"The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport said it had negotiated with 19 EU member state countries to allow British musicians and performers to conduct short tours visa-free." The only major markets not included so far are Spain, Portugal, and Greece. - The Guardian (PA Media)
The Gesture, an 82-foot sculpture by Nadim Karam, is made of steel debris from last year's catastrophe and stands at the blast site itself. While some Beirutis have welcomed it, others say it's too soon for such a memorial, especially at what one calls "a crime scene." - Artnet
A game-y galaxy that seamlessly fuses with the meatspace. What matters is that metaverse is now the buzzword du jour and that Facebook wants a piece of it. The bad news is that Zuckerberg’s metaverse ambitions sound boring as hell. - Wired
It’s a resumption of business — and, for many arts workers, employment — that’s been eagerly awaited and long in coming. But it’s also a balancing act of safety and economics. - Variety
Birkenhead is barely a mile from Liverpool, situated on the opposite bank of the River Mersey. It was once known as the “New York of Europe” thanks to its shipbuilding, but deindustrialisation and waves of austerity have created significant decline. - The Guardian
News companies in Canada have been struggling financially and digital platforms have vacuumed up most of the ad revenue that used to go to newspapers and broadcasters. - Toronto Star
Though its theater season each summer is a must-see in the industry, even that is more inward facing than outward, with only a few performances of each show and no reviews allowed. - The New York Times
Emily Oster looks at the phonics vs. whole-language debate (she has one word for you: "delumpification") and what studies show about how to entice (not persuade) children to read for pleasure. - Literary Hub
The sooner you accept that star stories are full of embellishments and omissions, invented quotes and one-sided recollections dictated to patient ghostwriters, the sooner you’ll come to appreciate them as the grand and eccentric performances that they are. - The New Yorker
Neo-noir "could spell out what the 1940s films could only imply, with themes, violence and sexuality that could only be hinted at four decades before. … In the era of Reagan and MTV, it was a genre that was at the same time throwback and cutting-edge." - CrimeReads
The resulting totemic structures, biomorphic forms, and sleek stacked shapes against drab gray backgrounds have a strange, mass-produced patina, as vaguely similar as Ikea furniture. - Hyperallergic
Nicholas Quah writes that the habit, reviled by creators, simply makes it easier to get through mountains of content, leaving time to try stuff (like generic Netflix documentaries) he'd otherwise skip. (And 1.25x speed just doesn't distort things that much.) - New York Magazine
Even in a society which tells itself the half-truth that it treasures ‘free speech’, there are, indeed must be, words that are beyond the pale – words that can still shock, thrill or shame. - Literary Review
"Making a mess is central to creativity and certainly to composition. … (With music software,) I think that sometimes young composers can be misled. Because it looks perfect on the screen and it looks perfect when it's printed out, and it's not done." (podcast with transcription) - Slate
