Category: issues

According to the survey of over 1,000 people in the U.S. conducted between Aug. 3–10, 70% of consumers believe COVID-19 has had a severe negative impact on movie theaters, and 69% see a severe impact for live music concerts. In comparison, 65% see a severe impact for fairs and festivals and live theater, 61% for airlines, 57% for sit-down restaurants, 50% for hotels and museums, and 44% for independent and non-profit arts organizations. But when asked whether they would support federal relief money being earmarked for those industries, the results are practically reversed. – Variety

Amid this backdrop, what are the options available to arts venues, upon which so much of the industry relies, when they find traditional spaces not fit for purpose within social distancing guidelines? Will hibernation or adaptation be the best long-term survival strategy? – Toks Dada

Seriously, SAG-AFTRA? During a global pandemic that has a lot of members out of work? Well, trustees say, “By 2024, the Health Plan is projected to run out of reserves. We must prevent this from happening.” – Variety

This is not to excuse the United States’ patchwork of school tests, the weirdness (and inequity) of the ACT or SAT, but … wow. “The coronavirus pandemic means exams were canceled and replaced with teacher assessments and algorithms. It has created chaos.” – Wired

That’s because all of Lebanon was in crisis, with daily demonstrations, the collapse of the currency, and a gridlocked, dysfunctional political class that has been clinging to control since the civil war ended inconclusively 30 years ago. “What is frightening is that we are already so exhausted, so discouraged,” said the director of the city’s leading museum. “I don’t think we’re going to be able to pick ourselves up and move on,” lamented one gallerist. “I am 55. I have reconstructed my life so many times, and this time it’s just the last straw.” – CNN

The latest figures for 2019 represent a slowdown in the growth of the number of completed projects seen each year since 2016, as well as the fourth consecutive drop in the number of announced projects, which hit a peak of 135 in 2016. – Artnet

“I served as an external adviser and peer reviewer for the museum over several years. The current crisis may be shocking, but it’s a predictable consequence of the museum’s history of separating strategic management practices from human rights principles.” – The Conversation

“What sometimes gets obscured is the fact that many online-censorship decisions are made not by powerful actors” — for instance, senior execs at Facebook or Twitter — “imposing their will on average internet denizens, but by an army of users who have, in effect, been deputized as censors” — for instance, moderators at Reddit or the people who report tweets they find offensive to Twitter. “This massive, mostly anonymous and pseudonymous group of internet culture cops is doing a large and likely growing share of the daily work of content-policing.” Jesse Singal looks into who they are and why they do it. – Nautilus

“The important idea here is this – there is a sharp difference between the meaning of the concept of art (which certainly doesn’t need you to be indispensable) and the meaning of the purpose of the art that your nonprofit performing arts organization produces. When your performing art makes its case by showing intentional measurable impacts, then it too will be indispensable.” – LinkedIn