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- The Board That Built Apple – And A Personal Computing Revolution – Is Turning Fifty
“The Apple I marked a great leap forward in convenience by coming already assembled, albeit without a monitor, a keyboard, or even a case; the purchase price of USD $666.66 (closer to $4,000 today) just got you the board. But what a board.” – Open Culture
- Letters That Keats Sent His Beloved, Stolen In The 1980s, Are Found
“The customer told them that the books had been bequeathed to him by his grandfather, who had kept them in a box at his retirement home in South Carolina.” – The New York Times
- No Big Deal, But This Canadian Director Just Had Two Movies Open On The Same Day
Chandler Levack: “It’s very surreal. I just feel like I crossed into, like, a multiverse or … a timeline that I was never supposed to be in.” – CBC
- Nathalie Baye, Star Of French Cinema, Has Died At 77
“Baye, a stalwart of France’s domestic cinema, starred in about 80 films and took home the best actress César, France’s equivalent of the Oscars, four times, including three years running from 1981 to 1983.” – The Guardian (UK)
- At The LA Times Book Festival, Prizewinners Tout The Power Of The People
One winner: “The people banning books are never the good guys in history, and it’s up to us in this room and beyond — as readers, as book lovers — to fight back.” – Los Angeles Times (Yahoo)
- Historically Face-Eating Leopard From Paramount Tells Hollywood Everything Will Be Fine
David Ellison of Paramount gave his pitch last week to theatre owners, saying that he would commit Paramount to a 45-day theatrical window. “‘Long live the movies,’ Ellison said.” – Boston Globe (AP)
- Writers Who ‘Use’ AI Are Truly Missing The Point
“The hard work of writing is, for people like me, a critical aspect of the whole effort, bringing one’s self to the task of communicating effectively and clearly.” – Wired
- What It Means That Hampshire College’s ‘Experimental’ Liberal Arts Education Is Saying Goodbye
“The shuttering of Hampshire College … feels different, not so much another liberal arts domino falling as the symbolic end of a whole tradition of progressive education in the US.” – New York Review Of Books
- Museums Are For Kids
There’s a “national wave of new children’s museums, expansions of existing institutions and a broadened lineup of programming aimed at young visitors.” – The New York Times
- Louise Erdrich On Writing, The Times We Live In, And ICE Near Her Bookstore
The multiple prize-winning author: “I guess it’s kind of ‘all or none.’ Either everyone is illegal except Native people, or no one is illegal. I don’t think anybody is illegal in the first place. I don’t believe in borders.” – El País English
- This Absolutely Unhinged Theme Park Presaged The Rise Of Silicon Valley
“From elephants to enterprise software — is there a better metaphor for the last half-century of radical change in San Mateo County? But mostly we should mark this anniversary so we don’t forget perhaps the most bonkers destination in Bay Area history.” – San Francisco Chronicle
- One Restaurant Decided To Replace Its Workers With QR Codes, And Then It Found Out What That Would Mean
Oops. The Walker Art Center is not happy: “Cardamom is slated to shutter within the next 60 to 90 days. The museum is now seeking proposals for a replacement restaurant.” – ArtNews
- Authors Are Leaving This Venerable French Publisher In Droves, All Together
“In an open letter, the ‘resigning’ authors explain that they refuse ‘to allow our ideas and our work’ to become the property of the ultraconservative billionaire [Vincent Bolloré], who has taken control of the Hachette Livre group, Grasset’s parent company, in 2023.” – Euronews
- Voting for real life experiences (enthusiastically!)
Good Morning,
Two threads running through today’s stories. First: the craft behind finished products keeps getting harder to see. Lit Hub argues that AI in contemporary publishing is really a labor story: editing time compressed, care squeezed out (LitHub). Variety walks through the small army of artisans required to build a single synthetic pop star for Mother Mary (Variety). And the Guardian pokes fun at our odd hunger to believe actors improvise their best lines, a preference for accident over something planned and rehearsed (The Guardian).
The second thread cuts the other way: audiences are increasingly voting with their feet for real life experiences. Indie bookstores opened 422 new shops in 2025, a 31% jump (The Guardian). Hollywood is “screenmaxxing” to pull people back to PLF screens (The Guardian). And the NYT walks through the paradox of museums trying to be porous and heist-proof at the same time (The New York Times).
All of our stories below.
