ART AND THE GOVERNMENT A federal judge recently ruled that Pandora must continue to pay ASCAP, which represents song writers and publishers, a 1.85% composition royalty. It was a (not entirely clean) victory for Pandora, which was arguing against a rise to 3%. The Future of Music Coalition has a good primer on the issue.Read More
Uncomfortable Thoughts: Are We Missing the Point of Effective Altruism?
People who want to do the most amount of good possible with the resources available don’t tend to take the arts very seriously. What if they’re right?
What We Talk About When We Talk About Race
What can we do to create an open environment for talking honestly about race relations in all of their kaleidoscopic, maddening, shame-inducing complexity?
Artists not alone in steep climb to the top
From fashion to law, winner-take-all markets are all over the economy.
MOOCs and the Future of Arts Education
What those popular online learning platforms might mean for hand turkeys and do-re-mi.
Watching Gentrification Unfurl
Cultural, civic, and private sector forces are on display in the evolution of two New York City neighborhoods.
Audiences at the Gate: Reinventing Arts Philanthropy Through Guided Crowdsourcing
(This article originally appeared in 20UNDER40 anthologyi edited by Edward P. Clapp, and has been republished with permission.) Spurred on by major technological advances, the number of aspiring professional artists in the United States has reached unprecedented levels and will only continue to grow. The arts’ current system of philanthropic support is woefully underequipped to evaluate thisRead More
Asset management on $5 a day
I’ve been thinking lately about Sudhir Venkatesh’s experiment in extreme poverty immersion and the lessons it holds for grantmakers. As I mentioned in that post, I’ve known only a tight-budget existence in my personal life thus far, which has been reinforced by four years working for a nonprofit with annual expenses in the $1.5 millionRead More
You Can’t Always Get What You Want
This is amazing. Freakonomics guest blogger Sudhir Venkatesh has been working for the past few months with Michael, a trust-fund baby with $78 million to donate over the next few years. After paying 20 grand to a few consultants to help him direct his funds and getting a lot of hogwash about “embracing the innerRead More