Public radio has a problem. In 2019, NPR’s newsroom was more than 70 percent white. The same year, 83 percent of the voices heard on its national shows were white, too. According to the most recent State of the System report by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, in 2018, just 23 percent of people working at member stations identified as people of color. That’s almost a full percentage point decrease from the previous year. – Columbia Journalism Review
Author: Douglas McLennan
Disney+ Now Has 73 Million Subscribers
That marks a leap from the 60.5 million paying subscribers that Disney Plus had when Disney last reported earnings in early August. Hulu now has 36.6 million total paying subscribers, up from 35.5 million in late June, while ESPN Plus has grown to 10.3 million subscribers, up from 8.5 million reported last quarter. – Variety
How London’s “Pleasure District” Became The West End And A Model For Theatre
It was the mid-19th century that really established the modern West End. The taverns around the Strand in the 1830s and 1840s helped develop the song and supper evenings that became Victorian music hall. The bazaars and arcades of the West End evolved into a distinctive form of retail: the department store. Shows at the theatres on Leicester Square, such as the Alhambra, became known for their exuberant spectacle. The West End was therefore a laboratory of mass entertainment that has shaped notions of luxury and fun ever since. It also confirmed London’s status as a capital city. – History Today
Sell Tickets Or Raise Money?
People buy tickets because they want to see a performance and rate that transaction by that experience. People donate because they want to manage/share in/support what the company does. Those that choose to donate large amounts to a select few organizations – the right-thinking group described above – gain power in that kind of relationship. – LinkedIn
Why Pianists Know So Little About Their Pianos
“Why are pianists at such a loss when it comes to understanding the mechanics of their own instrument? This lack of knowledge separates them from almost all other instrumentalists. Not only can violinists, clarinetists, harpists or flutists tune their instruments, and even bend pitches in performance, they also, by and large, know much more about how their instruments work.” – The New York Times
A Shortage Of Printed Books This Winter?
Large printing companies in the U.S. are under financial strain, made worse by shutdowns due to the pandemic and subsequent reopenings with fewer employees. Fewer books printed means fewer books going to distributors — who themselves have had pandemic-related issues with staffing their warehouses. Add in a paper shortage, and a publishing schedule in flux because many spring/summer books were pushed to fall, and you have a perfect storm of supply-chain gridlock. – Seattle Times
How Paris Is Becoming A “15-Minute City”
“The 15-minute city represents the possibility of a decentralized city,” says Carlos Moreno, a scientific director and professor specializing in complex systems and innovation at University of Paris 1. “At its heart is the concept of mixing urban social functions to create a vibrant vicinity”—replicated, like fractals, across an entire urban expanse.” – Bloomberg
TicketMaster Plans To Check COVID Status When Performances Return
Ticketmaster has been working on a framework for post-pandemic fan safety that uses smart phones to verify fans’ vaccination status or whether they’ve tested negative for the coronavirus within a 24 to 72 hour window. – Billboard
Why Are Contemporary Writers Obsessed With Self-Awareness?
Critics—and the authors they cover—seem to be obsessed with self-awareness. Writing about oneself isn’t new at all, but what’s current (and quickly growing stale) is the overtly self-conscious way contemporary writers have chosen to go about it. – The Nation
Why Opera Will Endure
Opera is one of those words that contains so much historical and symbolic weight and prejudice that you have to clamber through dense, thorny tangles before you even get to what it might actually be, and if there is anything really left, other than it being a segregated leisure pursuit for the entitled. – LitHub