The adoption and diffusion of such technologies led to wild-eyed speculation about their possible social and political consequences, a discussion that, characteristically, ricocheted between dreams of a technological utopia and fears of an artificial state. - The Guardian

If the Anthropocene began when the Industrial Revolution set industry against the living world, the Symbiocene imagines what should follow: interspecies democracy, life within Earth’s limits, and ecological reciprocity. - Aeon

What is Intelligence? simply reduces everything to physical implementations, either in AI neural networks or in the brain, and often conflates the two. - Inference Review

Zinn presented his readers with genuinely admirable dissidents, from Bartolomé de las Casas to Ida Tarbell and Langston Hughes. At a moment when the country needs effective dissidents, Zinn, the scholar-activist, is in that pantheon. But  A People’s History’s had flaws: It can flatten complex problems and people into apparently simple ones. - The New Republic

Unless impaired by a stroke or dementia, most older people retain their language skills and may even improve them as they steadily gain vocabulary throughout their lives. A new brain imaging study from an MIT-Boston University collaboration now reveals the neural activity underlying this observation.  - MIT News

But, cautionary moment (akin to making movies about war): “Sometimes the filmmakers, they can kind of get wrapped up in the bad behavior … of the men that they're trying to critique.” Think Fight Club. - NPR

Ticket sales had already dropped in the10 months following Trump’s takeover, but both ticket sales and donations plunged after the Trump-led board of trustees voted in December to rename the center after him and put his name on the front of the building, according to the records. - Washington Post

After a 15-year renovation, South L.A.’s historic Vision Theatre Performing Arts Center is reopening, marking a major milestone for Leimert Park and a $40-million investment in Black arts and culture. - Los Angeles Times

“Two Democratic-backed candidates beat out conservatives in Tuesday's school board election in Sarasota, Florida, flipping the board's majority. Helmed for the past year by a co-founder of Moms for Liberty, … the board is moving in a new direction, the winners said.” - The Washington Post (Yahoo!)

Since July 30th, more than a million people have clicked on the button accessible on each post. - The Verge

Wild: “Many of the AI generated images have been centred on the Irish counties of Limerick and Wexford, where shaky videos purportedly showed the character wandering through the streets, causing alarm and confusion among residents.” - BBC

What in the rolling over for rich people hell, Karen Bass? - Vulture

What she told me was a little alarming: “2025-2026 is the worst year for classical arts organizations since I’ve started doing this work.” The reason for this goes deep into the deficiencies of arts funding. - San Francisco Classical Voice

“The Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA), the trade group representing the country’s music industry, has banned wholly AI-generated songs from its weekly charts that showcase the most popular tracks in Australia.” - Variety

“He doesn’t have a pretentious bone in his body, eagerly embracing the way ... rockers bashed away at a late-19th-century Russian suite. And just as eagerly, he embraced the world of film music so completely that he became only the second LA Phil music director with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.”...

“AVROTROS will not participate in the Eurovision Song Contest in 2027 because the event can no longer be considered neutral, with a participating country still involved in a large-scale military conflict,” the network said, though the decision on the Netherlands’ participation remains up to national public broadcaster NPO. - AP

These stories from the classical music world are particularly jarring. It’s easy to stomach the idea of Swifties doing what they do: that’s part of their culture. But classical music fans have long cultivated an image of sophistication. - The Conversation

The Justice Department was preparing to wage a legal battle more than a decade in the making against the world’s largest concert promoter. Then President Trump called. Settle it, the president told a senior DOJ official, the official later told associates. - The Wall Street Journal

A controversial plan to auction off artifacts recovered from the wreck of the Titanic must be put on hold, a federal judge ruled Monday, after the U.S. government and preservationists raised concerns about the sale and the company’s care of the artifacts. - Washington Post

The report highlights a concerning rise in violent and forceful tactics, alongside a growing focus on high-value items such as precious metals, gemstones, and culturally significant artefacts. - Insight EU

“According to a report by United24, the Ukrainian government–run platform, the fire destroyed the museum’s historic plasterwork, parquet flooring, furniture, and books, as well as the building’s electrical and heating infrastructure.” No human casualties were reported. - ARTnews

On Aug. 31, the Smithsonian will consider whether to give the Latino Museum its Arts and Industries Building, which was built in 1881 and is on the National Mall between the Smithsonian’s Castle and Hirshhorn Museum. - The New York Times

It’s not like most of these flyers were ever going to be high art anyway. Still, the issue nags at me constantly, whenever I pass one of these synthetic images plastered over the real world. - The Atlantic

The report “accuses Pierre-Olivier Costa, the recently suspended president of Marseille’s Musée des civilisations de l’Europe et de la Méditerranée (MuCEM), of sexual and moral harassment, breaching rules for granting public contracts, and putting the southern French city’s only national museum ‘at risk.’” - ARTnews

Researchers have argued that eco-poetry can influence how we experience a place, what we notice and what it might become in the future. They suggest that by “sounding” environmental change, speculative poetry offers us a tangible way to engage with, interpret and navigate the uncertainty of the climate crisis. - The Conversation

According to NielsenIQ BookScan, sales of print books across the British consumer market have passed £1 billion at the earliest point in the calendar year since records began. - The Bookseller (UK)

The authors’ "plots have to be built on buried grudges and horrifying secrets hidden in the fog and the fjords. Otherwise, how else could they convincingly kill off their characters?” - The New York Times

The strategies to defeat AI are getting, well, old-school: “We’re re-humanizing the process with a dedicated hotline (which has the added benefit of weeding out supposed reporters who aren’t in the habit of ringing up strangers.” - Nieman Lab

But it’s a bit nervewracking: “I feel like for a small press you really need to, not just catch a break, but catch a break every time, … if you want to last.” - Los Angeles Times (MSN)

“Sometimes words need pictures and pictures need words. When they find each other, characters spring to life.” - NPR

“Modern localization, especially for video games, happens at a massive scale today. … A large update for (a) game can contain about 200,000 words, enough for a lengthy novel; major expansions to its world and story can approach 500,000 words. The English localization team can grow to more than 10 people.” - The Washington...

