Yearly Archives: 2021
Why Podcasts Are So Popular (As A Medium)
New research finds that of all media, podcast content generates the greatest degree of consumer concentration. - Inside Radio
It’s A Weird Time To Be A Critic
The instinct to abuse critics is justified by the idea that it is “punching up” at elitist gatekeepers. But unlike Siskel and Ebert, modern...
The Next Era: The “Exponential Age”
The Exponential Age is challenging our assumptions about globalization. A car can be designed in Guiyang and assembled in California with remarkable ease. But...
More Governments Are Censoring Online Content
Governments are limiting or banning applications, content and connectivity itself — and Big Tech companies, rich and powerful as they are, can't or won't...
The News Shared On Facebook Gets Smaller And Smaller
The percent that are about news — defined broadly, including sports and entertainment — is now somewhere less than 4%. It’s something of a niche...
Pennsylvania School District Bans Children’s Books On MLK And Rosa Parks
In a clip from a meeting aired by CNN, which reported on student protests of the ban, members referred to the list of reading and...
Pathbreaking TV Writer Irma Kalish Dead At 96
Most female scriptwriters in the 1950s and '60s had to churn out proto-Hallmark-Channel movies, but Kalish thrived in comedy. Her biggest mark was in...
Clearing Up Simplicity: The Fallacies Of Occam’s Razor
Cited widely in science, but often misunderstood, for some it’s invaluable, hinting at profound truths about the nature of knowledge. For others it’s worse...
Someone Thought Putting The Bible, The US Constitution, And Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless The...
"Big-name Christian authors penned a letter blasting it as 'dangerous,' and more than 900 people signed a petition decrying the decision to print it....
Free Artistic Expression In India Is Being Gradually Strangled
Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party, "censorship (is) no longer about nudity, gore, or promiscuity. It (has) firmly set its...
Scientists Have Created The Whitest White Ever
Their original goal was to create a paint that would effectively reflect sunlight away from a building, which required producing an extremely white pigment. -...
Looping — Perhaps Hollywood’s Most Surprising, And Most Secretive, Profession
Loopers are the equivalent of extras: they're voice actors who provide realistic background chatter for just about any setting or subject. And no, you...
Do You Know About #DarkAcademia?
On Instagram, the tag #darkacademia now has over 1 million posts, and Grazia has named the aesthetic as autumn 2021’s biggest trend. The TikTok generation has keenly...
The Royal Ballet’s Most Unlikely Star Says Farewell To The Stage
Edward Watson was a very promising student, but the gangly ginger never fit the handsome-Prince mold. As he retires after 27 years with the...
China Now Has Its Own Version Of The Carbuncle Cup
Each year, an online architecture magazine offers a list of 80-odd edifices from which readers can vote for the ten ugliest buildings in China....
Ethiopian Popular Culture Is Making The Chinese Its Bogeymen
As investment from China flows into Ethiopia, social media and entertainment are voicing worries about inexpensive made-in-China versions of Ethiopian handicrafts, mocking Chinese eating...
Five Small Theaters Sue City Of New York Over Vaccine Requirements
The issue: the venues must require audiences to wear masks and be vaccinated, but similar buildings, or even the same one, are exempt from...
Supply Chain Problems Are Still Plaguing Publishing, And There Might Be Book Shortages For...
"Supply chain problems have touched almost every aspect of book production, storage, and delivery, mostly as a result of Covid-related bottlenecks. Printer capacity issues...
With The Walls Finally Stabilized, Reconstruction At Notre-Dame In Paris Can Begin In Earnest
Those solid, 850-year-old walls were damaged much more by the catastrophic 2019 fire than authorities realized at first. (They really could have collapsed.) Now...
Enormous Stage Rock Nearly Crushes Tenor; Court Rules It Was Sabotage
It's the end of Tristan und Isolde at the Capitole de Toulouse. Isolde is singing the Liebestod and Tristan is playing dead upstage when...
“Pre-Saving” Music And What That Really Means
When you pre-save a song, it may look like the service you use, like Spotify, is the one requesting information about your account. But...
Nigel Kennedy Pulls Out Of Albert Hall Concert After ClassicFM Won’t Let Him Play...
Kennedy said the “culturally prejudiced” decision amounted to “musical segregation”, with the station he now calls “Jurassic FM” preferring him to play Vivaldi’s Four...
Fourteen Takeaways From This Year’s Emmys
The good, the bad, and the really long and bizarre. - Washington Post
What Does It Mean To Wrap The Arc De Triomphe?
Sebastian Smee: "Wrapping a triumphal arch is a way of creating something beautiful that also says: Enough with your delusions of grandeur. Away with...
Thomas Mann And The Case For Keeping Politics Out Of Art
Thomas Mann was not wrong to worry over democracy’s tendency to enlist art for its own ends, and he was not wrong to call...
