Christopher Orlet comes out swinging against attempts to promote diversity in orchestras. “If ever there was a case for elitism it should be made on the world’s great orchestral stages, where perfection should never be held hostage to political correctness. If you want mediocrity, look to the government and the public schools. Plenty there to go round.”
Tag: 03.22.07
A Merger Of Book Superstores?
Borders and Barnes & Noble both report mediocre sales. “With so many mergers and acquisitions across the equity landscape, some industry analysts see the book-selling business as ripe for the picking.”
Music Publishers Sue XM Satellite Radio
“The publishers said the suit alleges that XM engages in massive copyright infringement with devices that provide its service known as XM + MP3, which lets listeners store songs they hear on XM’s service and arrange them into playlists.”
A Competitor For YouTube
NBC and News Corp. say they’re launching a competitor to YouTube. The new site will feature “thousands of hours of full-length programming, movies and clips. The new entity — a company yet to be formed — will distribute its content on AOL, MSN, MySpace and Yahoo, the new partners say.”
How Publishing Is Improving
“Interesting things are happening on a variety of fronts that are changing the way books are found, read and talked about, and in almost every case for the good.”
Does It Matter How You Get Your Video?
Of course, writes Dan Brown. Movies belong on the the big screen. TV is for the TV set. And YouTube? Well, YouTube is for the computer of course. And it’s not good that TV, movies and video should mix…
MTT Takes To The Radio (Again)
Michael Tilson Thomas is at it again. “The latest phase of the San Francisco Symphony’s five-year, $23 million, multi-pronged project is a radio series titled ‘The MTT Files,’ to be distributed by American Public Media beginning next month. The eight one-hour shows are hosted by the media-savvy maestro and promise to be upfront and personal.”
The Plugged-In Dance Review
The internet provides a great opportunity to use multimedia to enhance writing about dance. “If multimedia in the dance environment can ‘amplify’ our understanding of movement, why can’t incorporating multimedia into our dance reading experience ‘amplify’ our knowledge of dance?”
Artist On The Move
Lisa Bufano’s legs and fingers were amputated when she was 21. “Bufano’s movement pieces — she turns them into video podcasts and posts them on her Web site — use music, props, prosthetics and illusion to explore the idea of deformity.”
Why The Music On The Radio Sucks
Indie music is booming. But you won’t hear much of it on radio. “The reasons for radio’s resistance to independent music are numerous: laziness, knee-jerk conservatism, a tendency to equate small labels with musical inferiority, and, most crucially, the fact that over the last 40 years, FM radio programming slipped out of the control of actual music fans, and into the hands of careerist bean counters.”