• How to write about Africa.
• Information Doesn’t Necessarily Want to be Free. Or so argues Robert Levine in his new book Free Ride, a treatise on cultural parasitism — on how technology companies have used cultural content they don’t produce to make money. I’m not sure I agree with all the conclusions in the book review (not everything free is bad or evidence of a cultural wasteland), but I find some of the arguments quite compelling, especially since I’m one of those poor slobs who pays the bills by producing ever-more-poorly remunerated cultural “content.” Plus, the stuff on how Germany has preserved its independent booksellers (by outlawing aggressive discounting by chain bookstores) is pretty damn interesting.
• From the Department of Hollywood Accounting: Philip K. Dick’s family experiencing some crazy movie-industry sci-fi. (@gregorg.)
• Speaking of Hollywood: it desperately needs more ladies. And they need to be not-naked. Behind the camera.
• The East L.A. accent.
• Comparing Time Magazine’s covers in the U.S. and abroad. We are a culture with our head in the sand.
• Art.sy: Applying the Amazon if-you-like-this-you’ll-like-that model to visual art. This should be hilarious. (John Perrault.)
• Using image recognition software to decode graffiti. There seems to be an implication in this story that all graffiti is gang graffiti. C’mon dudes, don’t you know that graff has been co-opted by art school types?
• Owning a dog in Tehran.
• If you live in S.F., Carolee Schneeman is giving a talk at Eli Ridgway tonight at 8pm. Check it!
• Plus: Find my New York recommends over at Gallerina.

Find my New York City Datebook here — and see pix from the group show Eraser, at Magnan Metz, featuring the above collage by Christopher Michlig.

Get the deets on the big David Wojnarowicz show at PPOW (image above) — and many other happenings — on the weekly Datebook.

Where you can find Meg Hitchcock’s work (seen here) in the weekly Datebook.

• NYC: Another Green World, with Vija Celmins, Mathias Kessler, Gerhard Richter and others, at Carriage Trade, opens Wednesday at 6pm.
• NYC: Geoff McFetridge, You Can’t Put a Hat on a Hole in the Sky, at Half Gallery, opens this evening at 6pm.
• NYC: Alternative Histories, an examination of New York’s alternative art spaces, at Exit Art, opens Friday at 7pm.
• NYC: Jeremiah Maddock, Daniel Trocchio & Amanda Wong, SeeNoEvilSeeNoEvilSee, at Factory Fresh, opens Friday at 7pm.
• NYC: A reception and book signing for the group show The Four Eccentrics, at The Proposition, on the Lower East Side, this Saturday at 5pm.
• NYC: Real Non-Fiction, the Third Annual Artists from the Registry Exhibition, at BRIC, in downtown Brooklyn, through Oct. 23.
• Poughkeepsie: Sharon Butler at Kork, the 864 square-inch art space, inside the offices of Bailey Browne CPA & Assoc., through October. (Read more about Kork here.)
• Pittsburgh: The Art of Structure at the Carnegie Museum of Art, opens Saturday. Yes, I’m an engineer’s daughter. And if I lived in Pittsburgh, I sure as shit would be checking out this show.
• Chicago: James Marshall (Dalek) at Rotofugi, through Sept. 17. (Hustler of Culture.)
• L.A.: Taryn Simon, Contraband, at Gagosian in Beverly Hills, opens Wednesday at 6pm.
• L.A.: Mario Ybarra Jr., Nao Bustamante, the Pocho Research Society, and many others, in Chewbacca to Zapata: Revisiting the Myth of the Mexican Revolution, at Morono Kiang Gallery in downtown, opens Saturday at 6pm.
• L.A.: Now I Remember, with Neckface, Todd Jordan, Jerry Hsu and many others, through Oct. 2. (Hustler of Culture.)
• L.A.: Brit Paint, with Will Barras, Simon Birch, Anthony Micallef, and many others, at Carmichael Gallery, through Oct. 16.
• London: Jason Rhoades, 1:12 Perfect World, at Hauser & Wirth, opens Friday.
• France: Takashi Murakami at Versaille, through Dec. 12. Smoke up for this one.
• Baden: Pipilotti Rist, at the Langmatt Museum, through Nov. 14.