And that’s a good thing, not something we should be worried about. Having a camera in your pocket all of the time is “an opportunity to capture your own life more honestly—a way to remember what you were really like in one season of life, the mundane food photos alongside shots of scenic vacations or birthday parties. The mundane things you use your phone to document are the details that add up to a full life, what it was like to be alive right then.” – Slate
Category: AUDIENCE
Why Some Pop Bands Are Giving Up Encores
The banality of encores has long been a frustration for some musicians, but, in recent years, a growing number of notable acts have taken a stand against performing them at all. – Toronto Star
Fifty Years Of The Community Museum Movement
“How should museums relate to their surroundings? What are the most meaningful ways for them to connect and work with their communities? … These questions date to the beginning of the community museum movement in the 1960s and remain foundational to the field.” Anna Diamond reports from a Smithsonian symposium on the subject. – Smithsonian Magazine
Hollywood’s Looming Content Crisis – Big Franchises Squeezing Everything Else Out
This year, a huge chunk of total sales went to a handful of titles. The top 10 films at the domestic box office have accounted for 38% of ticket sales so far this year, according to data firm Comscore. That’s up from 33% in 2018 and 24% five years ago. – Los Angeles Times
How Big Data Has (Is) Transforming The Music Industry
Analysts claim it’s not only possible to see who’s blowing up now, but more importantly, who’s going to be blowing up next. Chartmetric says it can shortlist which of the 1.7 million artists it tracks will have a big career break within the next week. Pandora-owned Next Big Sound reports its patented algorithm can predict which of the nearly 1 million artists it tracks are most likely to hit the Billboard 200 chart for the first time within the next year. – Wired
In Toronto, Classical Music Seems To Be Thriving
Classical music and opera are not an old wooded sailing ship about to break into pieces in a fierce storm. They are the thin, iridescent film of soap bubbles stretched and borne aloft by the breath of eager, expectant believers. – Toronto Star
Are You Ready To Celebrate Beethoven’s 250th? Vienna Sure Is
You might as well just plan to stay for the entire year. Don’t forget your Beethoven-reality-enhanced sunglasses. – The New York Times
Do Music Genres Even Exist Anymore?
Music critics may resist the idea, but “what if the genre killers are right? What if it doesn’t matter whether they’re right, but it’s happening anyway? Start to finish, 2019 gave us plenty of evidence.” – Slate
The Ten Top-Selling Books Of The 2010s
Though the list is all fiction, overall the trend is moving towards nonfiction on the best-seller lists. According to Lee Graham of the NPD Group, “In 2010, nearly 80 percent of the top-selling titles were fiction, and by 2019 that percentage dropped to 32 percent.” – LitHub
Poetry Anti-Slams, Where Bad Is Good
“The anti-slam was created by British performance artist Paula Varjack, inspired by poet Jamie DeWolf’s self-reflexive and satirical performance piece, The Worst Poem Ever. In DeWolf, Varjack saw an opportunity to push performers to be more creative by challenging the competitiveness of a traditional slam. … The first anti-slam took place in Berlin in 2009. Since then it has gone on to captivate audiences around the world.” – The Guardian