Up to the immediate post-WWII period, publishing was a fairly local, personal business, with houses founded by whiskered men shipping out books to stores on an irregular basis. Today we have the Big Five—HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, Macmillan, Hachette, and Penguin Random House. - The Bulwark
Crying live is the standard challenge, but these actors have also had to simulate coughing, sneezing, climaxing and even vomiting in front of an audience. - Los Angeles Times (Yahoo!)
Acquiring older cultural objects through purchase or donation can be risky for museums if they suspect the art or artifacts might have to be returned to a foreign government at some point. - The Observer
"OpenAI, the organization behind ChatGPT and text-to-image generator DALL-E, … (told Britain's House of Lords that) 'limiting training data to public domain books and drawings created more than a century ago might yield an interesting experiment, but would not provide A.I. systems that meet the needs of today’s citizens.'" - Artnet
The authors of a petition signed by more than 4,000 people "are concerned the addition of this clause as a prerequisite for funding will silence critics of the state of Israel and undermine freedom of expression." - Artnet
It all started when, in 2021, BuzzFeed CEO Jonah Peretti decided he wanted to take the company public using a SPAC (remember those?), all the rage on Wall Street at the time. - New York Magazine (MSN)
From the estate of Lois Kirschenbaum, who spent decades attending opera and ballet and collecting autographs at Lincoln Center and elsewhere, "donations of $215,000 apiece have started to arrive, surprising groups like New York City Opera, American Ballet Theater, Carnegie Hall and the Public Theater." - The New York Times
"The Academy … will keep its museum open and fully operating. It plans to carry on classes in continuing education and its K-12 arts programs. At the same time, PAFA intends to restore its comprehensive three- or four-year certificate program and relaunch it this fall." - The Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)
"Amazon is laying off “several hundred” employees at Prime Video and Amazon MGM Studios. Additionally, 500 employees — or 35% of the workforce — are being let go at Amazon-owned livestream platform Twitch." - Variety
"Freedom of information requests by the PA news agency to museums and galleries that receive public funding from the (national government) asking for details on absent items from the last 20 years found that more than 1,700 items were absent from collections." - The Guardian
A new Brexit tax hike set to hit U.K. orchestras later this year could make trips to Europe “unviable” and undermine their activities back in Britain, the trade body representing the musical ensembles is warning. - Politico
“I am interested in how being ‘in sync’ with other people through the experience of music-making and other forms of artistic expression supports a general feeling of connectedness to others, which in turn may support people’s well-being.” - Ludwig Van
A.I. is in the phase when kids live like tiny energetic monsters, before they’ve learned to be thoughtful about the world and responsible for others. That’s why I’ve come to feel that A.I. needs to be socialized the way young children are... It needs, in short, to be parented. - The New York Times
First was the original ‘world order’ created by Genghis Khan (and his house) in the 13th century. If there is indeed an ‘East’ that is distinct from the ‘West’, one of the points of separation can be placed here. - Aeon
The LAPL, which manages 73 branches and houses more than 8 million books, has lately been much more ambitious than even the average big-city library system, aggressively expanding its special collections in recent years. But acquiring an entire press takes the system to a whole new level. - Los Angeles Times
