“Warner Bros. Discovery’s leadership has repeatedly rebuffed Skydance-owned Paramount’s overtures — and urged shareholders just weeks ago to support selling its streaming and studio business to Netflix for $72 billion. Paramount, meanwhile, has made efforts to sweeten its $77.9 billion hostile bid for the entire company.” - TechCrunch
One of the major items in the Louvre–Nouvelle Renaissance renovation plan is the construction of a separate entrance and gallery for the huge number of people who want to see the famous portrait. Workers at the museum are urging management to spend that money on repairing the building’s crumbling physical plant instead. - Artnet
“While NPR may be staring down a tough couple of years ahead, I think public radio is better positioned in the long run than most American news organizations right now.” - Substack
“Shepard would astonishingly make his mark as an avant-garde playwright on the downtown scene with only a few months of networking and no production to his name. … ‘New York was like that in the Sixties,’ he said later. ‘You could write a one-act play and start doing it the next day.’” - Literary Hub
Our consciousness roams, it can be focused on the here and now, or maybe the there and then, but it is always focused on something. Yet the experience of lulls in consciousness content challenges this assumption. - Psyche
For opera singers, the challenges are unique. I’m going to have to figure out how to deal with giving up a life’s work that has asked for my whole heart all the time. - The New York Times
After a string of fresh lawsuits and a landmark settlement in 2025, the new year promises to bring a wave of rulings that could define how U.S. copyright law applies to generative AI. - Reuters
“Twenty years ago, (Beth) Morrison had nothing in the bank. Just ambition, a belief in opera as theater and a high-flown goal to ‘change this art form.’ Still, she founded Beth Morrison Projects. Since then, she has worked nearly around the clock to shepherd dozens of new operas into existence.” - The New York Times
Here's a look at 15 landmark architecture projects scheduled for completion in 2026, including museums, performing arts venues and a face-shaped tower. - Dezeen
According to a YouGov poll released at year’s end, American reading habits stay in the toilet. Four in ten Americans didn’t read a single book during our last spin around the sun. And of the 60% who did venture to a library, most were frugal. - LitHub
The orchestra alleges that Hwang, who was sexually assaulted by a senior player in the orchestra in 2017 and 2018, breached an NDA she signed following the incident. - The Violin Channel
“In recent years, covers had been assessed as part of the best recording package category, which considers all physical materials and images. … Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason Jr. (said) the split is an effort to recognize the impact of cover art in the digital age.” - AP
To begin the new year at public schools across the state, Utah officials banned three more books. Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire, Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult, and The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. - BookRiot
One study found that people who danced frequently (more than once a week) had a 76 percent lower risk of dementia than those who did so rarely. - Washington Post
