"In Boston, there are reports of people pronouncing the letter 'r.' Down in Tennessee, people are noticing a lack of a Southern drawl. And Texans have long worried about losing their distinctive twang. Indeed, around the United States, communities are voicing a common anxiety: Are Americans losing their accents?" - Salon
Many of the now-well-known cave drawings of animals include dots, short lines, and crosses; archaeologists suspected that they had some meaning but couldn't work out what. The new hypothesis is that the marks are records of the age and behavior of the animals that were drawn. - Smithsonian Magazine
Filippo Bernardini pleaded guilty in U.S. federal court last Friday, admitting he "had engaged in an elaborate email-impersonation scheme aimed at duping others in the industry into sharing unpublished book manuscripts." - Vulture
After someone claiming to be the daughter of indie author Susan Meachen wrote that the author had died by suicide in 2020, her community split apart with finger-pointing - and also honored her with fundraisers. But, it turns out, her death was staged. - BBC
In Golden Gate Park, a park ranger placed a piece of furniture with instructions: "'Take a poem, leave a poem.' Since the nightstand’s debut there last month, amateur poets have filled it with more than 100 handwritten poems." - Washington Post
Will the AI program kill high school English? Well ... maybe. But "if ChatGPT can do the things we ask students to do in order to demonstrate learning, it seems possible to me that those things should’ve been questioned a long time ago." - Inside Higher Ed
""One explanation might lie in Mansfield’s keen sense of the absurd and the striking lack of anything deferential in her attitude – whether towards men or anyone powerful or rich or influential." - The Guardian (UK)
Apple has new AI narrators. They're not great. "Jackson sounds like a pretty standard—if maddening—customer service line voice. ... Madison, on the other hand, sounds a little like a female version of Aiden Gillen playing American on The Wire." - LitHub
The head of production at Macmillan Audio started months ago. "Betting that the committee’s report would be substantial, accessible and 'very narrative-driven,' he hired nine experienced voice actors." - Washington Post
"There are worse ways of groping through the opening murk of another miserable year. ... if you are going to take on a New Year Reading Project it is as well to get the rules straight." - Irish Times
"Many experts feel they are in a race against time. A 2018 study published in the Climate Risk Management journal assessed 1,232 archival repositories in the United States and found that nearly 99 percent were 'likely to be affected by at least one climate risk factor."' - The New York Times
Ghostwriters channel someone else’s voice and construct with it a book that has shape and texture, narrative arc and memorable characters, all without leaving fingerprints. Doing it well requires a tremendous amount of technical skill and an ego that is, at a minimum, flexible. - The New York Times
