Regal Cinemas and Cinemark declared that they won’t show Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: The Green Legend, the first major release to appear on Imax and an online streaming service on the same date. Said one exec: “At Regal we will not participate in an experiment where you can see the same product on screens varying from three stories tall to 3 inches wide on a smartphone.”
Archives for September 2014
Fighting Our Addiction To Being Connected At All Times
Michael Harris: “I think that we’ve gone through this very giddy ride of absorbing new communication technologies, and what we’re hitting now is a point where we have to start becoming intelligent about our media diets in the same way that we had to become intelligent about our food diets after we got a super abundance of sugar and fats at our disposal.”
The Attractions Of Slow TV
“A slow-TV program is like a great view you encounter on vacation: it’s always there, impervious, but it gains meaning and a story depending on what it conjures in your head. … As entertainment, it is backward: it appears to do its job by casting viewers into their own minds.”
The Daydreaming Disorder: Is “Sluggish Cognitive Tempo” The Next ADHD? (Is It Even Real?)
“The name of [this] ‘new attention disorder’ sounds like an Onion-style parody … It also sounds like a classic case of disease mongering: blurring normality with sickness to boost drug companies’ bottom lines. … Disease mongering is a tough concept to define – but if it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck. What we have here seems to be a duck egg.”
Top Posts From AJBlogs 09.30.14
This is not censorship
AJBlog: For What it’s Worth | Published 2014-09-30
“Sculpture Victorious,” Yes, But In What Way?
AJBlog: Real Clear Arts | Published 2014-10-01
Have We Lost the Ability to Be Alone?
AJBlog: CultureCrash | Published 2014-10-01
It can be done
AJBlog: Sandow | Published 2014-09-30
Dancing the Breaking Point
AJBlog: Dancebeat | Published 2014-10-01
Another free Chicago jazz festival: Hyde Park and local stars
AJBlog: Jazz Beyond Jazz | Published 2014-09-30
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Joshua Bell Playing The D.C. Metro: Here’s What Happens When He Alerts People Ahead Of Time
“The hall was so packed that when the students who accompanied Bell performed an opening set, people in the back of the crowd kept clapping after the students left the stage, not realizing that the music they were then hearing was a recording.”
The Unexpected Rise Of Indie Bookstores
“In 2009, the number of independent bookstores in the nation stabilized at around 1,400, and then slowly began to grow. As of last May, the number of indie bookshops in the U.S. was 1,664. Why the turnaround?”
The Fight To Save Paris’s Oldest Bookstore
“It’s difficult to imagine the shuttering of a bookstore causing a similar outcry anywhere else—not to mention direct government involvement in the matter of a private lease. This has something to do with what the French call l’exception culturelle.”
Brooklyn Bar Sues City For The Right Of Patrons to Dance
“Andrew Muchmore, owner of Muchmore’s Cafe in Williamsburg, filed suit in Brooklyn federal court to challenge New York’s cabaret laws – which prohibit dancing by more than three people at one time unless the venue has a cabaret license. In the suit, he cites the first and 14th amendments and claims the tight restrictions against patrons shaking their money makers have forced him to play sedate if not dreary tunes at his nightspot and coffeehouse.”
The Problem With Protecting Canadian Content
“The problem facing the Canadian TV industry – from the big three commercial outfits to the guilds, unions and lobby groups representing the creators – is that cultural protectionism is a very, very hard sell. And it’s a hard sell because there is so little Canadian programming that is truly cherished and admired by the public. In this, everyone, from the top executives to the creative end of the industry, must face blame.”
Live Screening Of Billy Elliot Musical Tops UK Box Office This Week
“The screening, which was broadcast live from London’s Victoria Palace Theatre to more than 500 cinemas across the UK on September 28, beat new releases The Equalizer and The Boxtrolls to the top spot, and was the widest ever cinema release of a live event.”
Why Is Academic Writing So Dreadful?
“The familiarity of bad academic writing raises a puzzle. Why should a profession that trades in words and dedicates itself to the transmission of knowledge so often turn out prose that is turgid, soggy, wooden, bloated, clumsy, obscure, unpleasant to read, and impossible to understand?”
