A guy holding a 4 and 7 draws three cards in a poker game, successfully betting he’ll pull an inside straight flush. Skill or luck? Dumb luck for an unskilled […]
Arts and Culture
Posted inArts and Culture, Economy
Decision time for film tax credit
Beacon Hill lawmakers, who probably spent more than $300 million over the last four years trying to lure Hollywood filmmakers to Massachusetts, took a brief intermission today to consider whether […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Economy
Would you fund movies or environmental programs?
Back-to-back State House press conferences today showcased the type of choices Gov. Deval Patrick and state lawmakers have to make as they strive to balance the Massachusetts budget. At the […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Economy
Patrick seeks cap on film tax credit
JANUARY 28 UPDATE: A top House leader says the $50 million cap on film tax credits proposed by Gov. Deval Patrick would be a disaster for the movie business in […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Economy, Education, The Download
Journalism: The Poetry of the ’00s
Jared Sugerman is tired of hearing about the Death of Newspapers. A Northeastern University senior and journalism major, Sugerman says he can’t count how many times a week someone asks […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Economy, The Download
Will creativity gild the road to growth in Gateway City economies?
At a recent roundtable with leaders from across the state, we learned how Massachusetts discovered the value in “creative economy” economic development well before Richard Florida popularized the concept with […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Economy, The Download
This Side of Tax Paradise
A terrific new essay in The American Scholar analyzes F. Scott Fitzgerald's tax returns and is a startling reminder of how much the average American's relationship with the IRS has […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Economy, The Download
The Invention of Tax Credits
Friday, October 2, 2009 If you go to the new Ricky Gervais vehicle The Invention of Lying, keep in mind that the $9.75 you fork over isn't all you're paying […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Uncategorized
Free labor market
INTRO TEXT when caroline huang remembers her first job out of graduate school, tension creeps into her soft-spoken voice even now, almost 20 years later. The speech recognition scientist went […]
Posted inArts and Culture, The Download, Uncategorized
Innovation at 10
If necessity is indeed the mother of invention, an economic meltdown should spark lots of new ideas – some good, some so-so, some the sort you’re embarrassed to admit you […]
Posted inArts and Culture, The Download, Uncategorized
Statistically ignorant study ranks Boston 8th for literacy
Via Universal Hub: A study by the president of Central Connecticut University tags Boston as the 8th most literate city in the US, with Minneapolis and Seattle tied for first. […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Politics, The Download
Norton, Fitchburg now dead to state library board
Last week Norton became the 17th community in Massachusetts to lose certification for its library system, thanks to underfunding — specifically, a town meeting vote to cut funding by 33 […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Economy, The Download
1,000 great places to see before you die – on a budget
Gov. Patrick got into the swing of the recession yesterday, signing a law that costs nothing and will (maybe) make us feel better about not taking the Caribbean vacations we […]
Posted inArts and Culture, The Download, Uncategorized
Jacob’s Pillow, BSO, and MFA top NEA recipients in Massachusetts
The National Endowment for the Arts announced its first round of grants for fiscal year 2009 yesterday. Below, in descending order of grant amounts, are the Massachusetts recipients and the […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Politics
Play money
During tough fiscal times, arts and sports programs are often the first to get cut from municipal budgets. So it’s not a big surprise that the “culture and recreation” category, […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Uncategorized
Easy street
zero tolerance is always a favorite concept in American politics, and publicity-hungry politicians are still finding plenty of things they want to ban: transfats, people without health insurance, violent video […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Uncategorized
Your town, USA
walk into a bookstore almost anywhere in America and you’ll find a shelf full of thin paperback books with distinctive sepia-toned covers. Light on text, heavy on photos, numbingly similar […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Uncategorized
Marathon man
Bill Brett at a book signing at Fenway Park.Photo by Michael Manning. Few people know Boston and Bostonians as well as Bill Brett. He’s been taking photos for The Boston […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Politics, State House News Service
A shot seen round the world
every era has its touchstone photograph. The Marines hoisting the American flag on Iwo Jima telegraphs the hard-fought triumphs of World War II. The New York City firemen raising the […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Politics
Generation slap
mushy-middle political columnists often despair over the “blame game” that has supposedly poisoned American politics. And when a questionable use of taxpayer money appears on the front page of the […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Uncategorized
Engineering challenge
Photo by Frank Curran Ioannis Miaoulis swears he has nothing against dinosaurs or grasshoppers. That’s a good thing, since he presides over Boston’s Museum of Science, which attracts more than […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Environment
Squeaky wheels
the specter of little toothpicks twirling on the horizon of Nantucket Sound is causing fits among the political elites who make summer a verb on Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, and […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Uncategorized
Simple pleasures
buildings matter. They temper our mood, refract our ambitions and sensibilities. At their best, they might inspire us to behave better. “We want [buildings] to shelter us,” says essayist Alain […]
Posted inArts and Culture, Uncategorized
Brainstorms
we’re still in a state of invention, according to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Massachusetts ranked fourth in the total number of patents granted last year, outranked only by […]
