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OnlyFans Reverses Ban On Sex Workers. Creators Are Still Worried…

What remains is an uncertain future for both creators and OnlyFans, which has plans to go public later this year. The site has more than 130 million users and 2 million creators... - Wired

Why Does English Have No Equivalent Of The Académie Française? Pestilence

The Royal Society of London actually did attempt to start one in the winter of 1665, with a committee that included poets Abraham Cowley and John Dryden. Plague broke out in London that spring, everyone who could flee the capital did, and that was that. - Lapham's Quarterly

Algorithms Are Directing How I Grieve For My Dead Mother

I can hide my mom’s photos or block her zombie Facebook account. But I’ve become accustomed to grieving this way. Technology has dictated what I remember and when, because I’ve let it. - Wired

What’s The Torture In Today’s Russian Prison Camps? Eight Hours A Day Of State Television

Opposition leader Alexei Navalny says the prison he's in isn't like the old Soviet gulag, with inmates doing hard labor in subzero weather. Instead, part of what he calls "psychological torture" is being forced to sit and watch Putin-controlled news media and "propaganda films." - The Irish Times

Smithsonian Kicks Off Multi-Year Project To Reckon With America’s Racial History

“Giving people the reality — here’s the information, here’s a way to contextualize the moment we are in — you can’t build optimism unless you face the reality of the past, the reality of today.” - Washington Post

Desperate Venezuelans Turn To An Old Video Game To Earn Hard Currency

A large community has grown up around a now-outdated version of the online game RuneScape — and many players in rich countries don't want to slog through the tasks required to build their characters' skills or hoards of gold. - Slate

The Psychology Of Movie Trailer Music

“It’s called ‘trailerizing’ a song. That means changing every aspect of the song but leaving the lyrics. People know the lyrics. The goal is to catch people’s attention." - Variety

Emerson String Quartet Announces Retirement

The group, which for decades has been one of the world's most admired of its kind, said in a statement that it will close up shop in 2023, after what will have been 47 years. - Vulture

Who That Album Cover’s Naked Baby Is Today, And The Real Reason He’s Suing Nirvana

Spencer Elden claims that the band exploited him with what he now calls child pornography — but he's been exploiting that image of his infant self for some time. His actual grudge appears to be over an art show. - Artnet

L.A. Opera Builds All Scenery For New Production In Ten Days

The company's return to live performance, Verdi's Il trovatore, was to use sets from the Opéra de Monte-Carlo — but they're on a container ship stuck in the giant traffic jam at the Port of Los Angeles. But that won't stop L.A. Opera. - Los Angeles Times

Dealer Charged With Larceny And Fraud For Manufacturing Fake Antiquities

"Prosecutors say Mehrdad Sadigh, a New York antiquities dealer whose Sadigh Gallery has operated for decades in the shadow of the Empire State Building, decided not to go to the trouble of acquiring ancient items. He made (thousands of) bogus copies instead." - The New York Times

Bramwell Tovey Named Music Director Of Sarasota Orchestra

The 68-year-old chief conductor of the BBC Concert Orchestra, formerly music director of the Vancouver and Winnipeg Symphonies and Calgary Opera, begins a five-year contract term on next week and fully assumes the music director title in Sept. 2022. - Sarasota Herald-Tribune

Australian Rock Art May Be 43,000 Years Old

Archaeologists using new measuring techniques have analyzed layers of a mineral glaze covering ancient figures in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, and the oldest layer appears to date back more than 40 millennia. - ABC (Australia)

If Edinburgh Is Overtouristed, Don’t Blame The Festivals, Blame UNESCO: City’s Ex-Culture Chief

"Lynne Halfpenny … insisted the Old Town and the Royal Mile had become overwhelmed with visitors and was seen as a 'bucket list' destination because of Edinburgh's UNESCO designation and not its 'festival city' status." - The Scotsman

Canada’s National Ballet Outside (And It’s So Much More Complicated Than That)

Given such limited capacity and the pent-up eagerness of ballet fans, all four performances were fully booked almost as soon as they were announced. - Toronto Star

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