Cincinnati International Piano Competition Gets A New Name, New Format, New Life
“The World Piano Competition will now be known as the Cincinnati World Piano Competition. The Artist Division, which has a top prize of $20,000, will be held every three years, instead of annually. And on alternate years, there will be a Young Artist Competition and an all-new Amateur Competition.”
As Corporate Arts Sponsorships Decline, Lincoln Center Doubles Down
“Lincoln Center’s move comes as overall corporate philanthropy is dwindling and big companies’ support of the arts is eroding. Corporate giving fell nearly 2% in 2013, according to Giving USA. Meanwhile, the share of corporate philanthropy dedicated to the arts fell to 5.3% in 2012 from 8.8% in 2007, according to CECP, a coalition of chief executives working to improve society.”
Google Earth Reveals Ancient Giant Geoglyphs
“Using Google Earth, researchers have discovered an archeological gem in northern Kazakhstan—more than 50 previously unknown geoglyphs of different geometric shapes and sizes sprawled across the landscape. Geoglyphs are large designs created on the surface of the ground, usually made by arranging stones or sculpting the earth.”
Battle For The Soul Of Nashville Music
The cluster of streets southwest of downtown Nashville has long been the spiritual and commercial center of the nation’s country music business — a concentration of record companies, small-time showbiz strivers and studios that Christine Kreyling, a local writer, once called “the Vatican City of country music.” But “If we let certain musical touchstones go, these centerpieces of collaboration between artists and engineers, then what’s left that makes Nashville’s music scene unique?”
Piracy Stalemate – Illegal Downloading For Good And Bad
“Piracy is putting pressure on antiquated business models, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. But the prevalence of piracy shows that people are growing up in a culture of free, and that is not good for the future of entertainment, either.”
Carol Ann Duffy: My First Five Years As Poet Laureate
“When Carol Ann Duffy was appointed poet laureate in 2009, the first woman to hold the post in its nearly 350-year history, she set herself several goals that included setting up new prizes, giving support to new festivals and helping to generate commissions for poets.”
Tech Companies Begin To Understand That Changing The World Isn’t Just About Tech, It’s Politics Too
“A new generation of tech companies, however, have made Silicon Valley’s political needs less theoretical, and more immediate. They are taking on pre-existing, real-world industries. (The purely virtual ideas — search, portals, email — have been taken.) It’s harder to ignore politics when you’re changing the world, not just the web. And so these companies — Uber and Airbnb are the most obvious — have found a sweet spot where founders’ disdain for politics and regulators meets the smartest political strategy money can buy.”
A Remarkable Career: Soprano Magda Olivero Dies At 104
The spell she cast could win over even skeptics like Schonberg, who began his review of her now-legendary Met debut by inexplicably claiming, “It wasn’t Magda Olivero’s evening, as it turned out.” But he then went on to aver, “It was history come to life last night, as the soprano, despite her age, gave us a feminine, fiery, utterly convincing Tosca.”
How Do We Build Sustainable Arts Audiences?
Join the conversation: Building Arts Audiences – live panel discussion with Kurt Andersen, NEA chairman and national arts leaders. Oct. 1 at 3pm est. #buildingartsaudiences
Atlanta Symphony CEO Resigns As Lockout Continues
“I believe that my continued leadership of the ASO would be an impediment to our reaching a new labor agreement with the ASO’s musicians,” said Stanley Romanstein in a press release.
Julio Bocca Injured In Auto Accident
The former ballet superstar, now director of the National Ballet of Uruguay, suffered “minor traumas” when his car ran off the road and flipped over about 30 miles north of Montevideo.
Can Ballet Depict The Abuse Of Native Children In Residential Schools?
“In one scene, a young residential school student receives crippling blows from a clergyman. In another, he is brutally strapped. His classmate later has her long hair sheared off. This is part of what viewers will see when Going Home Star – Truth and Reconciliation debuts at the Royal Winnipeg Ballet on Wednesday.”
The New Yorker Discovers Barroom Shakespeare
Rebecca Mead visits the Three Day Hangover theatre company, founded last year, which performs “textually divergent interpretations” of Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet” in crowded New York bars.