Some big media companies want to start prioritizing the way information is handled on the internet, charging more for some kinds of data. Consumer advocates are howling. “Whether they tier their service, telecommunications companies need to expand capacity. To do so costs money, and the telecoms argue that internet users will have to pay, one way or another. They say it’s preferable that the money come from those who need and are willing to pay for better service, rather than spreading the cost out over all users.”
Tag: 02.26.06
How The Music Is Changing In New Orleans
Music changes when circumstances change. That’s certainly proving true in New Orleans. “They’re still playing New Orleans standards as the drinks flow. But there’s a changed spirit: the tenacity of holding together bands whose members have been scattered and the determination to maintain the New Orleans style. And in new songs, an open anger coexists with the old good-time New Orleans tone.”
UK Culture Minister Implicated In Bribe
“An investigation by The Sunday Times has established that UK Culture Minister Tessa Jowell signed a mortgage document that enabled her husband to bring an alleged bribe of £350,000 into Britain. Italian prosecutors claim the money was paid by Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister, for help from Jowell’s husband in two corruption hearings against the politician.”
How An Orchestra Is Changing Its Concert Model
“Traditionally, orchestras organize seasons horizontally because attendance is built on season subscriptions. Seasons often have themes that develop across the entire year, not quite as cohesively as an episodic TV show like “Lost” but designed to have some connection between concerts or to build up to key soloists or symphony works. But the recent explosion in entertainment has challenged that approach. Today’s world is driven by the event; live music must compete with a host of options from Netflix to sports to touring shows.”
Who’s Who Behind Broadway
It takes a lot of people to mount a Broadway show – not just actors. So who makes the industry work?
How To Reform The Getty?
As embattled Getty president Barry Munitz leaves the Trust, the Getty needs to reinvent. “In weighing what to do, the trustees must acknowledge that although the Getty Trust is a multiheaded beast — museum, grant-making foundation, research institute and conservation institute — art is what holds its programs together. Equally important, they must work to restore public confidence in the Getty, not just because it’s the United States’ largest art foundation, but because it’s the nation’s third-largest private foundation overall.”
UK Plagiarism Case Heads To The High Court
“On Monday, the High Court in London will hear a lawsuit which will either make publishing history or be dismissed as a storm in a teacup. The reason for the fuss is that it relates to one of the most successful novels of modern times and the lifting of “the whole architecture” of a body of research, a largely intangible entity which, not without reason, has caused paranoia throughout the literary world. Plagiarism is not a grounds for litigation in the UK, so instead the plaintiffs are alleging copyright infringement, which, of course, amounts to much the same thing. What makes the situation all the more titillating, and bizarre, however, is that they are suing their own publisher.”
Don’t Hate Me Because I’m Enjoying Myself
David Mamet can be a hard playwright to love, especially for those who have met him. But despite the difficulty of some of his plays, and his notoriously prickly persona, Mamet has become a bona fide icon. Still, he can’t resist playing the victim: “I think basically people hate artists,” he says. “They observe or they intuit that the artist is having a great time, that the artist doesn’t have to work, that the artist gets the girls, the boys, the adulation, the money. And it’s true. Once a studio executive or a journalist does that math, they are, of course, enraged.”
Making Art, Making Money
Success and profitability are quite different things in the cutthroat world of New York theatre, and achieving one is no guarantee of making headway towards the other. “What exactly makes the business so tough? Well, expenses, which keep growing, and audiences, which don’t.”
A Complex World, Reduced To A Buzzword
In much the same way that conventional wisdom in the Arab world tends to view “America” as a monolithic place speaking with a single, domineering voice, Westerners have begun to discuss “the Islamic world” as if such a thing could really be reduced to a simple set of ideas and actions. By extension, “Islamic art” is often seen as monolithic and single-minded, when the truth is far more complex. “It’s a political story, an ancient and universal one, about how an image, and almost any image will do, once it is fused to cultural identity — Islam, in this case — can end up being used as a weapon.”