AJ Four Ways: Text Only (by date) | headlines only
DANCE
IDEAS
- What Might the Kennedy Center Best Become — Take Two
I’ve received three memorable responses to my recent blog – also posted on Arts Fuse — pondering whether the Kennedy Center might become, or might
- A Landmark Deal for Music, and a new TV/Video Giant
Good Morning,
Two big stories for a Monday. First a landmark licensing deal between an AI company and industry-wide music publishers. (Music Business Worldwide). This is the first pact to value songs and recordings equally as training fodder, an admission that the human-made original is the scarce input the machines can’t generate themselves (yet). AND it means the first framework for how music will be compensated by AI companies is now set. This is a huge story that will impact musicians everywhere.
The second big story is Fox’s acquisition of Roku, the streaming interface, for $22 billion. The deal will create one of the world’s largest TV companies. It resets the new TV/video/streaming landscape.
Elsewhere, evidence keeps accumulating that the slower human version of creativity and cognition delivers something efficiency strips out: neuroscientists report measurable cognitive gains from reading physical books over screens (Psypost). Bookstores, improbably, are booming even as literacy declines, though the essay we link to today is clear-eyed that the boom is a class story, of an aspirational demographic doing what it always has while the reading crisis plays out elsewhere (LitHub).
None of this is really nostalgia. It’s the creativity markets discovering that when machines can make something, the value migrates to the context and provenance that human creators provide.
And just for fun: The Knicks, for their part, just turned all of New York into an impromptu dance floor (The New York Times).
Doug
- The Old Are Taking Over America
Samuel Moyn argues that the oldest Americans, because of their retrograde politics and ever-increasing presence, are profoundly reshaping our collective life. – The New Yorker
- Reimagining The Benefits Of Music In Dementia Care
Music has a unique capability to engage multiple areas of the brain that can function in sync with one another. This includes areas involved in hearing and listening, movement, attention, language, emotion, memory and thinking. – The Conversation
- Study: There Are Cognitive Benefits To Reading Paper Books
Reading a book involves a complex series of mental tasks. A reader must decode words, interpret pictures, and connect new information to what they already know. To do this efficiently, the human brain builds what scientists call a story schema. – Psypost
ISSUES
- Sagrada Familia Might Have Topped Out, But Big Challenges Ahead
“The biggest [challenge] will be Glory Facade, which is the main facade. Maybe it will take 10 years, but we don’t yet have a fixed schedule.” – Dezeen
- Behold The New Obama Library
After standing in the glow of this new South Side landmark, I admittedly feel like a buzzkill focusing on documents, kind of like visiting the Sistine Chapel and contemplating the plumbing. – The Atlantic
- Living ‘FridaMania’ In Kahlo’s Hometown
“Frida died – but she didn’t pass away. She was like a rocket. She just went up and up.” – The Guardian (UK)
- Why The Art Workers Coalition Still Resonates Across The Art World
“Among their demands were a section of the museum dedicated to Black (and, in a later, amended statement, Puerto Rican) artists, an artist committee granted curatorial power, a ‘rental fee’ paid to artists for the exhibition of their work and free admission for all.” – The New York Times
- The 91-Year-Old Venezuelan Artist Says No To Weaving With Electronic Machines
“Mora, who is 91 and tiny, wearing head scarves around her weathered face, has clung to a mix of ancestral Indigenous and Spanish traditions.” – The New York Times
MEDIA
- The Kennedy Center Sign Is Restored. But There’s A Bigger Issue
My biggest concern is that the Kennedy Center will remain nominally open—as in, I’ll be free to walk through the doors and perhaps buy a coffee at the cafe—but there will be few, or even no, performances to see. – Washingtonian
- What The Kennedy Center Might Have Been
Imagine a scenario in which Bernstein and the Kennedys — John and Jackie both — bequeathed a proactive White House arts component prioritizing American achievement, past and present. It would have shaped the goals of the envisioned national cultural center. It almost happened. – ArtsFuse
- They Just Had To Take That Man’s Name Off The Kennedy Center From Behind A Curtain
After blowing the deadline and begging for more time – and being denied – workers took Donald J. Trump’s name off the Kennedy Center on Friday night. But “a spokeswoman for the center, said the institution was … evaluating ‘legal options.’” – The New York Times
- Kennedy Center As De-Trumpification Warning
Trump’s threat to walk away from the Kennedy Center suggests an additional danger: He could lose interest and doze off, as if at yet another Cabinet meeting or NBA Finals game, leaving parts of the government to fend for themselves. – The Atlantic
- Trump Kennedy Center Board Appeals Judge’s Order On Removing Trump’s Name
The board voted Thursday to seek a stay of U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper’s May 29 ruling that said Trump’s name was illegally added to the Kennedy Center. – NPR
MUSIC
- If People Aren’t Reading, Why Are Bookstores Thriving?
