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Archives for May 2009

10 Ways to Think About Social Networking And The Arts (the zen of "free" as a strategy)

May 28, 2009 by Douglas McLennan 13 Comments

Power in numbers. There ought to be a simple formula to calculate it. Is it better to have a small devoted audience or a massive casual one? It depends on the scale of what you're trying to do. TV has power because it has the ability to attract millions of viewers. The New York Review of Books has power because though its audience is small, it is influential. The problem is when the scale of … [Read more...]

A New ArtsJournal Blog

May 18, 2009 by Douglas McLennan 1 Comment

I'm very happy to announce the latest ArtsJournal blog, Creative Destruction, by orchestra conductor John Dodson. I met John last summer while I was working on a story for Symphony magazine on new ways of running orchestras. John is music director of the tiny Adrian Symphony in Adrian, Michigan, pop. 21,703. In the past seven years he's remade the orchestra with executive director Susan Hoffman … [Read more...]

The Politics Of Free – Why Giving "Stuff" Away Is An Interesting Business Model

May 18, 2009 by Douglas McLennan Leave a Comment

Over at the top of the Studio 360 website on their segment about the state of arts journalism, there's a quote by me that says that the best business model right now is to give away as much "stuff" as you can. Okay, a bit inelegantly expressed, in the course of a long audio interview for the show. You can hear the full segment here: But the idea isn't new. And it's not mine. Cory Doctorow has … [Read more...]

If It Was Just About The Money We'd All Be Making Porn

May 14, 2009 by Douglas McLennan 12 Comments

A movie studio exec once told me that if it were true that Hollywood was only interested in making money, the studios would have long ago ditched what they were doing and made porn. Huge money in porn, apparently. Who knew? Much as it's easy to dismiss the moguls for chasing money, there is an aesthetic at work. And much as it's important to have an eye on the bottom line, to succeed over … [Read more...]

Us Against “Them” (That Anti-Expert Thing Again)

May 11, 2009 by Douglas McLennan 3 Comments

In the Weekly Standard, John Podhoretz has noted the carnage of movie critics at newspapers. He isn't weeping. Movie criticism has been a feature of American newspapers for a century, and sadly, one can count the standout critics throughout that time on maybe two hands. Many of these jobs were filled by reporters or editors who didn't get another plum assignment and were thrown a bone by a gruff … [Read more...]

Incremental Arts. Incremental Arts Journalism?

May 5, 2009 by Douglas McLennan 7 Comments

A few years ago I was hired to consult on a national radio show to develop a plan for covering the arts. I suggested that trying to cover culture in a scattershot way (one from column A, two from column B...) was an archaic approach that ought to be abandoned. Sports isn't covered like that. Politics isn't. Events don't happen in isolation. They're part of an arc of context. Why is it news that … [Read more...]

The Big Newspaper E-Reader Gamble

May 4, 2009 by Douglas McLennan Leave a Comment

Several new large-format e-readers are about to go on sale. Newspaper execs are excited:These devices from Amazon and other manufacturers offer an almost irresistible proposition to newspaper and magazine industries. They would allow publishers to save millions on the cost of printing and distributing their publications, at precisely a time when their businesses are under historic levels of … [Read more...]

Is Perfection Killing Classical Music?

May 3, 2009 by Douglas McLennan 9 Comments

Not literally, of course, at least not yet. The ability to edit and fix recordings has long conditioned audiences to expect that the music we hear should be perfect. Has it changed the way performers play in live concert? The role of recordings in the music business has changed. Once, recordings were primarily a product, a way to make money. But classical music recordings haven't made significant … [Read more...]

Douglas McLennan

I’m the founder and editor of ArtsJournal, which was founded in September 1999 and aggregates arts and culture news from all over the internet. The site is also home to some 60 arts bloggers. I’m a … [Read More...]

About diacritical

Our culture is undergoing profound changes. Our expectations for what culture can (or should) do for us are changing. Relationships between those who make and distribute culture and those who consume it are changing. And our definitions of what artists are, how they work, and how we access them and their work are changing. So... [Read more]

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  • Douglas McLennan on Inflection Point? A Crisis in Paying for Culture in the Age of Abundance: “True – but the Swiftie phenomenon demonstrates how deeply people want to engage and that they’re willing to pay dearly…” Jul 24, 21:25
  • Tom Corddry on Inflection Point? A Crisis in Paying for Culture in the Age of Abundance: “An additional data point: Taylor Swift drew 144,000+ to her two Seattle concerts, at an average ticket price of $123.…” Jul 24, 15:34
  • Steven Lavine on Inflection Point? A Crisis in Paying for Culture in the Age of Abundance: “Terrific account. Like so many of our social media Augmented crises, it’s hard to see a way forward.” Jul 24, 13:52
  • Howard Mandel on Inflection Point? A Crisis in Paying for Culture in the Age of Abundance: “At least it’s clear the “ long-tail” argument was a canard.” Jul 24, 06:10
  • Sam Hodak on Too Many Artists Or Not Enough Value?: “So what you’re telling me is… make a VR experience” May 12, 00:03
  • Mark on What If Disruption Was Just A Tech Con Game?: “Thank you” Mar 19, 13:15
  • Douglas McLennan on Still Amusing Ourselves to Death: Information as Cautionary Tale: “Hi John: Yes – remember over the last decade how Big Data was going to change everything and drive every…” Nov 26, 07:46
  • John McCann on Still Amusing Ourselves to Death: Information as Cautionary Tale: “I haven’t read this book, yet your review triggered an insight about information shared within organizations and how so much…” Nov 26, 03:57
  • Richard Voorhaar on The UnderTow: The High-flying Oil Industry fears “Demand Destruction.” Should the Arts?: “We have reached the point where the average American has no attention span. A 3-4 minute pop tune is all…” Jun 10, 11:22
  • Alan Harrison on The UnderTow: The High-flying Oil Industry fears “Demand Destruction.” Should the Arts?: “Brilliant piece, Doug. It’s why, in my own columns on LinkedIn and Medium, I may have become more strident recently…” Jun 8, 15:46

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An ArtsJournal Blog

Recent Posts

  • American Orchestras Could Learn Something from South Dakota
  • Inflection Point? A Crisis in Paying for Culture in the Age of Abundance
  • Still Amusing Ourselves to Death: Information as Cautionary Tale
  • The UnderTow: What the new Edinburgh Fringe Tells us about a Post-COVID World
  • The UnderTow: The High-flying Oil Industry fears “Demand Destruction.” Should the Arts?

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