Blog

FCC Crackdown Confuses Broadcasters

American broadcasters are complaining that the FCC’s crackdown on content has left them unclear about what will be deemed acceptable and what will not. But the pressure group Parents Television Council is unsympathetic: “They’re lucky they got away with as much as they did. It reminds me of a person who has been speeding as much as they wanted and now they’re getting tickets.”

We’re Watching You (Always)

A new book details the extent of the new security realities in America. A ‘security-industrial complex” is being built to tie together massive amounts of private information about everyone. It details the “far-reaching consequences for ordinary Americans, who must cope not only with the uneasy sense of being watched (leading, defenders of civil liberties have argued, to a stifling of debate and dissent) but also with the very palpable dangers of having personal information (and in some cases, inaccurate information) passed from one outfit to another.”

Painting Is Dead, Long Live Painting? (Don’t You Believe It)

This is the year collector Charles Saatchi was supposed to be renewing the cause of painting. “In 2005, the celebrated Iraqi/British collector would be reviving the cause of painting. He would be bringing a new batch of painters to the world’s attention with a series of exhibitions called The Triumph of Painting. Part One opens tomorrow. Its title makes a clear bid for legend. It sounds like a chapter in a history book already. So, to start with, let’s put the record straight. All the above story is untrue. Whenever you hear about a revival of painting you should be suspicious.”

Termite-Infested Eyesore… Or ART?

What was the Los Angeles Cultural Heritage Commission thinking back in 1978 when it recognized a “22-foot stack of Schlitz beer pallets” as a historic monument? Now the tower is a crumbling, termite-infested hazard, and the artist’s heirs want to tear it down and sell the property. But there’s that problematic cultural designation…

Queens Changes Architects (Does It Say More About The Museum Than The Architect?)

Three years ago, after extensive discussions and a competition, an architect was chosen for a redo of New York’s Queens Museum of Art. Now the museum is abandoning the plan and starting over. “A change in architects may not seem earthshaking. But the Queens Museum’s about-face suggests how a much-heralded public architecture project can be derailed by economics, politics, personalities and competing visions of how an institution operates day to day.”

Every Word A Gateway

The internet has revolutionized the way we get information. Now one researcher wants to push the revolution even further. The “idea is simple — he plans to move beyond the basic hypertext linking of the web, and change every word into a “hyperword.” Instead of one or two links in a document, every single word becomes a link. Further, every link can point to more than one place, pulling up all kinds of background context from the web as a whole.”

Sills Leaving Met

Beverly Sills, 75, is stepping down as chairman of the Metropolitan Opera, citing family reasons. “She said that her tenure would indeed be the last act of a 60-year career in the arts world that wended its way through the roles of soprano star, opera manager, Lincoln Center overseer, fund-raiser and, finally, Met chairwoman in 2002 – a volunteer job for which she had left a previous retirement. ‘I am stepping down for good. I had already decided that I was not really serving any of the masters well’.”