“The bookstore boom is a story about a certain educated, culturally aspirational demographic doing what it has always done, while the literacy crisis unfolds elsewhere, namely in under-resourced schools, rural communities, and households without the discretionary income to browse a charming bookshop on a Saturday afternoon.” – LitHub
- Ruth Ozeki Knows The Power Of A Good Book
And that good book is Charlotte’s Web. – The Guardian (UK)
- If You Want To Read More Books This Summer, Here’s How To Do It
“I have this daydream where I go to the park and read under a tree. The sun is shining. It’s not too hot. The ground beneath me is comfortable. I have snacks on hand, I’m hydrated, and I am captivated by the book in front of me.” – NPR
- Debut Authors Take Home Women’s Prize For Fiction, Nonfiction
The fiction award is well-known (as is, in this case, the award winner), but the Women’s Prize added the nonfiction award in 2023 to help redress an imbalance in nonfiction award winners in the UK. – The Guardian (UK)
- Oh, The Drama: Someone Tries To Trademark A Bookstagram Term, And It Does Not End Well
Can ‘Hot Girls Read’ be trademarked? One creator thought so. “She is using the trademarking this common phrase to retroactively target small businesses who very likely had the idea before her, or at the very least had it around the same time as her.” – Slate
PEOPLE
- What Might the Kennedy Center Best Become — Take Two
I’ve received three memorable responses to my recent blog – also posted on Arts Fuse — pondering whether the Kennedy Center might become, or might
- A Landmark Deal for Music, and a new TV/Video Giant
Good Morning,
Two big stories for a Monday. First a landmark licensing deal between an AI company and industry-wide music publishers. (Music Business Worldwide). This is the first pact to value songs and recordings equally as training fodder, an admission that the human-made original is the scarce input the machines can’t generate themselves (yet). AND it means the first framework for how music will be compensated by AI companies is now set. This is a huge story that will impact musicians everywhere.
The second big story is Fox’s acquisition of Roku, the streaming interface, for $22 billion. The deal will create one of the world’s largest TV companies. It resets the new TV/video/streaming landscape.
Elsewhere, evidence keeps accumulating that the slower human version of creativity and cognition delivers something efficiency strips out: neuroscientists report measurable cognitive gains from reading physical books over screens (Psypost). Bookstores, improbably, are booming even as literacy declines, though the essay we link to today is clear-eyed that the boom is a class story, of an aspirational demographic doing what it always has while the reading crisis plays out elsewhere (LitHub).
None of this is really nostalgia. It’s the creativity markets discovering that when machines can make something, the value migrates to the context and provenance that human creators provide.
And just for fun: The Knicks, for their part, just turned all of New York into an impromptu dance floor (The New York Times).
Doug
- The Old Are Taking Over America
Samuel Moyn argues that the oldest Americans, because of their retrograde politics and ever-increasing presence, are profoundly reshaping our collective life. – The New Yorker
- Reimagining The Benefits Of Music In Dementia Care
Music has a unique capability to engage multiple areas of the brain that can function in sync with one another. This includes areas involved in hearing and listening, movement, attention, language, emotion, memory and thinking. – The Conversation
- Study: There Are Cognitive Benefits To Reading Paper Books
Reading a book involves a complex series of mental tasks. A reader must decode words, interpret pictures, and connect new information to what they already know. To do this efficiently, the human brain builds what scientists call a story schema. – Psypost
PEOPLE
- What Might the Kennedy Center Best Become — Take Two
I’ve received three memorable responses to my recent blog – also posted on Arts Fuse — pondering whether the Kennedy Center might become, or might
- A Landmark Deal for Music, and a new TV/Video Giant
Good Morning,
Two big stories for a Monday. First a landmark licensing deal between an AI company and industry-wide music publishers. (Music Business Worldwide). This is the first pact to value songs and recordings equally as training fodder, an admission that the human-made original is the scarce input the machines can’t generate themselves (yet). AND it means the first framework for how music will be compensated by AI companies is now set. This is a huge story that will impact musicians everywhere.
The second big story is Fox’s acquisition of Roku, the streaming interface, for $22 billion. The deal will create one of the world’s largest TV companies. It resets the new TV/video/streaming landscape.
Elsewhere, evidence keeps accumulating that the slower human version of creativity and cognition delivers something efficiency strips out: neuroscientists report measurable cognitive gains from reading physical books over screens (Psypost). Bookstores, improbably, are booming even as literacy declines, though the essay we link to today is clear-eyed that the boom is a class story, of an aspirational demographic doing what it always has while the reading crisis plays out elsewhere (LitHub).
None of this is really nostalgia. It’s the creativity markets discovering that when machines can make something, the value migrates to the context and provenance that human creators provide.
And just for fun: The Knicks, for their part, just turned all of New York into an impromptu dance floor (The New York Times).
Doug
- The Old Are Taking Over America
Samuel Moyn argues that the oldest Americans, because of their retrograde politics and ever-increasing presence, are profoundly reshaping our collective life. – The New Yorker
- Reimagining The Benefits Of Music In Dementia Care
Music has a unique capability to engage multiple areas of the brain that can function in sync with one another. This includes areas involved in hearing and listening, movement, attention, language, emotion, memory and thinking. – The Conversation
- Study: There Are Cognitive Benefits To Reading Paper Books
Reading a book involves a complex series of mental tasks. A reader must decode words, interpret pictures, and connect new information to what they already know. To do this efficiently, the human brain builds what scientists call a story schema. – Psypost
THEATRE
VISUAL
- The Old Are Taking Over America
Samuel Moyn argues that the oldest Americans, because of their retrograde politics and ever-increasing presence, are profoundly reshaping our collective life. – The New Yorker
- Reimagining The Benefits Of Music In Dementia Care
Music has a unique capability to engage multiple areas of the brain that can function in sync with one another. This includes areas involved in hearing and listening, movement, attention, language, emotion, memory and thinking. – The Conversation
- Study: There Are Cognitive Benefits To Reading Paper Books
Reading a book involves a complex series of mental tasks. A reader must decode words, interpret pictures, and connect new information to what they already know. To do this efficiently, the human brain builds what scientists call a story schema. – Psypost
- Juneteenth Is A Big Deal In Parts Of Mexico
Why? It all goes back to enslaved people escaping their captors across the South, and fleeing to Spanish-controlled Florida. – NBC News
- What America’s Treasure To Trash To Treasure Pipelines Say About All Of Us
After WWII, “single-family homes spread across the nation like fireweed. In a distinctively American architectural feature, many of them were joined to a small dungeon dedicated to the tidy storage of automobiles—and other items.” – The Atlantic
