“It could almost be a writing workshop prompt: tell a story, do it in six words, go for the wow effect – and that’s exactly what the Ritz-Carlton wants. Recently, the hotel company launched a campaign inviting social media friends and followers to provide six-word stories about their Ritz-Carlton experiences with the hashtag #RCMemories.”
Jane Austen Used Pins To Edit Her Manuscripts
“Before the word processor, before Whiteout, before Post-It Notes, there were straight pins. Or, at least that’s what Jane Austen used to make edits in one of her rare manuscripts.” Have a look.
One Thousand Choreographed Robots (Or, Flo Ziegfeld Meets The Roombas)
“There’s something unsettling about watching 1,000 robots execute a perfectly choreographed routine. … And yet, these machines – tiny $20 robots that take five minutes each to assemble, for a total of 83 hours – are actually completely banal. In fact, according to the researchers, their capabilities are pretty abysmal.” (video)
The Two Things Students Really Want From Teachers
William Deresiewicz: Not, as people commonly believe, to entertain them in class and hand out easy A’s. That’s what they retreat to, once they see that nothing better is on offer. … They don’t want fun and games; they want the real thing.”
What’s The Benefit Of Long – REALLY Long – Plays?
“You could read on the actors’ faces real gratitude that people had come and stayed for that long, despite plenty of chances to flee. In this instance, mere presence was quite a statement of support.”
Take A Look At How These Artists Live
“I wanted to see how people spend the majority of their time, how they work, to motivate myself—and take away more positive ways that people work with their space, or work with whatever situation they’re in, to stay motivated.”
What Kind Of Art We Should See After Ferguson
“The piece is a stunning reflection of a society that is grappling with the notion of African American men as threats; that there might be places where they should and shouldn’t be.”
Do People Who Inspire Hit Movies Deserve More Than $2000 And A Lifetime Gag Order?
“She has been watching Tom Hedley promote his musical in the Canadian press. More than once she has heard him say that the women on whom Flashdance was based were never able to cash in on their dreams. ‘Are you kidding me?’ she says. ‘You took my dreams.'”
Eastern Ukraine Museums Warned To Hide Their Collections
“Culture officials in the Luhansk and Donetsk regions in eastern Ukraine have ordered museums to put their most valuable pieces into storage, and some institutions have closed to the public … Ukraine’s culture ministry has also asked that the media refrain from ’emphasising objects of cultural heritage’ to avoid their being targeted [in the ongoing fighting].”
John Oliver Isn’t Just Making Fun Of Current Events, He’s Making People Care About Them
“Last Week Tonight has found a way to take a seemingly complicated issue, break it into understandable parts – and then rebuild it. … And Oliver is not just influencing viewers; he’s actually having an effect on the people he’s criticizing.” His viewers crashed the FCC’s website, and he’s been denounced by the Government of Thailand.
Flash Flood Damages Historic Theater In Death Valley
“The historic Amargosa Opera House suffered serious flood damage after heavy rain struck the tiny town of Death Valley Junction, Calif., last week.” More than a foot of water “ripped through the theater, warping the original wood floors of the 91-year-old [venue].”
The Latest Group To Use Drones: Archaeologists
“Archaeologists around the world, who have long relied on the classic tools of their profession, like the trowel and the plumb bob, are now turning to the modern technology of drones to defend and explore endangered sites. And perhaps nowhere is the shift happening as swiftly as in Peru.”
Nicholas Kristof: Don’t Abandon The Humanities; They Still Matter
“University students focusing on the humanities may end up, at least in their parents’ nightmares, as dog-walkers for those majoring in computer science. But, for me, the humanities are not only relevant but also give us a toolbox to think seriously about ourselves and the world.”
Top Posts From AJBlogs 08.14.14
Take Control of The Tate, With A Robot, After Dark
AJBlog: Real Clear Arts | Published 2014-08-14
The Importance of the Humanities
AJBlog: CultureCrash | Published 2014-08-14
The Courage to Fail
AJBlog: Field Notes | Published 2014-08-15
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This Documentary Caused SeaWorld’s Stock Price To Fall By A Third
“Shares in the amusement park SeaWorld fell 33% after a 6-7% decline in the company’s revenues was forecast – with falling attendances driven in part by the negative publicity surrounding the documentary film Blackfish.”
Fantasy King Lear (Like Fantasy Football): Casting The Title Role
Charles McNulty: “Liam Neeson doesn’t have the Shakespearean chops but he has that combination of paternal fury and tenderness that is just what the role requires. … Al Pacino would either be the greatest Lear in recent memory or the most embarrassing. Actually, he could very well be both at the same time. … Nathan Lane is hardly just a comic actor.” (We haven’t even told you the real curveball.)
Rauschenberg Foundation Appeals $24.6M Court Award To Estate Trustees
“A legal battle has reignited between the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation and three of the late artist’s friends and business associates. The foundation yesterday appealled a Florida judge’s decision to award the trustees of the Robert Rauschenberg Revocable Trust a fee of $24.6m.”
Utah Symphony Barnstorms The State’s National Parks
This orchestra had lost the high profile and wide admiration it had during its glory days under the late Maurice Abravanel. Now music director Thierry Fischer is determined to get them back, both nationally and within the state – so he and his players are touring beyond Salt Lake City to five of Utah’s most scenic locales.
“Who The Hell Wants To Be Happy All The Time?” Asks Christopher Plummer
“It’s a miserable state to be in permanently. Can you imagine how dreary that would be?”
Re-Creating The Palace Of The Kaisers
“After much contention and delay, the Hohenzollern Palace, seat of Prussia’s monarchy and the jewel in the city’s crown until the East Berlin regime leveled the building in 1950, has begun rising again. … Off-site sculptors are crafting an exact replica of the palace’s baroque facade as it was before World War II.”
Why the Public Library Beats Amazon, Even For E-Books
“More than 90% of American public libraries have amassed e-book collections you can read on your iPad, and often even on a Kindle. You don’t have to walk into a branch or risk an overdue fine. And they’re totally free.”
E-Reading Is Convenient, But It’s Less Memorable (Literally)
“In most respects, there was no significant difference between the Kindle readers and the paper readers [in the study] But, the Kindle readers scored significantly lower on questions about when events in the story occurred. They also performed almost twice as poorly when asked to arrange 14 plot points in the correct sequence.” Says one of the researchers, “It’s interesting to us that the differences were both related to time and temporality – why is that?”
Do Broccoli Eaters Get More Out Of Life?
Of course we do! “People [in a recent study] who ate more fruits and vegetables over the 13-day period reported higher average levels of curiosity, creativity, and positive emotions, as well as engagement, meaning, and purpose.”
Misty Copeland May Get Her Own Biopic
New Line Cinema has purchased the option to adapt Copeland’s memoir, Life In Motion: An Unlikely Ballerina, into a feature film; producers and scriptwriters have already been selected. The Hollywood pitch: “The Blind Side set in the dance world.”
Email Is Still The Best Thing On The Internet
Some pundits, and Silicon valley types with cloud software to sell, keep arguing that email is an antiquated, dying technology. But no: “You can’t kill email! It’s the cockroach of the Internet, and I mean that as a compliment. This resilience is a good thing.” Alexis Madrigal explains why.