A prominent Latino group is raising fresh concerns about Paramount Skydance’s proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, saying the blockbuster deal would crush Latino workers and small businesses that support Hollywood. - Los Angeles Times

Theater chain apps suffered apparent outages as moviegoers waited in long virtual lines, hoping to finally glimpse a seat map with some empty spots left on it. In Manhattan, those who have grown mistrustful of this unreliable tech found time on a weekday morning to line up around the block at AMC Lincoln Square. - Wired

Rob Bonta, the attorney general, called off the meeting late Sunday, accusing Paramount of acting in bad faith. In a statement to The Times, Mr. Bonta accused Paramount of leaking details of a meeting the parties held on Friday. - The New York Times

California Attorney General Rob Bonta is expected to ask Paramount to divest some cable channels and commit to keeping its movie studio separate from Warner Bros. before he signs off on the $81 billion merger, people familiar with the matter said. - The Wall Street Journal

And the reason that happened (probably not the reason you think it is) says a lot about where we are with ownership and access to digital stuff. - Reactor

“Fluency in a variety of movement techniques — including street dance, acrobatics and, especially, parkour — allows these dancers to shape seemingly unbounded interactions with their environments. Is that chain-link fence asking to be hurdled with a flip? Could those four stories of scaffolding become a creative jungle gym?” - The New York Times

The idea is that most people access ballet through a story ballet - often, even usually, Nutcracker, but also Sleeping Beauty. It was, simply, time for a refresh - including 268 new costumes. - PBS

The ways that the company’s skill level, repertoire, national and international reputation, budget, and especially school (a ten-fold increase in enrollment) have grown during Sklute’s 20 years as artistic director are extraordinary. - The Utah Review

Gia Kourlas on champion Caitlin Simmers: “Her undulating torso, her sensitivity to the fluctuations of an unsteady surface and her speed are all part of her power. ... Her clarity comes from her deep center of gravity, which allows her to slice up and down waves like a silken ribbon.” - The New York...

“Pole dance is a big part of the festival this year, popping up in sweaty, dazzling shows right across the Fringe. Not only do these acts show off amazing physical feats, they also tell stories that range from one woman’s HIV diagnosis, to the relationship between a neurodivergent mother and son.” - The Guardian

The entire field is facing heightened levels of uncertainty, and we have not been spared. Dance/USA needs to reimagine and rebuild its business model. Our existing organizational strategy and structure are not sustainable. I took this job knowing that that was the case. - Dance Magazine

“There's an entire team at work behind the scenes and a good-natured actor who doesn't mind flames, sweating and being unable to use his hands for the entire run time (of Beauty and the Beast). Making it work is a show unto itself.” - Los Angeles Times (Yahoo!)

Over the next 50 years, until its sudden closing in 2006, the playhouse earned a reputation as one of the leading regional theaters in the country, producing a mix of classic and new plays, many of them hits and some flops. - Miami Herald

Tiffany - of the gorgeously fun teen sex anthem “I Think We’re Alone Now” fame - will relive the ’80s, “making her Off Broadway debut in Spandex the Musical. She plays Linda, a housewife who escapes a life of domestic drudgery to compete in a national aerobics championship.” - The New York Times

“A slapdash seediness has been embedded in the musical’s aesthetic DNA ever since it started in 1973 in a tiny upstairs space at the Royal Court Theater in London.” - The New York Times

Billed as a “five night only” event, “Hadestown: The Musical” has extended its run in theaters for four weeks, thanks to popular demand. In the process, the filmed stage show has become an indie blockbuster, grossing $20.7 million.  - Indiewire

For instance, Sam Eley gives the background on his Basil Crumbwick, whose papier-mâché head makes him seven feet tall, while Katie Pritchard recounts the origin story of her Sir Elton Scone, who hosts a Great British Bake Off-style show which uses no ovens. - The Guardian

Diya Vij: “We know the presence of art in a neighborhood leads to better outcomes in health, safety and education. We know it matters to the economy, to people’s bodies, to relationships, to their ability to find each other. On a policy level, it’s essential to the full life of a New Yorker.” -...

In 1937, Douglas was told to come to a producer’s ranch for a movie. But, “she later said, she and more than 100 other young women — many of whom were minors — had been summoned to entertain men attending MGM’s annual sales convention.” - The New York Times

“The Iranian American actor drew from her own childhood experiences and advocacy work as an ambassador with the International Rescue Committee to shape Dr. Al-Hashimi into who audiences get to know onscreen.” - HuffPost

Working in the 1960s, when most standup was a succession of one-liners, Bruce used profanity, political satire, and sexual material which comedians today consider a basic right. Yet in his day he was regularly arrested and tried for obscenity; Phil Spector ultimately said Bruce died from “an overdose of police.” - Los Angeles Times...

Ted Striggles, a dancer and lawyer who combined his disparate skills to support artists both struggling and successful, and to advise them on how to survive, including with his influential 1976 guide, “Poor Dancer’s Almanac,” died on Saturday at his home in Manhattan. - The New York Times

One of the opera world’s most admired lyric sopranos of the 1970s and ‘80s, she was known for her acting skill as well as her voice, especially in such roles as Violetta in La Traviata, Gilda in Rigoletto, and Tatiana in Eugene Onegin. - Moto Perpetuo