Author: Douglas McLennan

UK’s Post-Brexit Plans On Copyright Worry Creators

Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society (ALCS) Deputy Chief Executive Barbara Hayes laid out the scale of the challenge the Government’s decision presents to authors: “At a time when the UK creative industries are growing to unprecedented levels we are also seeing a persistent decline in the earnings of professional authors, representing a real terms decrease of 42% since 2005.” – Arts Professional

Australian Artists Hijack Bus Shelter Ad Spaces

Forty-one artists are involved in this latest Australian iteration, including Georgia Hill, Tom Gerrard, Sarah McCloskey, Ghostpatrol, Callum Preston and E.L.K, as well as anonymous artists.In one poster, a Caramello Koala has burst and is melting above the words “Save an Aussie icon”. In another, Blinky Bill runs from an encroaching wall of flames. The collective launched three weeks prior to the posters going up, via a group chat of artists on Instagram. They were dismayed at what they saw as biased bushfire coverage and at the misinformation being shared by some media – particularly the Murdoch-owned press. – The Guardian

How The Unthinkable Becomes The Inevitable

How does the once-unthinkable become not only thinkable but self-evident? How does the unthinkable become something we cannot think away anymore? To get at that, we have to tell a history not only of emergence, but of the formation of the deepest levels of our intuition. I have a strong sense that our best reasoning takes place at a semi-conscious level, and I’m very interested in how that lower stratum of reasoning — the intuitions that drive our thinking in philosophy, mathematics, and the rest — is established. – Los Angeles Review of Books

How The Right Conductor And The Right Orchestra Can Make A Statement

Alex Ross: “For the most part, the classical-music world is in need of conductors with broad horizons, who can guide audiences from a passive worship of the past to an active awareness of the present. The rote repetition of Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, and Mahler ultimately does those composers no favors. But we also need conductors who know how to revitalize the grand tradition—and orchestras that can respond in kind. At the moment, Pittsburgh is one of the few places on the international scene where that alchemy regularly happens.” – The New Yorker

If Hits Can Be Built With Data, Won’t Everything Be A Hit? Well…

“If there are benefits to humans using data to assimilate this kind of information and attempting to make it actionable, the results have yet to impact the production-to-hit ratio of major studios in any meaningful way. That said, I expect that to change very soon as AI models trained to maximize engagement start to show up in video production departments.” – Shelley Palmer

Data: Pop Songs Have Become Sadder. Why?

English-language popular songs have become more negative. The use of words related to negative emotions has increased by more than one third. Let’s take the example of the Billboard dataset. If we assume an average of 300 words per song, every year there are 30,000 words in the lyrics of the top-100 hits. In 1965, around 450 of these words were associated with negative emotions, whereas in 2015 their number was above 700. – Aeon

The Remarkable Caroline Shaw

Some composers deal with the threat of boredom by cramming their scores full of drama and extreme sounds. Others embrace it, stretching time and indulging in trancelike repetition. Shaw describes her approach as the avoidance of both extremes. “I know what I don’t like,” she says: “plain harmonies that don’t ever change. What makes me sad is hearing a sequence of interesting chords — and then it goes to vanilla. That’s the worst.” – New York Magazine