AJ Four Ways: Text Only (by date) | headlines only
DANCE
IDEAS
- Are Debates Over Student AI Use Arguing Over The Wrong Things?
The battle for the role of AI in higher education this fall is being fought over when and where AI and other digital technologies should be used. This combat ignores the larger crisis: how can colleges verify that they are preparing students to become productive members of society in a digital age? – Post Alley
- Jonathan Franzen’s TV Conversion
Franzen used to think TV was the “enemy” of the serious novelist. But after the HBO series failed, he watched Breaking Bad, Nurse Jackie and Silicon Valley and loved them. In the age of social media, AI and the endless scroll, TV has started to look like a “friend”, he says now. – The Guardian
- Equity UK And National Theatre Of Scotland Agree To Something Novel: Five-Day Work Weeks And Overtime Pay
“As well as reducing standard rehearsal weeks from six to five days,” the new agreement “includes the reduction of the working week from 44 hours to 40 hours, meaning any performers and stage management working more than 40 hours in a week for NTS will receive extra pay.” – The Stage (UK)
- Toronto Symphony Reports A Banner Financial Year
The TSO closed its 2026 fiscal year with an operating surplus of approximately $34,000, thereby increasing its accumulated surplus to nearly $1 million—putting it in its strongest financial position ever. – Colin’s Column
- Warner And Paramount Workers Shocked By Merger Approval
The general mood on both sides of the Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount Skydance aisles on Monday was shock and surprise over the sudden turn of events. – Variety
ISSUES
- The “Extraordinary” Bolivian Painter Whose Work Was Discovered In The Trash
“Alejandro Mario Yllanes was a protégé of Diego Rivera, who championed the bravery with which Yllanes made searingly political works. Yllanes … left little trace of his life after 1950, leaving a cache of paintings, engravings and documents in an apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.” – The New York Times
- National Trust For Historic Preservation Announces $10M Fund To Push Back Against Trump
The fund “will provide resources for legal defense, public advocacy, and community action when historic places and the laws that protect them are under threat,” Brent Leggs, the trust’s president, said in an interview on Tuesday. – Washington Post
- Comedy Comes To The Museum Tour
During the Edinburgh Fringe Festival last month, she made her way to the National Galleries of Scotland for what was billed as a “cheeky romp” uncovering the “gossip, glamour and glorious absurdity hiding behind the art.” Gloriously absurd it was. – NPR
- Faced With Soaring Costs, Museums Are Rethinking Their Climate Control Standards
For decades, professionals codified a climate range of plus or minus 2°C and plus or minus 5% humidity into museum practices and loan agreements worldwide, applying these numbers to institutions in environments wildly different from London. In recent years, however, professionals have started to push back against these stringent standards. – The Art Newspaper
- British Museum Bans Picture-Taking At The Bayeux Tapestry
The museum made like the Sistine Chapel and announced a ban on photography in the exhibition, an unforgivable move to some in the Instagram age but a godsend to others. – The New York Times
MEDIA
- Higher Ed’s AI-Detection Struggle
Four years into the ChatGPT era, colleges may be further from solving AI cheating than they were when it launched. – The Atlantic
- Hungary’s New Government Temporarily Closes Orbán’s House Of Terror Museum
“The museum closure is part of new Hungarian Prime Minister Péter Magyar’s attempts to rectify his predecessor, Viktor Orbán’s, control of state media and arts and culture entities. … (Culture minister Zoltán) Tarr said that the museum would reopen later this year ‘pending a review of the exhibition’s content.’” – ARTnews
- Inside The Capture Of The Kennedy Center
Internal emails and documents obtained by The New York Times demonstrate the political capture of the institution by the whims of Mr. Trump, who at the start of his second term installed a board that made him chairman. Audiences and donors fled, and its finances cratered. – The New York Times
- Why Education Should Be More Like Gym Class
For years, the architecture of higher education quietly encouraged students to believe that the point of a class, and indeed of the entire college experience, was the credential. But if the grade is the goal, and a machine can get you the grade, the machine is not a shortcut; it’s just efficiency. – The New Yorker
- Inside The Kennedy Center’s Real Finances
Now there’s a fuller picture of the finances Trump inherited—and of what happened during his first months in charge. A previously unseen federal tax filing captures an institution in transition. – The Atlantic
MUSIC
- Jonathan Franzen’s TV Conversion
Franzen used to think TV was the “enemy” of the serious novelist. But after the HBO series failed, he watched Breaking Bad, Nurse Jackie and Silicon Valley and loved them. In the age of social media, AI and the endless scroll, TV has started to look like a “friend”, he says now. – The Guardian
- Arkansas Ends Effort To Restrict Prisoners’ Access To Hard-Copy Books
“The Department (of Corrections) first proposed banning incarcerated people from receiving physical books last year in order to tamp down on drugs making their way into prisons. … (The focus will be shifted) to ban ‘misbehaving’ third-parties selling publications laced with drugs to incarcerated people.” – Arkansas Advocate
- 2026 Booker Prize Finalists Include “The Disappearers,” “John Of John,” “The Things We Never Say”
“This year’s Booker prize shortlist features some very familiar names – previous winners Marlon James and Douglas Stuart …, along with Pulitzer winner Elizabeth Strout and prominent British speculative fiction writer M John Harrison. Novelist and poet Luke Kennard and debut novelist Rebecca Perry are also in contention for the £50,000 prize.” – The Guardian
- How The American Public Library Model Evolved
When you view the centuries-long history of American librarianship through a Pennsylvania lens, it’s more complex, nuanced and fascinating than many people realize. – The Conversation
- Russia Is Deliberately Waging War On Ukraine’s Book Industry
More than 40 Ukrainian publishing houses and numerous bookstores have been seriously damaged — and some simply obliterated — in targeted attacks by Russian drones and missiles since the summer began. Over 13 million books — a third of the country’s annual print run — were destroyed in two months. – AP
PEOPLE
- Are Debates Over Student AI Use Arguing Over The Wrong Things?
