Says one exec, "While we don't live or die by ratings, as at commercial stations, learning when and for how long people are listening helps us make programming decisions. Since we sell sponsorships, being ranked in the top 10 is helpful especially when approaching media buyers." - Inside Radio
Tony Kushner: "She either comprehends or intuits, not what necessarily is the most obvious choice for dramatic action, but what's under the surface, where the real meaning of a piece lies. … She has this absolutely uncanny ability to translate that into music." - The New York Times
"The public continued to interrogate museums over their treatment of workers, their attachments to patrons with problematic sources of wealth, and their dragon-like hold on items of questionable provenance." And then there's Hunter Biden … - Artnet
It's happening with works by the likes of Klimt, Picasso, Rembrandt. Most controversially, if the only surviving photos of a lost work are in black-and-white, the software adds color. - The Washington Post
The dictatorship's censors were all too thorough: scenes were even cut from It's a Wonderful Life — and the doctored version of that film is turning up on television. Same with books. Here's how and why this has happened … - The Guardian
Swimming has been officially banned since 1923. More than two-thirds of all French have a negative perception of the river. And yet when French officials unveiled their ambitions for the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris this month, the Seine was treated like a resurrected national monument. - Washington Post
It is impossible to overestimate the volume of stuff that is being produced, edited, and put online today. The content cup runneth over, and much of what’s in it is baffling and bizarre. - Wired
You can sense it in all the calculations Disney has been making with regard to what goes to theaters, what’s PVOD, and what goes directly to Disney+. - Slate
News accounts described its dozens of donated artifacts, including Confederate memorabilia. Based on historical records, some have also speculated the capsule might contain a rare photo of deceased President Abraham Lincoln. - The Guardian
"Vulture's theater desk, Helen Shaw and Jackson McHenry, discuss the 2021 version, how it alters a hugely familiar piece of art, and how and where those changes worked." - Vulture
New opera, by any reasonable definition – by any defensible amalgamation of the definitions commonly put forward over the years – is thriving. - Osborne on Opera: A Critical Blog
How the pulp nonfiction devoured by the public during Tsar Alexander II's reign led to Crime and Punishment — and how Dostoevsky used the hunger for true crime stories to get his political message into the public's hands. - The New Republic
In November, we presented a list of the 25 most-nominated books (one per author) for a vote. After tallying more than 200,000 ballots, the winner, by a narrow margin, is... - The New York Times
"In the last few weeks, I've seen … Trouble in Mind, Caroline, or Change and Clyde's. Individually, their plots and period settings offer great insight into how far we've really come. But taken together, they reveal a full range of aesthetic and racial possibilities." - The New York Times
Made via an elaborate, 16-step process with a rare cotton that only grew along the banks of the holy Meghna river, the cloth was considered one of the great treasures of the age. It had a truly global patronage, stretching back thousands of years. - BBC
