This spring, the San Francisco chapter of the American Institute of Architects gave three of its design awards “to housing complexes built by nonprofit developers, while an urban design commendation celebrated the rebirth of a public housing project. This isn’t a fluke, or political correctness applied to subsidized housing. It reflects a surprising aspect of today’s urban landscape: Many of the most progressive buildings — both in appearance and function — are designed expressly for low- and moderate-income residents.”
Tag: 06.23.07
The Librarians Who Stood Up To Big Brother
“Peter Chase and Barbara Bailey, librarians in Plainville, Connecticut, received a National Security Letter to turn over computer records in their library on July 13, 2005. Unlike a suspected thousands of other people around the country, Chase, Bailey and two of their colleagues stood up to the Man and refused to comply, convinced that the feds had no right to intrude on anyone’s privacy without a court order (NSLs don’t require a judge’s approval). That’s when things turned ugly.”
Clear Channel Signs Deal For New People Meters
“Arbitron’s portable people meter technology detects inaudible signals embedded in radio and television broadcasts to measure a listener’s exposure to media and is designed to replace paper diaries. Such data is used as the basis for setting advertising rates on radio shows.”
Jury: JT LeRoy A Fraud
“A Manhattan jury decided Friday that Laura Albert had defrauded a production company that bought the movie rights to an autobiographical novel marketed as being based on LeRoy’s life. The federal jury, after a short deliberation, awarded $116,500 to Antidote International Films Inc. The San Francisco author, who went to strange lengths to hide her identity behind the nonexistent LeRoy, condemned the jury’s decision, saying it had ominous implications for artists.”
JT LeRoy Declared “Fraud” By Jury
Writer Laura Albert has been found guily of going beyond use of a pseudonyms and commiting draud. “Among the battles waged at the trial — art versus commerce, truth versus fiction, reality versus the imagination — it was perhaps the battle over JT LeRoy’s purpose in the world that was most in dispute. Before his identity (or, rather, nonidentity) was revealed last year in a series of newspaper articles, the production team at Antidote considered him that rare commodity in today’s biography-obsessed entertainment world: a gifted writer with a titillating past that only enhanced the value of the work.”
V&A At 150
London’s Victoria & Albert Museum is 150 years old this week. Antony Gormley says that it remains a shining example of what a museum should be: “a great and varied building with internal and external spaces, full of extraordinary objects that talk to us and each other, contextualised within the wider institutions of science and art, both university and museum, in a way that encourages curiosity, scholarship – and the creativity in all of us.”
Race On Screen: An Increasingly Complicated Issue
Angelina Jolie is currently on the big screen playing the part of Marianne Pearl, “a French-born, brown-skinned, kinky-curly-haired woman of Afro-Cuban and Dutch heritage. Ponder the societal implications of Jolie sporting a spray tan and a corkscrew wig. Discuss: Is this the latest entry in the American canon of blackface –21st-century style? Or does Jolie’s color-bending turn as the wife of slain journalist Daniel Pearl herald a sea change in our racial consciousness?”
Those Dirty, Dirty Arabs
Hollywood has never been shy when it comes to stereotyping non-white characters, especially in time of war. As one young filmmaker puts it, “In every movie they make, every time an Arab utters the word Allah? Something blows up.” A new documentary tirelessly (some would say obsessively) highlights the industry’s one-dimensional treatment of Arab characters.
The Next Great Canadian Conductor?
Seemingly out of nowhere, 30-year-old Canadian conductor Julian Kuerti has emerged to become one of the fastest rising talents in a highly competitive business. He runs a new-music ensemble in Berlin, has served as assistant to Ivan Fischer in Budapest, and this fall, he’ll step into the position of assistant conductor of the Boston Symphony. Not bad for a guy who’s been conducting for less than a decade…
The Death Of Internet Radio?
Internet radio stations around the world will be going silent this Tuesday, in protest over new rules that could put many of them out of business permanently. “The Copyright Royalty Board ruled earlier this year to increase the fees Internet stations pay to record labels and artists to a flat fee for every track played. The increase is retroactive for the prior 17 months.”