The battle for the role of AI in higher education this fall is being fought over when and where AI and other digital technologies should be used. This combat ignores the larger crisis: how can colleges verify that they are preparing students to become productive members of society in a digital age? – Post Alley
- Jonathan Franzen’s TV Conversion
Franzen used to think TV was the “enemy” of the serious novelist. But after the HBO series failed, he watched Breaking Bad, Nurse Jackie and Silicon Valley and loved them. In the age of social media, AI and the endless scroll, TV has started to look like a “friend”, he says now. – The Guardian
- Equity UK And National Theatre Of Scotland Agree To Something Novel: Five-Day Work Weeks And Overtime Pay
“As well as reducing standard rehearsal weeks from six to five days,” the new agreement “includes the reduction of the working week from 44 hours to 40 hours, meaning any performers and stage management working more than 40 hours in a week for NTS will receive extra pay.” – The Stage (UK)
- Toronto Symphony Reports A Banner Financial Year
The TSO closed its 2026 fiscal year with an operating surplus of approximately $34,000, thereby increasing its accumulated surplus to nearly $1 million—putting it in its strongest financial position ever. – Colin’s Column
- Warner And Paramount Workers Shocked By Merger Approval
The general mood on both sides of the Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount Skydance aisles on Monday was shock and surprise over the sudden turn of events. – Variety
PEOPLE
- Are Debates Over Student AI Use Arguing Over The Wrong Things?
The battle for the role of AI in higher education this fall is being fought over when and where AI and other digital technologies should be used. This combat ignores the larger crisis: how can colleges verify that they are preparing students to become productive members of society in a digital age? – Post Alley
- Jonathan Franzen’s TV Conversion
Franzen used to think TV was the “enemy” of the serious novelist. But after the HBO series failed, he watched Breaking Bad, Nurse Jackie and Silicon Valley and loved them. In the age of social media, AI and the endless scroll, TV has started to look like a “friend”, he says now. – The Guardian
- Equity UK And National Theatre Of Scotland Agree To Something Novel: Five-Day Work Weeks And Overtime Pay
“As well as reducing standard rehearsal weeks from six to five days,” the new agreement “includes the reduction of the working week from 44 hours to 40 hours, meaning any performers and stage management working more than 40 hours in a week for NTS will receive extra pay.” – The Stage (UK)
- Toronto Symphony Reports A Banner Financial Year
The TSO closed its 2026 fiscal year with an operating surplus of approximately $34,000, thereby increasing its accumulated surplus to nearly $1 million—putting it in its strongest financial position ever. – Colin’s Column
- Warner And Paramount Workers Shocked By Merger Approval
The general mood on both sides of the Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount Skydance aisles on Monday was shock and surprise over the sudden turn of events. – Variety
THEATRE
VISUAL
- Are Debates Over Student AI Use Arguing Over The Wrong Things?
The battle for the role of AI in higher education this fall is being fought over when and where AI and other digital technologies should be used. This combat ignores the larger crisis: how can colleges verify that they are preparing students to become productive members of society in a digital age? – Post Alley
- The Real Qualities Of A Skeptic
‘Sceptic’ comes from the Greek skeptikos, meaning enquirer, and has a long and serious pedigree in philosophy. Yet, since the 1990s, the term has been hijacked by science-denial movements, giving us oxymorons like ‘climate sceptic’, ‘vaccine sceptic’, and ‘evolution sceptic’. – Aeon
- New UK Company Will Recreate Famous Concerts With Hyper-Realistic Digital Avatars In Any Space
The former chief executive of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s entertainment group has obtained a near-£15m investment for his UK music tech startup that hopes to recreate classic concerts by manifesting musicians as digital avatars. – The Guardian
- Turns Out The Lucas Museum Provides A Great Backdrop For Jedi-Themed Protests
At the event, about workers’ rights and the upcoming Olympics in L.A., “protesters from the Fair Games Coalition — wearing Jedi robes and Jar Jar Binks masks and carrying lightsabers — rallied together outside the new museum.” – Los Angeles Times (MSN)
- Why Do So Many Of Us Love A Good Small Murder Town?
Sure, they started with Miss Marple and the written word, but “the Small Murder Town really came into its own with the advent of film—and not just any film. Small Murder Towns thrive on the small screen; this is a trope that was made for television.” – Reactor