{"id":9900,"date":"2015-01-24T11:10:29","date_gmt":"2015-01-24T19:10:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/?p=9900"},"modified":"2015-01-25T10:32:28","modified_gmt":"2015-01-25T18:32:28","slug":"saturday-stew-mostly-twofers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/?p=9900","title":{"rendered":"Saturday Stew: Mostly Twofers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-5009\" src=\"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/userpicobservations.jpg\" alt=\"userpic=observations\" width=\"100\" height=\"72\" align=\"right\" hspace=\"5\" vspace=\"5\" \/>It&#8217;s Saturday, and that means it is time to clean the links. This week&#8217;s collection of links is a bunch of twofers, with a few singlets. Here goes&#8230;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Ch-ch-ch-changes<\/strong>. Two changes to institutions &#8212; at least institutions to me &#8212; to report. The first concerns the <a href=\"http:\/\/nottinghamfestival.com\/\">Nottingham Festival<\/a>, a new RenFaire styled after the original Agoura faire that got kickstarted two years ago. For their third year (2015), <a href=\"http:\/\/www.simivalleyacorn.com\/news\/2015-01-16\/Community\/Nottingham_Festival_has_new_home_for_2015.html\">they are expanding to a new location and two weekends<\/a>. The other ch-ch-ch-change concerns <a href=\"http:\/\/tompaxton.com\/\">Tom Paxton<\/a>: Tom has announced that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pollstar.com\/news_article.aspx?ID=815900\">after his current tour ends in November, he will finally be stopping touring<\/a>.\u00a0 Age, the death of his wife last June, and the rigors of the road have taken its toll, although he&#8217;ll still be writing, recording, and occasionally, performing. This means &#8212; those of you in the Bay Area &#8212; that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thefreight.org\/janis-ian-tom-paxton\">his stop at Freight and Salvage with Janis Ian on April 25 will be your last chance to see him live<\/a>. Given that I don&#8217;t know if he will make it down to McCabes for one last show, I&#8217;m envious. He was last at McCabes in November 2013, and was at Theo Bikel&#8217;s 90th Birthday in early 2014.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Porn Doesn&#8217;t Sell<\/strong>. The market for published soft porn is changing. This week brings news that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/media\/2015\/jan\/19\/has-the-sun-axed-page-3-topless-pictures\">Britain&#8217;s <em>The Sun<\/em> has decided to stop publishing Page 3 topless models<\/a>. Further, both <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2015\/01\/19\/business\/media\/as-playboy-and-penthouse-fade-newer-pornographic-magazines-tilt-artistic.html?partner=rss&amp;emc=rss&amp;_r=2\">Playboy and Penthouse have seen significant circulation declines<\/a>, going from 6 million copies a month to perhaps 1 million (with Penthouse down to 100,000). What&#8217;s replacing them? Art. The trend is towards artistic printed nudes, as opposed to when Playboy, Penthouse, and The Sun peddled. Times change.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Going Away<\/strong>. Two interesting articles on things that are disappearing. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.vox.com\/2014\/10\/13\/6840233\/music-archiving-disappearance-history\">One is music<\/a>. Specifically, archived music: music recorded on tape is rapidly degrading &#8212; both cassette and 8-track. CDs, once touted for longevity, aren&#8217;t lasting. Wax cylinders or lacquer records &#8212; really degrading. The best archival medium: vinyl, followed by digital music (which often loses fidelity or has incompatible formats). What else is going away? <a href=\"http:\/\/arstechnica.com\/gadgets\/2015\/01\/skymall-parent-company-files-for-bankruptcy-ceo-blames-electronic-devices\/?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+arstechnica%2Findex+%28Ars+Technica+-+All+content%29\">The Skymall Catalog<\/a>. It&#8217;s parent company has filed bankruptcy, citing competition from electronic devices and airlines not purchasing as many copies of the catalog.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Los Angeles History<\/strong>. Here&#8217;s a twofer on Los Angeles. The first explores <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kcet.org\/updaily\/socal_focus\/history\/la-as-subject\/how-santa-monicas-third-street-became-a-promenade.html\">how 3rd Street in Santa Monica turned into the 3rd Street Promenade<\/a>.\u00a0 It&#8217;s a fascinating transition, reflecting an attempt to bring back business that worked for a while, failed, and then came back even stronger. The second deals with <a href=\"http:\/\/sanfernandovalleyblog.blogspot.com\/2015\/01\/bttf-26-chatsworth-ranch-that-broke.html?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+SanFernandoValleyBlog+%28San+Fernando+Valley+Blog%29\">Veronica Lake &#8212; the actress, not a real lake &#8212; and the home she bought out in Chatsworth in the 1940s<\/a>. Truly a different time and era in the valley.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Dramatic Thoughts<\/strong>. A twofer related to the theatre. The first is <a href=\"http:\/\/bittergertrude.com\/2013\/03\/21\/why-your-play-was-rejected\/\">an article from an artistic director on how to get your play read<\/a>. Yes, this is from 2013, but I just discovered it and felt it provided some really good insights. The second was highlighted by Bitter Lemons, and <a href=\"http:\/\/losangeles.bitter-lemons.com\/2015\/01\/19\/the-financial-anatomy-of-99-seat-production-in-los-angeles\/#sthash.Ot10sAWm.dpbs\">looks at a costing analysis of 99-seat theatre in Los Angeles<\/a>.\u00a0 I attend lots and lots of 99-seat theatre (two shows this weekend, in fact), and this really shows why the vibrant scene doesn&#8217;t provide a lot of financial support to actors, and why folks rarely make money at it. Some do by violating the rules and doing longer runs or not paying for rights; others charge more and pay their actors more; others find other ways to bring in funds. It also shows the importance of going to your local intimate theatre and filling the seats with paying customers: if the budgets plan on 60% occupancy, and they have a sold out run, they do better. Also, eschew comp tickets if you can &#8212; they&#8217;re cheap, but they hurt the venues. Pay for your tickets what you can afford.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Lastly, a twofer solely because it consists of two singlets [ETA: Well, make that three]:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Media Polarization<\/strong>. Here&#8217;s an interesting singlet: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.journalism.org\/2014\/10\/21\/political-polarization-media-habits\/\">a nice article on political polarization and the media<\/a>. It includes a great chart showing how most of the major media in the US is perceived with respect to political bias.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Good Design.<\/strong> Here&#8217;s another singlet, although I&#8217;ve discussed this some in the past: <a href=\"http:\/\/priceonomics.com\/a-designers-war-on-misleading-parking-signs\/\">Here&#8217;s an attempt to design a better parking sign<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Getting Gas<\/strong>. Here&#8217;s an interesting article on <a href=\"http:\/\/arstechnica.com\/security\/2015\/01\/internet-attack-could-shut-down-us-gasoline-stations\/?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+arstechnica%2Findex+%28Ars+Technica+-+All+content%29\">a potential cyberattack on gas stations<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s Saturday, and that means it is time to clean the links. This week&#8217;s collection of links is a bunch of twofers, with a few singlets. Here goes&#8230; Ch-ch-ch-changes. Two changes to institutions &#8212; at least institutions to me &#8212; to report. The first concerns the Nottingham Festival, a new RenFaire styled after the original <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/?p=9900\">Read More &#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9900","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-chum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9900"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9900\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9915,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9900\/revisions\/9915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}