Yearly Archives: 2021
I Miss Chitchat
In our pandemic world, casual conversation has been all but eliminated. The closest thing I get these days is saying “thank you” to a...
How Those Algorithms Manipulate Your Behavior
University of Chicago economist Richard Thaler and Harvard Law School professor Cass Sunstein popularized the term “nudge” in 2008, but due to recent advances...
The Contentious History Of Grammar Books
In that era, a Grammar was second only to a Bible as a necessary object in a God-fearing household. While the Bible provided moral...
Microsoft: Back-To-Back Video Meetings Are “Unsustainable”
“Our research shows breaks are important, not just to make us less exhausted by the end of the day, but to actually improve our...
Jerry And Kenny’s Excellent NFT Adventure
Jerry Saltz and Kenny Schachter team up to "test" the NFT market. "To be clear, NFTism doesn’t necessarily disrupt anything but rather presents a...
Choreographer Cathy Marston, Making New Story Ballets Cool Again
The 46-year-old Briton, who has continued to work remotely even as her big U.S. premieres planned for last year (Of Mice and Men at...
How Do We Structurally Change Theatre Criticism?
“The answer is not more diverse critics because what the fuck does that mean? More diverse critics and then they go where? More diverse...
Size Matters: Of Novels And Novellas And Their Fluctuating Lengths
Novels started out long in the 18th and 19th centuries, got shorter in the early 20th century, and really started bulking up (especially genre...
How To Fight Online Disinformation
"The trend of people celebrating and posting photos of themselves or loved ones receiving the vaccine has been far more effective than any attempt...
Tempest Storm, Last Of The Great Old-Time Striptease Artists, Dead At 93
"Routinely named in the same ardent breath as the great 20th-century ecdysiasts Lili St. Cyr, Blaze Starr and Gypsy Rose Lee, Ms. Storm was...
Historian Pinpoints The Worst Year In Human History
The year was terrible due to cataclysmic eruptions that blocked out the sun and the spread of the plague. It ushered in the coldest...
What Ever Happened To All Those Quibi Shows? They’re Now ‘Roku Originals’
"The streaming device maker will rebrand the Quibi library, which it bought in January, as Roku Originals in the run-up to debuting them on...
AI Music App Creates Music For You On The Fly, Depending On Your Mood
Endel uses a bunch of data, including your location, weather, time of day and even biometrics to create an individual soundtrack on the fly....
The New Whitest-Ever White Paint Could Potentially Replace Air Conditioning
The paint, developed at Purdue University's mechanical engineering department, reflects 98.1 percent of the sun's rays, while the strongest heat-resistant white paints currently on...
Bad Feelings At Second City In Chicago: Old Food Service Staff Is Fired And...
The 90-odd people who worked, some for decades, as waiters, bartenders, dishwashers and the like were told last fall that their furloughs were officially...
Researchers Figure Out Why Some Picassos Have Deteriorated More Quickly Than Others
"The study centred on four paintings inspired by the Ballets Russes, the Russian impresario Sergei Diaghilev's itinerant dance troupe, which Picasso produced in no...
Classical Music Podcasts Are Coming Into Their Own
"Classical music has been surprisingly slow to embrace podcasting, a medium ideally suited to illuminate its sounds and stories. But something changed in the...
Canada’s Federal Budget Has More Than $800 Million In New Cultural Funding
"The budget earmarks $300-million over two years to Canadian Heritage to create a recovery fund to combat that drop in employment and support the...
Detroit Symphony’s Long-Serving CEO, Anne Parsons, To Retire Next Year
"Parsons faced a financially embattled DSO when she took the reins in 2004, followed by grueling labor strife several years later. She ultimately helped...
Charlotte Plans To Overhaul Arts Funding, With 50% More Money — But Some Artists...
"Last week, City Manager Marcus Jones recommended that the city take over arts funding from the Arts & Science Council, which has managed the...
Daily Mail Newspaper Sues Google For “Manipulating Search Results”
It alleges Google "punishes" publishers in its rankings if they don't sell enough advertising space in its marketplace. Google called the claims "meritless". Associated...
How Public Ideas Evolved In The Cold War Era
What most comes across is the protean creativity of the period, the globe-spanning connections that promoted it, and Menand’s mastery of large slices of...
How To Be A Silicon Valley Intellectual
On your path to becoming an intellectual in Silicon Valley, understanding these two lessons—the Peter Principles, we’ll call them, since that adds nothing to...
Consider The Environmental Cost Of Making Music
Musicians addressing the environment head-on only represents one side of the music industry’s engagement with the climate crisis. The way we listen to music...
Brexit Is Killing UK Musicians’ Gigs
The stress and cost of work visa requirements, new taxes, and prohibitively high touring costs have upended the careers of scores of British musicians,...
