The Grammy Awards performance gave the New York Times a news hook on which to hang the issue. The paper noted that the tiger icon featured in the video for M.I.A.'s 2007 hit "Bird Flu" bears a striking resemblance to the logo for Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers, described by the FBI as "among the most dangerous and deadly extremists in the world," pioneering suicide bombing techniques and killing world leaders. You can compare the logo above, from the video, with the group's logo below.

The paper also quoted Sri Lankans who say M.I.A., whatever her artistic merits, glorifies the Tigers. Her father is a leader in the Tamil separatist movement.

The thing is, M.I.A. is far from the first rapper to toy with paramilitary or violent imagery. Public Enemy had the Uzi-toting S1Ws; N.W.A.'s first mass album cover had a member of the rap group pointing a gun at the camera; Ice Cube dabbled in the Nation of Islam, incorporating some themes into his music; MC Ren did a song about ethnic cleansing in America. The cartoonish extremism mainly served to help make the music appealing to suburban white kids, but, as the cliche goes, that was before 9/11.

With terrorism perceived as a bigger threat these days, M.I.A.'s music will draw harsher scrutiny. But it will be hard to take her too seriously as a terror apologist now that she's marrying into a very rich family and is cashing big corporate checks from MTV and her record company.

(Below, find a critical cover of M.I.A.'s "Paper Planes" by Sinhalese rapper DeLon.)

Popular Internet sites may be the flashy new kids on the entertainment block, but moviehouses rank among the original social networks. As a kid in Kansas, the local cinema was a center of the community. Still today, when we ask teens how they prefer to see movies, over and over they tell us in the theater with friends (apparently, we parents are too embarrassing to be seen with in public). It makes sense to a generation that perpetually seeks out community — whether it be online gaming, video-sharing or social networking.

It's easy to get nostalgic about the movies. But it's important to appreciate and celebrate the renaissance they are enjoying in the here and now. In a world where a recent study claims that 62% of the country prefers spending time with their computer than with their spouse, it's worth noting that we still seek out the communal experience of going to the movies.In the dark of the moviehouse, there's a rare camaraderie in modern society. We laugh together. In more poignant moments, we collectively pretend there's something stuck in our eyes. It's comforting to know that in our famously wired world, we still like to occasionally unplug and connect instead with one another.

It's at a moment like this that we really miss the late Jack Valenti's leadership of the MPAA. While we appreciate Glickman's blog-enabled "Up with movies!" positivity, it's no substitute for a hyper-articulate screed faxed to the trade papers blaming international copyright pirates for Spider-Man 3's failure to post a billion-dollar opening weekend, announcing his intention to "bathe in the blood of every last Beijing black market stallminder trying to steal three square meals from the mouths of honest Hollywood working folk," and recognizing that the seeming health of the industry is merely "an illusion conjured by the tireless, scheming enemies of the business of show."

• A Long, Hot Summer at the Movies [HuffPo]