UMG and Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square have an agreement that Pershing Square can request UMG to list in the U.S. if it sells at least $500 million in stock as part of the offering. - The Wall Street Journal
St. George’s Guildhall, located in the Norfolk town of King’s Lynn and dating from 1445, and the surrounding buildings and courtyards are to undergo a £30.5 million restoration and development. The venue’s original stage floor, on which Shakespeare is believed to have once performed, was uncovered earlier this year. - BBC (MSN)
The UK government should intervene to make public broadcaster (PSB) content easier to find on YouTube, the regulator has urged, as it gravely posits that “time is running out” to save the sector. - Deadline
Who knew that it was possible to talk in this educated but roughhouse way about Mozart, star sopranos, Herbert von Karajan? Or that the fate of the world—or at least the fate of pleasure—hangs on whether string players warm their tone with vibrato? For those to whom such things matter at all, they matter desperately. - The New Yorker
“I believe this kind of complicated financial settlement with a sitting government official has a technical name in legal circles—it’s big fat bribe,” he said. - The New Yorker
“A report by Ofcom warns that UK-focused programming made by the British public service broadcasters (PSBs) – the BBC, ITV and Channels 4 and 5 – is under threat and there is a ‘strong case’ for legislation to make sure it is easy to find on third-party platforms,” notably YouTube. - The Guardian
Our lifespans have expanded, but our health spans—the number of years we live with mental sharpness, physical independence, and emotional well-being—has not kept pace. If we don’t prepare now, the result won’t just be personal hardship. - Time
What made libraries so exciting? They were hardly novelties. Roman writers like Cicero and the two Plinies assembled rich collections of books in their city houses and country villas. - London Review of Books
Despite more advanced manufacturing and design technologies than have existed in human history, our built environment tends overwhelmingly toward the insubstantial, the flat, and the gray, punctuated here and there by the occasional childish squiggle. - n+1
Patrick Soon-Shiong, the pharma billionaire who bought the L.A. Times in 2018 (and was seen as a savior at the time but no longer), said that he is planning to “take L.A. Times public, (for it) to be democratized. And allow the public to have ownership of this paper.” - The Hollywood Reporter
“Herbert Blomstedt is still conducting major symphony orchestras around the world at the age of 98. And as correspondent Martha Teichner reports, he plans to continue doing so past 100 because, he says, ‘I have gifts I have to live up to.’” - CBS News
“For Ukraine, For Their Freedom and Ours!, a French nonprofit, has filed a case with the International Criminal Court (in the Hague), accusing Russia of the ‘systematic, widespread, and organized’ looting of Ukrainian cultural heritage.” - ARTnews
“Blending Tin Pan Alley sentiment and contemporary pop, the Bergmans” — Alan and his wife, Marilyn (who passed in 2022) — “crafted lyrics known by millions, many of whom would not have recognized the writers had they walked right past them.” - AP
The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, umbrella organization for the de Young Museum and the Legion of Honor, is eliminating 12 positions. A statement explained the layoffs as a response to reduced municipal funding due to the city’s budget crisis, a slump in tourism, and a continued slump in attendance post-COVID. - San Francisco Chronicle
“Donald Trump sued Dow Jones, News Corp, Rupert Murdoch and two Wall Street Journal reporters on Friday over an explosive report that the president wrote a 2003 birthday letter to Jeffrey Epstein that contained suggestive language. Trump claims the Wall Street Journal and its journalists defamed him.” - Variety
