Stifling Creativity - Control Concern "How does an economy best promote innovation? Do patents and copyrights nurture or stifle it? Have we gone too far in protecting intellectual property? In a paper that has gained wide attention (and caught serious flak) for challenging the conventional wisdom, economists Michele Boldrin and David K. Levine answer the final question with a resounding yes. Copyrights, patents, and similar government-granted rights serve only to reinforce monopoly control, with its attendant damages of inefficiently high prices, low quantities, and stifled future innovation, they write." Reason 02/20/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 1:32 am
Venice's New Logo - License It And Pay The city of Venice has a new logo, a "rather severe-looking winged lion superimposed over a V. Winged lions, dating to Assyrian times, have been a symbol of Venice for hundreds of years." But the city wants merchants to pay for the logo. "We don't want to raise money just by selling T-shirts. Anyone who now uses Venice for private reasons to make private money, we're asking them to add our logo and pay a fee. This way they will state that they are participating in a worldwide campaign to save Venice — and to preserve its heritage." The New York Times 02/20/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 2:24 am
Abandoning The New In Scotland "In the Scottish Arts Council's recent announcement of its funding plans for the next financial year, two stories commanded the headlines: the shelving of the plans for a national theatre and the freezing of Scottish Opera's grant. There were many other stories, but these were, in the shadow of the "big" issues of the day, relegated to footnote status, or not even noticed. One of those issues is politically important, and strikes at the heart of a perennial concern in Scottish musical society: the support for contemporary classical music and for those composers - Scottish by birth or working in Scotland - who write it." The Herald (Glasgow) 02/19/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 5:27 am
Giving Russian Musicians A Reason To Stay The Russian government hs established a set of grants designed to provide incentive for the nation's top musicians to keep their talents in country, rather than seeking out higher-paying positions in Europe and America. The average Russian orchestra musician currently makes around US$120 a month. The grants, which will be doled out to seven musical organizations in Moscow and St. Petersburg, will be used principally to increase those salaries to as much as $1400 a month. The money is a welcome relief for cash-strapped orchestras and conservatories, but many fear the fix may be temporary. Gramophone 02/19/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 5:20 am
Houston Symphony Standoff The Houston Symphony and its musicians are locked in a contract dispute that threatens the future of the orchestra. The orchestra is carrying a big deficit, and management proposes cuts in musicians and musician salaries. The musicians, not surprisingly, have a different idea. How did the situation deteriorate to the point of work stoppages and accusations? Houston Press 02/19/03
Posted: 02/19/2003 11:34 pm
States Hack Away At Arts Funding Several US states propose eliminating arts funding. Others - like Virginia - are considering major cuts of 50 percent of their arts budgets. "As a result of these cuts, many arts councils and nonprofit cultural groups will lose matching funds from private donors and the federal government. The $3.9 million cut in Missouri, for example, will mean the loss of about $1 million in federal matching funds." The New York Times 02/20/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 6:15 am
- Minnesota Joins The Party Minnesota is facing a staggering $4.5 billion budget deficit, and the state's new Republican governor has promised to get rid of the imbalance without raising taxes. So it came as no surprise to anyone in the state's arts community when Gov. Tim Pawlenty's budget proposal included a sizable slash in arts funding. While the proposed 22% cut is far from the "zeroing out" being suggested in some states, Minnesota has always prided itself on its commitment to the arts, and artists are preparing a massive lobbying effort to defeat the plan in the state legislature. St. Paul Pioneer Press 02/20/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 6:10 am
Standing Up For The Little Guy "Among Boston's arts groups, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Now there's a new effort to balance the scales. Local arts leaders hope a 40-member task force set to be announced today by the Boston Foundation will generate fresh momentum on a problem the city has failed for decades to address. The task force will work from a study to be released today by the foundation that shows that while big bucks continue to flow into a handful of the city's largest cultural institutions, donations have been declining for more than 500 Boston-area arts organizations." Boston Herald 02/20/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 5:35 am
Saving The Culture A government agency is warning that Great Britain "faces a cultural crisis if the government does not set up tax breaks to prevent important art going overseas." The government has been scrambling recently to prevent several important works of art from winding up in the hands of US museums and collectors. So far, the only thing preventing the art export is a set of temporary bans, but officials say that the only permanent solution is to provide financial inducements for the art to stay in the UK. The US already has such a system. BBC 02/20/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 5:08 am
New Mexico Legislature Votes To Restore Arts Education The New Mexico House of Representatives has voted unanimously to restore arts education in public schools. "Arts education has been shown to enhance many aspects of a child's intellect, including critical thinking and creative problem solving," said the bill's sponsor. "The bill was supported by members of both parties." Santa Fe New Mexican 02/19/03
Posted: 02/19/2003 11:46 pm
