Author: Douglas McLennan

Study: High Incidence Of Concussions Among Theatre Performers

Research revealed 67 percent of those surveyed had experienced at least one theater-related head impact. Astonishingly, 39 percent respondents sustained more than five head injuries and 77 percent had more than three head impacts during their time in theater. Of those who experienced a head impact, 70 percent had concussion-related symptoms but continued working.

In The Reputation Economy (Like Uber) Inflation Has Run Rampant

How did Uber’s ratings become more inflated than grades at Harvard? That’s the topic of a new paper, “Reputation Inflation,” from NYU’s John Horton and Apostolos Filippas, and Collage.com CEO Joseph Golden. The paper argues that online platforms, especially peer-to-peer ones like Uber and Airbnb, are highly susceptible to ratings inflation because, well, it’s uncomfortable for one person to leave another a bad review.

How Streaming Data Is Changing How (And What) Music Is Made

Streaming reflects what people will actually listen to on their own, when provided with infinite choices that aren’t entirely constrained by what radio programmers, retailers and record company executives put in front of them. With streaming services, “it’s more data-driven, and more give-the-people-what-they-want-driven, because it’s so limitless.”

Report: UK Theatres Passively Allow Culture Of Harassment

The report concludes that “bullying and abuses of power were seen to be prevalent” and that inappropriate behaviour can be found at “all levels” across all areas of the industry and in all genders. “There can be a passive culture of endorsing bullying. Leaders may encourage new entrants not to challenge, perpetuating the culture with statements such as ‘That’s just how they are’ or ‘We have extreme characters in our industry’,” it states.

Scientific Papers Have Become Obsolete

“The more sophisticated science becomes, the harder it is to communicate results. Papers today are longer than ever and full of jargon and symbols. They depend on chains of computer programs that generate data, and clean up data, and plot data, and run statistical models on data. These programs tend to be both so sloppily written and so central to the results that it’s contributed to a replication crisis, or put another way, a failure of the paper to perform its most basic task: to report what you’ve actually discovered, clearly enough that someone else can discover it for themselves. Perhaps the paper itself is to blame.”

Employees Of Richard Meier Talk About Architect Firm’s Culture Of Helplessness

After a report last month by The New York Times detailing a pattern of sexual misconduct by Mr. Meier, more women have come forward to share their own upsetting encounters with him. But in recounting such experiences, these women said they had also been disturbed by a sense of helplessness that pervaded the firm. Mr. Meier’s behavior was common knowledge, they said, but no one seemed to have the power to stop it.