Douglas McLennan
Doug is the editor of ArtsJournal
Wordle Copycats Are Multiplying. Apple Is Taking Them Down
It's exceedingly hard to copyright an abstract game mechanic like "guessing five-letter words and giving hints based on correct letters." - Wired
Time To Take Play More Seriously
"You're making connections between different parts of the brain which haven't necessarily been connected before and then you're repeating it. It's through this process...
Toronto Symphony Picks A New Executive Director
Mark Williams currently serves as chief artistic and operations officer of the Cleveland Orchestra, reporting to music director Franz Welser-Most. - The Plain Dealer...
Hot Topic Du Jour: Why Is Everyone Upset About “Don’t look Up?”
Critics, audiences, and activists have both savaged and praised the movie, and the backlash has highlighted the difficulty of conveying an urgent message with...
World’s Second Largest Movie Theatre Chain Reports Sharp Rebound In Ticket Sales
Box office and concession revenues saw significant growth across the second half of 2021. Notably, group performance was at 50% of 2019 levels in...
Jon Podhoretz Remembers Terry Teachout
"Terry’s ability to bounce month to month from film noir to the crisis of the symphony orchestra to the talents of Robert Mitchum to...
Group Calls On Seattle Art Museum To Treat Homeless People Better
A collective of anonymous workers called Decolonize SAM is calling for a boycott and demanding the museum stop removing unhoused people from museum property, provide de-escalation...
Omicron Is Soaring. Is It Ethical To Go To Concerts?
Is it a good or an ethical idea to go to a concert in the vortex of this unprecedented surge, what with local hospitals...
NBC Universal Picks New Audience-Measuring Service
The company announced today it will use data from iSpot.tv, a Bellevue, Wash.-based company that measures audiences across linear TV and streaming platforms to provide...
The Pope Is Caught Shopping For CDs. Here’s What’s In His Collection
While it is mostly made up of classical music, it also includes: an old album of Édith Piaf’s greatest hits; Argentine tango tunes, especially...
AJBlogger And Wall Street Journal Theatre Critic Terry Teachout, 65
Very very sad to announce the death of one of ArtsJournal's original and most prolific bloggers. - The Wall Street Journal
Claim: UK Government Funding Of Theatre Makes No Sense
Even before Covid, the government’s (and Arts Council England’s) approach to the complex private/public ecology of the sector felt confused and outdated. Now, it...
NFTs? A Really Dumb Idea
It’s possible to see a purpose for cryptocurrencies, but NFTs are (for now) almost comically bereft of anything most of us would associate with...
Insisting That Art Focus On Social Justice Is A Narrow View Of How Art...
Consider those charitable foundations that have decided to stop funding the arts, or to only fund arts activities that explicitly promote diversity, equality, and...
Norman Mailer Wasn’t “Canceled.” (Dumb)
Instead, the publishing conglomerate’s decision to back away from Mailer points to a different set of financial imperatives, as well as a growing impulse...
Should Art Be “Relevant?” Jed Perl Thinks Not
Perl’s thesis, most succinctly framed in his concluding chapter, is that the arts, rather than being obliged to convey utilitarian messaging, must instead remain...
Workers At The Art Institute Of Chicago Unionize
The Art Institute union will be the first group of its kind at a major museum in Chicago. It comes amid a larger push...
United States Artists Chooses Its Next President
Judilee Reed is currently the program director of creative communities for the William Penn Foundation, where she leads the organization’s arts and culture and...
How Jazz Grew And Flourished In Japan
American troops brought jazz records with them; Japanese musicians picked up work entertaining the troops. There was a proliferation of jazz kissa (cafes), a distinctly Japanese...
UK Book Sales Set Records In 2021
Driven by booming appetites for crime novels, sci-fi, fantasy, romance and personal development titles, sales last year showed an increase of 5% on 2020....
Image Of Maya Angelou To Be Featured On US Quarter
The quarter features an image of Angelou with her arms uplifted, a bird in flight and a rising sun behind her, with a portrait...
Eighty Factcheck Groups Worldwide Protest YouTube Policies
The letter lists worldwide examples which have the potential to cause real-life harm, which went under the radar of YouTube's content policies. It says...
Gideon Arthurs Chosen As New Director Of Soulpepper Theatre
Arthurs joins Soulpepper after eight years as the chief executive officer of the National Theatre School of Canada. - Toronto Star
Inside The Healing Art Of Bibliotherapy
Bibliotherapy is premised on the idea that books can be healing tools. The main distinction is between clinical bibliotherapy, where texts, including fiction and...
Do Our Digital Lives Need An Intervention?
It’s clear that the internet needs design innovations—and brake mechanisms—to reduce its noxious impact. Our suffering arises, in part, from the speed and volume of...