- It’s Getting Harder To Spot AI In Contemporary Publishing
And, frankly, it’s a labor issue: “The more time an editor has to edit a particular book, the more care they can put into it.” – LitHub
- Very Short Concerts Aren’t A Scam
OK: “The beauty of the less-than-an-hour show is that it ends before 10. You can get a drink or even dinner or hustle home.” – Washington Post (Yahoo)
- Chains Dominate Retail, But Indie Bookstore Numbers Are Way Up
“About 422 new indie bookshops opened in 2025, according to the American Booksellers Association, a 31% rise from 2024.” What the heck? – The Guardian (UK)
- It Is Physically Painful To Write This, But Hollywood Is ‘Screenmaxxing’ Now
“Screenmaxxing is big business for an imperiled theatrical exhibition industry. … PLF screens seem to be an effective way to lure them out of the house, and charge a little (or a lot) extra for the assurance that they’re seeing a version of the movie that goes above and beyond.” – The Guardian (UK)
- All The Science Fiction And Fantasy Novels Reimagining China’s Past May Be Doing Weird Political Things Today
“Web novels have become a massive and highly profitable industry in China, and many titles have been adapted into blockbuster movies and TV series in recent years” – and they may be reinforcing authoritarian regimes today. – Wired
- An Author’s Main Characters Might Resemble Her Demographically, But That Doesn’t Mean They’re The Same
“Writing for Ms. Riley is both straightforward and a little bit mysterious. ‘Animal instinct, honestly,’ she said.” – The New York Times
- Every Town, Including Every Refugee Camp, Needs A Theatre
“As migrants faced uncertainty, displacement and made frequent attempts to cross into the United Kingdom, a robust arts community began to take shape inside the Good Chance Theatre. Residents staged stand-up comedy, music, storytelling, kung fu, circus acts and theater performances.” – Sahan Journal
- This RAM Shortage Thing Isn’t Going Away
Yikes: “Everything from phones and laptops, to VR headsets and gaming handhelds have seen price increases due to the RAM shortage.” – The Verge
- Isa Briones Gets Her Time, On The Pitt And On Broadway
The actor who plays Santos – the abrasive, competitive, smart young resident on The Pitt – is also a dab hand at karaoke, a longtime Broadway and national touring company singer, and a person who posts Instagram Stories defending the theatre from weird Pitt fans. – Vulture
- The V&A East Is Just One Example Of How England, And The Entire UK, Could Put Money Back Into The Arts
Make the United Kingdom truly good again – with culture. – The Guardian (UK)
- The Film About France During WWII That Is Very, Alarmingly Relevant To Several Other Countries Right Now
Yes, you need to watch The Sorrow and the Pity, and you need to do it right now. Why? Because “Ophuls’s film is illuminating precisely because its lessons about complicity apply to evil and corruption of all kinds.” – The Atlantic
- Some Companies You Probably Love Are Taking Trademarks Too Far
“If you have a granola group, seed society, cherry circle, or risotto ring, and a lawyer league owns a trademark on one of them, they might just airdrop cease-and-desist letters like leaflets over a city in World War II.” – Slate
- Television And Theatre Aren’t Oil And Water, But They Don’t Mix Well, Either
“Despite so much practice, television still manages to get a few things wrong, specifically the process, the product and the people. (It occasionally manages to nail the excitement.)” – The New York Times
- Reed Hastings Is Leaving Netflix, But Is It Because They Didn’t Get Warner Bros., Or Because They Ever Tried?
Bizarrely, Netflix would up in a much stronger place: “The company did not say how it plans to spend the $2.8-billion US termination fee it received after losing the Warner Bros. movie studio, including HBO, and lifted its earnings per share.” – CBC
- It Takes Many Artisans To Create A Lady Gaga-Level, But Fake, Pop Star
The Mother Mary gang has been finding out over the past couple of years. – Variety
- We Are Weirdly Quick To Believe That Actors Simply Improvise In Movies
“Audiences clearly crave these stories – but why? Isn’t a movie more impressive if it’s so well rehearsed that it seems real? Isn’t it better that an actor’s pained scream sounds authentic because they’re an elite professional, not because they stubbed their toe?” – The Guardian (UK)
- How Do You Secure A Museum From Heists Without Closing It Off Entirely?
“Transparency, porousness — all the buzzwords of architecture today are antithetical to security. It’s a paradox implicit to museum design today.” – The New York Times
- Is Pop Star Rosalia Leading A Surge In Affection For Opera As An Art Form?
Yes, and then there’s this: “Pinterest said ‘opera aesthetics’ – a trend which it said encapsulated ‘dramatic, opulent and theatrical styles’ – was one of its fastest growing trends, with a 55% increase in interest in opera-themed dresses on its app over the past year.” – BBC
- Children’s Author Jon Klassen Is The First Canadian To Win This Huge Children’s Literature Prize
“The Winnipeg-born children’s book author and illustrator of I Want My Hat Back, has won the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award, which is worth nearly $750,00” (Canadian). – CBC
- How A Few Simple TikToks Or A Viral Insta Reel Can Lead To A Poetry Contract
“A century ago, the democratization of poetry was only a dream. Today, everyone can be a poet thanks to social media.” – Los Angeles Times
- A bend in the culture
This Week’s Highlights:
The question running through this week’s stories isn’t whether cultural institutions are in trouble. It’s who gets to decide what they’re for. At the Kennedy Center, a former staffer describes being told to “get rid of everything” in the permanent collection (The Atlantic). In Paris, more than 100 authors walked out of the storied publisher Grasset after its billionaire owner forced out the editor who’d run it for 26 years (The Guardian). The V&A quietly censored its own exhibition catalogues to satisfy a Chinese printer (The Guardian). And the Trocks — beloved for 50 years — say some American venues are now afraid to book them (The Irish Times).
Meanwhile, the gulf between haves and have-nots is widening. The Met is mid-renovation at $1.5 billion (New York Times). NPR landed $110 million in philanthropic gifts (Editor & Publisher). But a 36-year-old Berkeley theater is closing because nobody wanted the job (San Francisco Chronicle), Hampshire College is shutting down (WBUR), and San Diego wants to slash city arts funding by 85% (San Diego Union-Tribune). The money hasn’t disappeared. It’s just not going where it used to.
All this week’s stories below, organized by topic.
