebrity is that every little thing you do is noticed and commented on. Parents are especially vulnerable since they, like almost any parent, are proud of their children and want to show them off. This time it is Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and an image of his 2-year-old Jasmine posted on Instagram. There is also a sweet story about Jasmine celebrating her 4th birthday.
Street Muse: An associate sent me a couple of videos of a young girl violinist named Karolina Protsenko. In order to promote her albums, she does street performances of her cover songs (for example, here and here) and posts them on her YouTube Channel. Although her smile is certainly a requisite part of her performance, it is moving in its warmth and authenticity.
No Longer Sheepish: Pip forwarded an interesting article about Najiah Knight, a now 13-year-old bull rider.
The Highest Form of Flattery: They say imitation is the highest form of flattery. For a while, an article about Graham Ovenden has been in the works to be published in Alice Lovers Magazine (Issue #4). For the most part, it is a reprint of the article I wrote a few years ago along with some revisions.
Those of you who found Karolina Protsenko’s performances charming have probably found some of her other videos. One of my associates followed up with a couple more items about the girl.
Here are links to more of her videos: Never Enough and footage of her playing for a squirrel!
Financial contributions can be made to her PayPal account.
You can get her music at iTunes, Spotify, Amazon or Google Play.
You can get her music sheets at musicnotes.com and her merchandise and teespring.com.
She also participates in social media outlets Instagram and Facebook.