Month: February 2018

The Berklee School Of Music Is Dead. What Comes Next Might Be Revolutionary

Berklee wants to build new spaces both physical and virtual and break down barriers between all the arts disciplines emphasizing the transferability of skills. And perhaps best of all for the students, it focuses attention upon affordability which in turn will support recruitment and retention. The plan is visionary and under the extraordinary leadership of President Roger Brown more than doable. As Brown puts it, “With music, movement and digital technology converging, artists possess powerful new means of creative expression in the theater, on the concert stage, and through emerging platforms.”

Are The Border Wall Prototypes Art?

I ask Michael Diers if it’s appropriate to hail the aesthetics of the border prototypes, given their xenophobic political purpose. “It’s always about aesthetics,” he says. “We live in a media world, and you have to present yourself. In 1920s Germany, everybody wore black suits with white shirts because it looked good in black and white photography. Here, the politicians wear red ties and blue suits because they look like the flag — it’s the allegory of the Stars and Stripes. Aesthetics is politics.”

Here’s How We Reinforce A Culture Of Mediocrity

In a recent book, The Hard Thing About Hard Things, the tech investor Ben Horowitz adds a twist: “The Law of Crappy People”. As soon as someone on a given rung at a company gets as good as the worst person the next rung up, he or she may expect a promotion. Yet, if it’s granted, the firm’s talent levels will gradually slide downhill. No one person need be peculiarly crappy for this to occur; bureaucracies just tend to be crappier than the sum of their parts.

Why Paper Jams Keep Happening, No Matter How Far Technology Progresses

“According to The Wall Street Journal, printers are among the most in-demand objects in ‘rage rooms,’ where people pay to smash things with sledgehammers; Battle Sports, a rage-room facility in Toronto, goes through fifteen a week. … Unsurprisingly, the engineers who specialize in paper jams see them differently. Engineers tend to work in narrow subspecialties, but solving a jam requires knowledge of physics, chemistry, mechanical engineering, computer programming, and interface design.”

What Happens When You Take People’s Smartphones Away At Concerts

The effects are immediate: At first, people seem agitated and unsure of what to do with their hands. But then they adjust. “In line at the concession stand, you’ll overhear people talking about the artist and the show, and then about the fact that they’re having this conversation because they don’t have phones. You’ll see people fully engaged with each other talking, and the feel of it is radically different.”

Learning To Give Up, And Give Up On, Woody Allen

“Renouncing Woody Allen is painful for many of us, not just because we enjoy his work, but because it feels like renouncing a part of ourselves. It also feels cheap, because there’s no point in renouncing him if we can’t also renounce the part of us that finds his characters relatable. We need to take a closer look at the films that taught us to be this way, and to consider what else they taught us.”