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The L.A. Times Sets Up Its Own “Meme Team” (And You Won’t See Its Work On LATimes.com)

It's called The 404, and "video — especially on TikTok — (will) be the first priority. Other areas of concentration will be images (think: memes, illustrations, comics, and graphic art); and content for emerging platforms (AR, VR, live streams, and 'stuff that doesn't exist yet')." - Nieman Lab

What COVID School Closures Really Cost Students

Conventional accounts of the effect of school closures focus on the shift from in-person to online teaching and the academic losses that resulted. This familiar story isn’t false, but it’s only a part of the truth, and it understates both the disruption and the inequities that COVID wrought on students’ lives. - The Atlantic

What’s Behind The Closing Notices For Long-Running Broadway Musicals?

Come From Away, Dear Evan Hansen, and Tina did solid business before the pandemic.  Yet with tourism to New York City still down, they've struggled since reopening, when they found themselves in competition with not only hot new shows (The Music Man) but also institutions like Wicked. - The Hollywood Reporter

The Bind Facing Black American Playwrights: How Do You Offer Deliverance, Or Even Hope, While Still Reflecting Reality?

"How can these stories end? What does deliverance look like in a world in which the odds are stacked against these Black characters, and at a time when, post-Black Lives Matter and post-George Floyd, artists are being held newly accountable for portraying Blackness responsibly?" - The New York Times

The San Antonio Symphony Is Dead, But Its Musicians Will Keep Giving Concerts

"After playing three concerts this spring, the Musicians of the San Antonio Symphony is making plans for a fall season in which it hopes to stage one to two performances per month, says Brian Petkovich, president of the MOSAS Performance Fund." - San Antonio Magazine

Yes, San Antonio Can Have The Professional Symphony Orchestra It Deserves

"Not only is a reborn symphony possible, but ... it is essential to the quality of life in San Antonio, and preservation of the performing arts and the city's creative class. People are already working on it" — including conductor Sebastian Lang-Lessing, fired by the board in April. - San Antonio Report

Despite The Symphony’s Death, There’s A Thriving Chamber Orchestra In San Antonio

"Unlike the symphony, it's a young institution. Unlike the symphony, it has diversity and inclusiveness deep in its DNA. ... Its performing artists hail from Europe, Asia, and the Americas, ... and (its) board of directors is relatively young and decidedly diverse, too." - MSN (San Antonio Express-News)

Librarians Find A Dürer Just Sitting There In An Old Book On Their Shelves

"During a recent inventory audit, researchers at the Oldenburg State Library (in Germany) found on the title page of the book (the) small drawing. ... Measuring just 16.5 by 6 centimeters (6.5 by 2.4 inches), the illustration depicts a pair of cherubs perched atop fantastical sea creatures." - Artnet

James Rado, Co-Creator Of The Musical “Hair”, Dead At 90

Contrary to popular lore, Rado and collaborator (and then-lover) Gerome Ragni weren't out-of-work actors writing themselves roles (they played Claude and Berger), they were actors with a growing career. And they had no idea of what Hair would become. - The New York Times

After 47 Books, John Grisham On Writing, Hollywood, And Storytelling

"I can’t get a fraction of that today. You can say, Well, we choked the golden goose, but all those films made money. Then Hollywood changed. I don’t understand that world. Nobody understands that world. There’s no rules. - The New York Times

Shall I Compare Thee To A Summer’s Algorithm?

We Googled the first line, expecting it to be an existing Philip Larkin poem, but we couldn’t find it on the Internet. It was an original work, composed by the A.I. in less time than it takes a man to sneeze. - The New Yorker

What The Toppling Of Public Monuments Says About Our Time

While the recent destruction of statues in the contemporary West ostensibly relates to a racial reckoning, it nonetheless stands in a long lineage of iconoclasm, and one can understand its meaning only when viewed alongside its predecessors. - American Affairs Journal

Cornell West: America’s Essential Philosophy Is Pragmatism

Pragmatism emerged in the US in the late 1800s as a response to the Enlightenment push for absolute truth. Pragmatists — like William James and John Dewey — were less interested in certainty and more concerned with immediate experience. They wanted to know what worked for ordinary human beings. - Vox

The Purpose Of Comedy?

Comedy is a social corrective exposing the gap between what is (injustice, poverty, environmental disaster) and what some think it ought to be (fairness, equal opportunity, gentle breezes). This gap, which may be history’s largest mass case of cognitive dissonance, remains our omnipresent duality. - The Conversation

The Obamas Move Their Media Company From Spotify To Audible

The agreement between the company, called Higher Ground, and Spotify was not renewed because of disagreements over both content and distribution. The new deal with Audible (owned by Amazon) will make Higher Ground available on numerous platforms, not only on Audible, thus addressing one major sticking point with Spotify. - Variety

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