Friday, January 6
The Machine That Sees Inside Your Head "Functional magnetic resonance imaging - fMRI for short - enables researchers to create maps of the brain's networks in action as they process thoughts, sensations, memories, and motor commands. Since its debut in experimental medicine 10 years ago, functional imaging has opened a window onto the cognitive operations behind such complex and subtle behavior as feeling transported by a piece of music or recognizing the face of a loved one in a crowd. Now fMRI is also poised to transform the security industry, the judicial system, and our fundamental notions of privacy." Wired 01/06
Posted: 01/05/2006 9:28 pm
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Art Borne Of Sickness Moscow's 1200-bed Children's Clinical Hospital has quietly become an international pioneer in the field of art therapy, simply by encouraging its young patients to engage their creativity, even as they struggle through batteries of tests and exhausting medical treatments. Now, a Russian foundation is displaying the art created by the young patients in a space normally reserved for "serious" art. "The artworks, which include elaborate beadwork, went on display at the Russian Abroad Foundation, a gleaming new library and research and cultural center that is the creation of Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn and was built with the backing of Moscow's mayor." The New York Times 01/07/06
Posted: 01/08/2006 9:10 am
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CD Stores - The Squeeze Is On Independent CD stores are having a tough time. "Album sales are in decline, music consumers continue to migrate to music downloading and CD-burning. The loss-leader approach to CD sales at giant chains such as Wal-Mart and Best Buy have smothered mom-and-pop outfits. And when prerecorded CDs are sold, more and more often it's through new-approach merchants that are as varied as Amazon.com and Starbucks." Los Angeles Times 01/06/06
Posted: 01/06/2006 7:55 am
Welsh National Opera Hires A Star "Glasgow-born John Fisher will take over the running of WNO in May. He replaces Anthony Freud, who has left after 11 years to take over Houston Opera in Texas. Mr Fisher's track record includes being the first non-Italian ever to run an Italian opera house - La Fenice, in Venice. He has also been head of music at La Scala, Milan, and is now director of music administration at the Met." The Guardian (UK) 01/06/06
Posted: 01/05/2006 10:04 pm
Are Headphones Killing Our Hearing? "Sales of MP3 players soared by 200% in 2005 and the market for headphone entertainment continues to grow with portable video players and handheld games consoles. But the trend has prompted concern from Britain's leading hearing loss charity, the Royal National Institute for the Deaf (RNID). It found 39% of 18 to 24-year-olds listened to personal music players for at least an hour every day and 42% admitted they thought they had the volume too high." BBC 01/05/06
Posted: 01/05/2006 6:32 pm
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Is There A Silver Lining In Detroit's Abysmal Arts Year? 2005 was a tough year for the arts in Detroit, with funding cuts and red ink dominating the cultural landscape. But if there's a bright side to be found in the latest round of government funding pullbacks, it may be that arts advocates have been prodded to begin looking seriously at a diverse array of funding mechanisms that may provide more long-term stability than the whims of finicky politicians would ever allow. Detroit Free Press 01/05/06
Posted: 01/05/2006 6:16 am
Better Late Than Never The Electronic Records Archive, being undertaken by the U.S. National Archives at a cost of more than $300 million, is supposed to finally find a way to catalog all of the significant material that doesn't fit on a piece of paper. As you might imagine, this is a monumentally complex project, and even the chief archivist doesn't seem entirely certain where to begin. "The National Archives has been receiving electronic materials since 1970, but plans for long-term preservation of it all didn't begin until 1998. And the government has only started to take it seriously in the past three years.The National Archives has been receiving electronic materials since 1970, but plans for long-term preservation of it all didn't begin until 1998. And the government has only started to take it seriously in the past three years." Wired 01/05/06
Posted: 01/05/2006 6:04 am
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Aging Like A Fine Wine Let's face facts. Elaine Stritch is not exactly in her prime these days - her voice cracks, her intonation is off, and she sounds like every bit of her 80 years. But Stritch did not become a Broadway legend by vocal talent alone, and her magnificent stage presence and bravado is 100% intact. Furthermore, the aspects of her singing that always made her unique - her use of silence and her special way of delivering lyrics - could be used as a primer for aspiring theatrical singers. The New York Times 01/07/06
Posted: 01/08/2006 9:16 am
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Stratford Scores £20 Million "The planned £100m transformation of Stratford-upon-Avon's Royal Shakespeare Theatre is to get a £20m grant from the regional development agency, Advantage West Midlands. The project has already secured £50m from the Arts Council of England." The Guardian (UK) 01/06/06
Posted: 01/05/2006 10:34 pm
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Men - They're Just Not That In To Reading About It "According to Barnes & Noble, 80% of customers who bought books on relationships are women. Relationship books for women outsell those for men by a ratio of 4 to 1, the company reports. But if it indeed takes two to tango, if on a very basic level men and women are seeking the same thing — each other — why are women so much more keen to study the ins and outs of dating and relationships? Where are the advice books for men? Why aren't books being written for men?" Los Angeles Times 01/06/06
Posted: 01/06/2006 7:52 am
Authors Phone It In Want your favorite author to talk to your book club. These days they might just do it. "Book clubs are a growing force in the publishing industry, and publishers and authors view the call-ins as a way to show their appreciation, build loyalty and market their books. 'This is the next step in the evolution of the relationship between book clubs and publishers'." Yahoo! (USA Today) 01/05/06
Posted: 01/05/2006 8:52 pm
Legal Life As Lit Okay, so maybe it's a stretch to consider the literary merits of legal filings. And yet... "Has there ever been such a deluge of mass-consumed legalese in a condensed period? Indeed, this is a golden age for the turgid and stultifying, a wave of indictments, plea bargains and "informations" interspersed with three Supreme Court justice nominations in a five-month period, with all of the poetic briefs, memos and opinion-writing those can yield." Washington Post 01/05/06
Posted: 01/05/2006 7:21 pm
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Coronation Street Tops UK TV "The biggest Coronation Street episode of the year was on 21 February when 14.35m viewers followed the storyline of Katy's relationship with Martin. An EastEnders episode on 18 February saw 14.34m watch Dirty Den's murder." BBC 01/05/06
Posted: 01/05/2006 6:25 pm
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Dance As A Visual Art? "Ballet, in the present day, has lost much of its dialogue with the progressive visual arts, which have raced into post-modernism and beyond. It risks getting left behind unless it can, once more, find a willing partner in another art and achieve a synchronous rebirth." La Scena Musicale 01/04/06
Posted: 01/05/2006 7:30 pm
Aussie Dance Scene Is Starved For Support "In Australia, dance, the art form that epitomises our ideal image of ourselves as a nation of youthful athleticism, is in peril. Melbourne is home to many significant dance institutions. This city was once noted for its feisty, provocative and prolific independent dance scene, but the dance performance calendars of the past two years suggest the creative ferment is dying for lack of sustenance." The Age (Melbourne) 01/06/06
Posted: 01/05/2006 7:15 pm
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