Leading The Way The dearth of African-Americans in the classical music business is well-documented, and role models for young black musicians are few and far between. That makes the success of composer Adolphus Hailstork all the more impressive. Not only is Hailstork one of America's preeminent academic composers, he has made his mark on the industry by basing many of his works on music with great significance to the African-American experience. "When conductors and performers see a well-crafted piece, they not only come back to me but to other black composers as well. When a piece works and I walk onstage in front of a predominantly white audience, I know I've changed their world in many ways." Detroit News 02/20/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 5:44 am
Missing Diva Still Missing It's been a week since soprano Sumi Jo abruptly up and left Australia, abandoning a performance of "Lucia" for Opera Australia without a word. No one at the company has yet heard from her. "Even Jo's manager, Tony Russo, hasn't had a phone call explaining her actions. 'I haven't spoken to her yet. She took everyone by surprise. I still don't know what came to pass but she's not a canceller'." Sydney Morning Herald 02/19/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 1:25 am
Ted Perry: Music With A Conscience Ted Perry was a singular voice in the music business. He founded and ran Hyperion as a small recording label and "modest as it was, Hyperion became a marque of musical conscience, a reproach at the preposterous Classical Brits to the fixed smiles of the bottom-liners and their forgettable novelties. 'When I first knew him, he was driving a minicab at nights to pay the musicians he recorded by day. The gleam in his eye was an urge to share good music with anyone who might love it - chaps like himself, without social pretensions or academic qualifications, whose grey horizons could be tinted by an exposure to aural glories." London Evening Standard 02/19/03
Posted: 02/19/2003 11:22 pm
A Reprieve For Seattle ACT Theatre... Seattle's ACT Theatre gives itself a reprieve from oblivion. The theatre had said it needed to raise $1.5 million by this Friday to avoid closing. But "at a meeting yesterday afternoon, the 25-member board elected to pay ACT's skeleton staff of nine employees and the company's other essential expenses out of their own pockets for a month, while trying to raise the $1.5 million they say is needed to keep the theater from closing permanently." Seattle Times 02/20/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 2:41 am
- Seattle's ACT Theatre Breathing Its Final Gasps? How do you sell 120,000 tickets and still run up a $500,000 deficit? Seattle's A Contemporary Theatre did it last year, and last week said if it wasn't able to raise $1.5 million toward an accumulated deficit of $1.7 million, it would have to close its doors by this Friday. So far, no white knight has come forward... The New York Times 02/20/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 2:13 am
- Previously: Seattle's ACT Theatre On The Verge Of Closure Seattle's A Contemporary Theatre is $1.7 million in debt, has $3,000 in the bank, and has reduced its staff from 65 to nine. If the theatre doesn't raise $1.5 million by next week, one of Seattle's oldest and most respected theatres will close its doors. Seattle Times 02/15/03
Gregerson Wins Kingsley Tufts Poet Linda Gregerson has taken home a $100,000 prize from the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award for her collection "Waterborne." The award is the largest of its kind in the US. Gregerson is a profesor at the University of Michigan, and the former poetry editor of The Atlantic Monthly. Boston Globe 02/20/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 5:31 am
Can Good Writing Be Taught? Judging by the number of writing courses offered, the answer for many is yes. But "a quick glance at the bestseller lists will tell you it's hard enough to find something halfway decent to read at the best of times, so no great synaptic leap is required to intuit that most writing courses produce writers who are only going to be read by those unlucky enough to be friends, family or fellow course mates. So there is a lurking feeling that many creative writing courses are driven by market forces rather than any altruistic desire to release untapped genius." The Guardian (UK) 02/18/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 12:52 am
Can Salon Survive? Can Salon magazine survive past the end of February? "The company has already been through several rounds of layoffs and cut everyone's pay by 15 per cent. It now employs fewer than two dozen staffers." But its remaining employees are loyal: "Our impending non-existence has been predicted in the press for so long and with such conviction that we considered adopting 'die another day' as a marketing slogan until the Bond franchise beat us to it." The Globe & Mail (Canada) 02/19/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 12:22 am
Slashing Canadian TV Canadian TV producers are apoplectic over a 25% budget cut handed down by the federal government this week. The cuts came as the nation's TV industry prepares to select which funding proposals for new and existing shows will actually get the money they need for production. Additionally, the government is offering new financial inducements designed to attract even more American production crews to Canada, leading Toronto-based TV execs to complain that Ottawa is favoring foreign media interests over domestic ones. The Globe & Mail (Toronto) 02/20/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 5:51 am
Hollywood Offers Money For Piracy Snitches The Motion Picture Association of America is offering rewards to informats on DVD piracy in Asia. The "MPA estimates that pirated DVDs cost Hollywood $3 billion in lost revenue in 2002, and $646 million in Asia." The MPA declines to say how much informants will be offered, that "rewards would be significant and dependent on the quality of information provided. 'If we need more money we'll get it. Money isn't the issue'." Wired 02/19/03
Posted: 02/20/2003 1:51 am
