Seabiscuit (2003)

Engaging 2003 film based on the true story of Seabiscuit, an unlikely racehorse winner in 1930s' US. Jeff Bridges plays the owner, Tobey (Spider-Man) Maguire the irrepressible jinja jockey, Red Pollard, and Chris Cooper the quiet but effective trainer.

Rich colours throughout and an equally rich, piano-based soundtrack from Randy Newman. IMDB 7.4/10

Paywall @ The Times

John Gapper in the FT (registration required) seems to doubt whether Murdoch's heart will be in the paywall that he's putting up next month around The Times and The Sunday Times:

'Radically reducing the readership, becoming more specialist and charging more for news than his rivals is not his style. Yet that is the logic of charging for online access to The Times and Sunday Times; having marched them downmarket, he must march them up again.

...Mr Murdoch’s News Corp estimates that the marginal revenue from an occasional browser is less than one tenth of a penny a year. Even Group M, the media buying agency of WPP, the advertising group, argues in a research note that the bulk of news surfers are “useless tourists” who not only pay nothing but have little advertising potential.

“Free distribution of premium content is like eating your babies. You will give value away until you go bust,” writes Group M. It suggests avoiding a “permanent oversupply of digital inventory” on the open web by using a paywall to “lift the publisher out of remnant inventory and restore a much smaller but aggregated audience.”

The Times and The Sunday Times are right to try it – there is little alternative – but success depends on consumers finding sufficient value behind the wall. The irony is that Mr Murdoch has broadened the intended audience of his titles so heavily over the past three decades that it is not obvious they will.

Business outlets such as the FT and the Journal have a big advantage in charging online because they are business-focused. If general publications are to match them, they must provide, as Stevie Spring, chief executive of Future Publishing, the magazine group, puts it, something “closer to must-have than nice-to-have”.

...He (Murdoch) does, however, know where the money is and there is precious little of it in commoditised online news, given the number of free providers. His heart may not be in it but his head must have figured it out.'

Who will be first to launch the UK version of The Huffington Post?

More Cricket Sledging

Howzat! From The Independent's guide to the best insults in cricket:

Sri Lankan skipper Arjuna Ranatunga (pictured) was not the most popular figure on the international circuit, and was perhaps most unpopular with the Australians (perhaps because he did rather well against them). One occasion, the great spinner Shane Warne was trying to lure the comfortable figure of Ranatunga down the pitch and was being frustrated by Ranatunga's unwillingness to be tempted. Wicketkeeper Ian Healy piped up: "Put a Mars Bar on a good length. That should do it."

Cantanti Camerati @ Sunbury

Sang my first concert with Cantanti Camerati choir @ Sunbury Parish Church in Sunbury-on-Thames last night. Conducted by the eccentric yet redoubtable Geoffrey Bowyer, the Spring Concert performance went a good way to raising the £800 needed to complete the restoration of organ pipes damaged by water over recent years. The organ is surely one of the best in the west of London and it was shown off well by Geoffrey in Fauré's Cantique de Jean Racine and Frank's Panis Angelicus. The unusual programme also included a selection of motets, madrigals, airs, partsongs a glee and solos from the versatile choir members:

William Byrd - Non Nobis Domine

William Byrd - Ave Verum Corpus

Alessandro Scarlati - Exsultate Deo

Thomas Weelkes - In pride of May

John Dowland - Come again! Sweet love doth now invite

Ellis Gibbons - Long Live fair Oriana

Roger Quilter - The pretty birds do sing

arr Arthur Warrell - Roving in the dew

Charles Wood - Music when soft voices die

Sir Edward Elgar - As torrents in summer

Thomas Arne - Which is the properest day to sing 

Anton Bruckner - Locus Iste

Franz Schubert - Hail to the Chief 

Franz Schubert - The Lord is my Shepherd

Peter Rose arr Hugh Frey - Deep purple

Emile Waldteufel - The scent of roses

Sir Charles Stanford - Diaphenia

Solos:

Samuel Liddle - Abide with me

Sir Edward German - She had a letter from her love

Mozart - Bassoon Concert (Andante, Adagio)

Robert Schumann - Du Ring an meinem Finger

Roger Quilter - O mistress mine

Franz Lehar - Vilia (from The Merry Widow)