<div><p>Common started his rap career as a Midwestern representative of all that made mid-'90s indie hip-hop so great. Soul- and funk-driven beats were matched by confessional, verbose rhymes that eschewed rims and strippers for more pressing, mature, and human concerns. He has spent the last decade slowly augmenting that image, adding a dash ...

<div id="subtitle">Hip-hop veteran Common touts the Zune as Microsoft tries to mine its music player for hipness</div><div><p>A video for the title track on hip-hop veteran Common's forthcoming album, "Universal Mind Control," begins with a digital music player pulsing to the beat. The viewer is pulled ...

<div><p>Last January, 28-year-old home accessories boutique owner Georgia Tapert and her good friend Stephanie LaCava, 25, a features assistant at Vogue, were having lunch at Ms. Tapert's Broome Street store. Not long before, Ms. Tapert's mother, author Annette Tapert, had been telling the ladies about her tenure as a PEN American Center ...