Michael Jackson Sells 750,000 Tickets In Hours

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Singer Michael Jackson has sold out all 750,000 tickets to his run of 50 shows at London’s O2 Arena in just hours today, reports Billboard, at an average rate of about 11 per second. Ticketmaster UK called it the “busiest demand for tickets” they have ever experienced. The 50 shows will supposedly take place in July, August, and September of this year, as well as January and February of 2010. The publicity has pushed sales of Jackson’s albums up as well, with sales of Thriller up 80% at stores in the UK and Ireland. The lesson I take from this is that if I act all crazy and allegedly abusive and transparently arrogant and dishonest and mess up my face a whole bunch, I could sell more tickets to my DJ gigs. Although, come to think of it, maybe having something as stupendous as “Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough” on the resume might help, as well. Video for that after the jump.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT.

We have a considerable $390,000 gap in our online fundraising budget that we have to close by June 30. There is no wiggle room, we've already cut everything we can, and we urgently need more readers to pitch in—especially from this specific blurb you're reading right now.

We'll also be quite transparent and level-headed with you about this.

In "News Never Pays," our fearless CEO, Monika Bauerlein, connects the dots on several concerning media trends that, taken together, expose the fallacy behind the tragic state of journalism right now: That the marketplace will take care of providing the free and independent press citizens in a democracy need, and the Next New Thing to invest millions in will fix the problem. Bottom line: Journalism that serves the people needs the support of the people. That's the Next New Thing.

And it's what MoJo and our community of readers have been doing for 47 years now.

But staying afloat is harder than ever.

In "This Is Not a Crisis. It's The New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, why this moment is particularly urgent, and how we can best communicate that without screaming OMG PLEASE HELP over and over. We also touch on our history and how our nonprofit model makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there: Letting us go deep, focus on underreported beats, and bring unique perspectives to the day's news.

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