Category: today’s top story

Some board members, pushing for a 20% cut in musicians’ base pay, have intermittently threatened Chapter 11 bankruptcy – even though, while the PhilOrch has been running consistent deficits, it currently has no long-term debt and an endowment of well over $100 million. (Over the 15 years since the Philadelphians’ bitter 1996 strike, the musicians’ base salary has risen by more than 60%.)

“In their announcement, the writers listed two primary demands: that a pay schedule be proposed and initiated for all contributing writers and bloggers, and that paid promotional material no longer be posted alongside editorial content.”

“Now, the vast interconnection of humanity we call the internet promises to divorce the press and power forever, by dissolving the press. Now, every mobile phone, every document scanner, every camera, every laptop, are part of an immense network in which everything we see, we think, we know, can be transmitted to everyone else, everywhere, immediately. Democracy in its deepest sense follows.”

“Expanding the definition from “benchmark” activities (like going to the opera) to the creation and viewing of art or art-related content digitally has yielded a radically different picture of American’s relationship to the arts.”

“The steady stream of comedy flowing throughout [Tahrir Square] functioned much as Twitter and Facebook did: to build community, strengthen solidarity, and provide a safe, thug-free outlet for Egyptians to defy the regime.”

“The online retail giant on Tuesday began offering U.S. subscribers to its $79-per-year Amazon Prime shipping service the additional benefit of access to 5,000 movies and television shows that can be streamed at no additional cost on computers and certain other Internet-connected devices.”

“Those who broke into the museum were professionals looking for gold. And it was not just in Cairo; there were also two burial chambers broken into in Sakkara and Abusir, and there the damage was visible. Overall, we have to thank God that we got off relatively lightly.”

“Saturday’s developments call into question not only the next few months in the life of the DSO but also next season and beyond. No major U.S. orchestra in memory lost an entire season to a labor conflict, and no one knows what will happen next in the DSO saga.”

“The negotiating committee representing the striking Detroit Symphony Orchestra musicians has recommended that the full orchestra reject management’s final contract offer.” If the players as a while agree, the orchestra’s current season will likely be cancelled.

The writers responding so angrily to Amis’s statement “missed the fact that Amis was talking only about himself, about his own interests and limitations. Key to his avoidance of this genre is the phrase ‘conscious of who you’re directing the story to.’ Amis is saying that writing to a specific audience is a constraint on his art.”