Bridge Pavilion | courtesy of Zaha Hadid Architects
How can newspapers boost both print and digital advertising? How can they monetize their Web sites? Are search engines friends or foes? The 1,500 media reps attending the four-day World Newspaper Congress will reckon with such tough questions, gathering in the homeland of the world's oldest continuously published paper, Post- och Inrikes Tidningar (Post & Domestic News-paper) -- which went online-only in 2007, after 362 years in print. As Tim Bowdler, CEO of Britain's Johnston Press and a congress headliner, says, "The opportunities lie in the very threats that confront us." -- Clay Dillow
tuesday, june 3
Worry
OECD Forum 2008
Paris
If you're looking for comic relief from the world's woes, you might want to skip the annual forum of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. The OECD -- a think tank funded by the world's 30 richest countries -- will entertain 1,000-plus business and political leaders with doomy-gloomy discussions on the faltering economy and market turmoil. Expect humor-free speeches from WTO honcho Pascal Lamy and European Central Bank boss Jean-Claude Trichet. -- TB
tuesday, june 3
Read
Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior
By Ori Brafman and Rom Brafman
Why would a game-show audience intentionally mislead a contestant? And why shouldn't you pay your friend for a favor? Sway has the answers. In this engaging journey through the workings -- and failings -- of the mind, the Brafman brothers use captivating characters, from a violin virtuoso to a Florida football coach, to explain the forces that derail rational thinking and suggest how to avoid being swayed. Their stories of senselessness -- including one about a Harvard business student who paid $204 for a $20 bill -- are as fascinating as the lessons we learn from them. -- Bianca Bosker
tuesday, june 3
Read More
Why the Dalai Lama Matters
By Robert Thurman
The eve of the 19th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests brings this timely and passionate essay from Robert Thurman, a Columbia professor, former Tibetan Buddhist monk, and father of the famous Uma. He makes the business case for developing a semiautonomous Tibet as not only an exclusive, Bhutan-like tourist destination and eco-preserve but also a Switzerland of Asia. He envisions it as a global finance center, with its own privacy laws, that would help free the flow of foreign investment on the continent. However utopian, Thurman is compelling on the point that a radical about-face on human rights is a prerequisite for China to grow into its role as a 21st-century superpower -- a point that has been made in the Olympics-related protests. "Tibet's problem is China's problem and Asia's problem," he writes, "and therefore our global, individual problem -- yours and mine." -- Anya Kamenetz
wednesday, june 4
Brainstorm
World Economic Forum on Africa
Cape Town, South Africa
Every year, the World Economic Forum holds a powwow focused on Africa, and every year, it's in Cape Town. Beautiful as the city may be, you have to wonder whether that's the only place in Africa to which the hundreds of attendees -- CEOs, ministers and heads of government, academics, assorted members of entourages -- will go. This year's theme, "Capitalizing on Opportunity," suggests the opportunity is for Africans. In reality, it's marketers and investors from outside the continent who seem most eager to capitalize on the potential of a region where economic growth has exceeded 5% for four years running. In a sign of that enthusiasm, two of the meeting's cochairs are E. Neville Isdell, CEO of
thursday, june 5
Green
World Environment Day
Cape Town, South Africa
It's a little ironic that far-off New Zealand is this year's host of the UN's rotating symposium on environmental issues. The 2008 theme is "Kick the CO2 Habit! Toward a Low-Carbon Economy," but the long airplane flight to Kiwi-land is probably as carbon unneutral as it gets. Save the airfare and the emissions: We suggest you jump-start your celebration of World Environment Day by staying home instead. The day will be marked in more than 100 countries with local rallies, tree plantings, art exhibits, lectures, cleanup campaigns, and concerts.-- Kate Rockwood
friday, june 6
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Wal-Mart annual Shareholders Meeting
Fayetteville, Arkansas
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