PBS and NPR are cratering, and unless a new model of funding emerges, public broadcasting as we know it will die. No more Barney. No more American Experience. No more sensible, well-reasoned, soft-spoken discussions headed by Jim Lehrer. The regional and local flavor that member stations represent more so than local broadcast affiliates of the private networks will evaporate. Reality television and its spawn will not. The FCC can prevent that from happening by negotiating a better deal for the public with the global media giants.”
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Education – Your Ad Here
As schools across America cut back on classes and programs, corporations are seeing opportunity and stepping in with funding. And, of course, opportunities to market their products to children. Critics don’t like the trend. “Children are more susceptible in school because they tend to believe that what they learn there is valid. So a commercial message in schools, no matter how subtle, gives an aura of responsibility and truth. Companies acknowledge they are trying to reach their current and future customers, but say their programs promote goodwill and help cash-strapped schools.”
Could Big-Media Control The Internet?
Big media companies control radio and TV. Could they also control the internet? Some critics warn that they could. “The Internet could become like cable television, a pay-as-you-go service with price tags for premium channels, Cooper says. The content and service provider would favor its own content and shut out nonprofit groups and start-up sites. For example, an ISP/content provider’s search engine would display its own products first–or exclusively. Media companies clearly have their eyes on “convergence,” blending distribution across print, broadcast, and digital devices. Critics fear this means big media will silence smaller players online as well.”
Magnetic Idea – Canada’s National Theatre Festival
Does Canada need a national theatre festival? “The very undertaking both addresses some obvious lacks and points to some troubling challenges. English-Canadian theatre artists don’t tour enough, leaving pockets of dynamic activity in Vancouver, Edmonton, Calgary, Winnipeg, Toronto and Halifax that are largely mysterious to the other centres. Performers on Vancouver’s burgeoning small theatre scene, for example, complain they can’t find affordable venues in Toronto, to introduce their work to the country’s largest theatre centre. So, the festival program put together by artistic director Mary Vingoe is consciously transnational.”
Note To Historians: Travel, Open Your Minds!
There was a time in mid-20th Century that American historians and critics set American culture in the context of the rest of the world. “In the global contest with Soviet films and ballet companies, America’s most eminent historians and literary critics found themselves writing about the United States from a transnational perspective. They also served as guest lecturers and visiting professors overseas, confronting audiences and points of view different from the ones they were used to at home, even as they tried to spread the word about the virtues of America’s culture and civilization.” But “starting in the 1970s, it was no longer fashionable in academic circles to write about ‘America’ as a community of shared beliefs and values.” And over the next few decades, that sense of transnational perspective was replaced with more provincial perspectives.
California’s Dollars-For-Arts Protest
As a protest against California’s cuts in arts funding, arts supporters are being asked to mail the Art Council dollar bills with the names of state senators written in red on the bills. “The suggested donations would be part of a protest against Gov. Gray Davis’ proposed cuts in the council’s budget. Grappling with the state’s fiscal crisis, he has suggested trimming that budget from $22.4 million to $8.4 million.”
Sandow: A Critic’s Manifesto
Is classical music dying? Maybe. But maybe music critics are partly to blame. “We shouldn’t be boosters. We shouldn’t pretend that everything’s wonderful and glorious, because, first of all, it isn’t, and, even more important, nothing in the world is. I’ll grant that some people idolize classical music, or at least the idea of it, and honestly believe that all classical concerts are wonderful and that there’s no ego or careerism in the classical music world. (Let’s have a moment of silence for that last idea, which I first heard from the bass player in a long-ago metal band, Kingdom Come.) But most of us are more realistic than that, even about things we don’t know much about. So it’s crucial, at least in my view, that classical critics pull no punches when they talk about bad concerts.”
In Praise Of Vinyl
There’s something satisfying and human about vinyl records. “It’s really these imperfections that make records worthwhile. Vinyl can break, bend and scar. Records are organic black slabs stuffed inside sleeves as big as the music itself. LPs are also designed and organized to flip, like chapters in a book. I don’t always want to listen to hours of music. Our culture is bent on maximizing everything: Supersize that DVD with movie extras and bonus concert footage. Sometimes I just want to listen to one side of a record and then fold over my musical bookmark.”
Buffalo – How Do You Trim A Structural Deficit?
A study of the operations of the Buffalo Philharmonic concludes that the orchestra has a $1 million “built-in” deficit, but that the orchestra has cut its budget by as much as it can “without jeopardizing its artistic excellence, according to the study.” Still, there may be some ways the orchestra can earn more money…
The Super Bowl And World Cup Of Publishing
The release of the new Harry Potter installment is as big as publishing gets. “The launch of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, at midnight on Friday, is going to make the launch of an Apollo rocket look like a shamefaced sidling-away. It is the largest such event in bookselling history. Bloomsbury, JK Rowling’s publisher, is not saying exactly how big the first print run is going to be, but it has been estimated at two million in this country, 8.5 million in the States.”