The supermodel Elle Macpherson says that Noam Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent was "a book that changed me". Interesting. How did this change manifest itself? The tome argues that the dominating cultural environment called the media is an infernal, insatiable machine that exists only to perpetuate its own commercial interests. Maybe Macpherson decided that, since she was in the game herself, she could flog expensive scanties safe in the knowledge that her products would be publicised with great enthusiasm, in order that likable and attractive pictures of her could be reproduced. Such as this one (above). A sterling intellectual exercise, surely, and one that's got the business bang to rights.