Resident thinker and creativity

How cool is this: the city of Bristol (in the western bit of the UK) is hosting a Festival of Ideas this coming May and they've invited Pat Kane as the resident thinker. Wow, that is one cool job!
Pat Kane is the author of THE PLAY ETHIC: A MANIFESTO FOR A DIFFERENT WAY OF LIVING which according to the blurb 'explores the real meaning of play and shows how a more playful society would revolutionize and liberate our daily lives.' Sounds interesting, I'm adding it to my 'to read' list. I think that a little play wouldn't hurt society one bit. Pat also keeps a blog (who doesn't) which is found here and makes for interesting reading material.

Next up: creativity. Below are a couple of resources I found on creativity in business AND the business of creativity, both subjects which have my interest (see also earliers posts).
Related to Richard Florida's The Rise of the Creative Class (which I'm still debating whether or not to pick it up again) is this site. Some good stuff there, especially the news page.
London's mayor is making creativity in London one of his focus points, and that has resulted in website Creative London and several reports on the creative industry in London (there's even a special report on Asian creative business in London). Another exciting initiative is the Clore Leadership Programme, which according to their website is 'an initiative of the Clore Duffield Foundation, and our aim is to help to train and develop a new generation of leaders for the cultural sector here in the UK'.
On the importance of the arts for the UK economy, see this article in the Guardian.
Special mention for what I think is a great 'creative' business idea: the Affordable Art Fair. Started in London, selling affordable art at specialist fairs, it has now branched out to several different countries and is quite succesful.

Lastly, one of the speakers at the Bristol Festival of Ideas is Paul Ormerod, who just has a new book out called Why most things fail. Read the review here, another book that is going on my 'to read' list.