maestro64

How interesting Apple is now censoring apps because some company is saying the apps is making them look bad. All restaurant owers should demand Apple remove yelp since it allows users to place bad reviews and makes thier business look bad.

Most time when I see something for sale on Amazon and it looks too good to be true I run it through those fake review websites and most times it usually is was not good. 

First, this is the reason I do not enable automatic updates. Generally Apple does a good job of getting it right but they too fall down and miss things especially as the complexity grows. I generally wait to see what happens to those who can not help themselves and updated immediately and find all the problems for the rest of us. 

Next for those of you who have more than a few homepod, I'm not sure why you may need so many unless you home is that big. I got 3 and think that may be over kill, having two one on first floor and other on the second is enough to fill the house with music. Grant it I have two surround sound setup for watching movies and found they too were over kill when playing background music in the house. Having Siri on the watch and phone is enough to do most everything without the need for homepod in each room.

FileMakerFeller said:

maestro64 said:

thelemmingface said:

(Before saying my piece I just want to make clear that I'm not attempting to either defend or criticise this proposal).

As someone involved in the arts in the UK, I can confirm that there are two major issues in the current British arts landscape.

The first issue is a general lack of funding: since 2000ish, the vast majority of our most successful actors, writers, comedians, musicians, artists etc have all come from privileged backgrounds. This is no coincidence: one requires a reasonable private income (ie from rich parents) in order to be able to start a career in the arts. This naturally restricts the diversity of the arts world, and makes our artistic landscape much the poorer - many talented creatives are unable to even consider getting a career off the ground.

Secondly, enjoyment of the arts is increasingly becoming available only to the privileged. Theatre tickets cost a fortune (even at festivals such as the Edinburgh Fringe!); concert tickets are extortionate; exhibitions are surprisingly costly and original artwork is prohibitively so. This is generally not a result of greed (at least, not in all cases!), but rather because our economy is tilted against artisan craftsmanship and personal creation. If you can only fit a small number of people in the theatre, you have to charge a lot for tickets simply to pay the salaries of all those needed to mount the play. It's a matter of great personal sadness to me, the arts thus being put out of the reach of so many: kids from poorer backgrounds have never been to the theatre or a live concert! This was the case even before the pandemic; it is especially so now, and is a situation that really does need to change. The arts are such an essential part of our culture (Apple, for instance, would never have existed without a whole plethora of artists inspiring Steve Jobs and the team in myriad different ways, as you will all be aware).

The second issue demonstrates that the solution to the first issue cannot be to simply 'charge more for art' or 'make something people want to pay more for', as suggested by some people above.

As I said at the top, I haven't considered the pros and cons of the 'Smart Fund' proposal, so I am certainly not attempting to express an opinion about whether it is a good or bad idea. I'm just pointing out that there is a problem with the arts in the UK, and a state-sponsored financial solution is probably the only way to solve said problem. Contrary to the general tone of the dismissive comments above, I don't believe the premise of this campaign is flawed.

I do agree the arts do bring a lot of value which is not monetary. However, the arts generally has always been for those with enough disposable income. This has not really change in thousand years. Yes there were times in history when the arts were brought to the everyday person, but even then without lots of knowledge about the subject you may not be able to appreciate what the artist is doing. Then add in the fact you have artist who do things which lack of better word "off the wall" and call it art and get upset when others do not see or understand what they are doing. The US has lots of free museums and Art Galleries so and who is inclined to learn can go, but it takes desire. Whether your a person of means or not , there is lots of people who lack the desire as such it should not be the burden of the tax payer to fund something only very few tend to appreciate.

Over the years the wife and I have bough art from local artist where we have lived and traveled, we try to buy things which represent the area we are visiting or a unique way to make something that only that artist is doing which shows off their skills. We really try to avoid buying commercial art, we like buying directly from the person who made it when possible.

FYI, I do not thing Steve Jobs was inspired by artists, he was more of a person who tried to be connected with nature.

Science was also the province of the wealthy for a substantial portion of human history. Yet we don't argue about the benefit of public funding bringing the ability for "poor" people to become scientists.

Actually Science has benefits everyone, if you look at the money put into NASA and look at all the technology that has come out of the program which benefits everyone no mater of their means, technology does not discriminate anyone is capable of using or benefitting from it. The total return on the invested money into NASA is huge. I am not saying all tax payer money invested by the government had huge returns which is not always true. 

Here is a simple example the money they government put into fundamental silicone physics lead to the development of the transistor. The transistor is the basic building block of every electronic device every person in the world benefits from. People lives are far better off today because of investment made in science of device physic. Can you find a similar example in arts where people lives are far better off today due to some investment into the arts.

But, the arts can not show the same return or even show society as a whole is much better because of those investments. 

Even looking at the non-monetary return, the money put into medial science has shown benefit on society that is huge and some of the benefits is not $ measurable, people are living longer today and there are people alive today who would not be here  if it was not for modern medicine.

Long and short everyone's lives are far better off today due to the investments made into all the science verses any amount put into the arts. Public money need to go to things which benefit the largest part society of those who pay in verse going toward things which only a small number of people see a benefit.

thelemmingface said:

(Before saying my piece I just want to make clear that I'm not attempting to either defend or criticise this proposal).

As someone involved in the arts in the UK, I can confirm that there are two major issues in the current British arts landscape.

The first issue is a general lack of funding: since 2000ish, the vast majority of our most successful actors, writers, comedians, musicians, artists etc have all come from privileged backgrounds. This is no coincidence: one requires a reasonable private income (ie from rich parents) in order to be able to start a career in the arts. This naturally restricts the diversity of the arts world, and makes our artistic landscape much the poorer - many talented creatives are unable to even consider getting a career off the ground.

Secondly, enjoyment of the arts is increasingly becoming available only to the privileged. Theatre tickets cost a fortune (even at festivals such as the Edinburgh Fringe!); concert tickets are extortionate; exhibitions are surprisingly costly and original artwork is prohibitively so. This is generally not a result of greed (at least, not in all cases!), but rather because our economy is tilted against artisan craftsmanship and personal creation. If you can only fit a small number of people in the theatre, you have to charge a lot for tickets simply to pay the salaries of all those needed to mount the play. It's a matter of great personal sadness to me, the arts thus being put out of the reach of so many: kids from poorer backgrounds have never been to the theatre or a live concert! This was the case even before the pandemic; it is especially so now, and is a situation that really does need to change. The arts are such an essential part of our culture (Apple, for instance, would never have existed without a whole plethora of artists inspiring Steve Jobs and the team in myriad different ways, as you will all be aware).

The second issue demonstrates that the solution to the first issue cannot be to simply 'charge more for art' or 'make something people want to pay more for', as suggested by some people above.

As I said at the top, I haven't considered the pros and cons of the 'Smart Fund' proposal, so I am certainly not attempting to express an opinion about whether it is a good or bad idea. I'm just pointing out that there is a problem with the arts in the UK, and a state-sponsored financial solution is probably the only way to solve said problem. Contrary to the general tone of the dismissive comments above, I don't believe the premise of this campaign is flawed.

I do agree the arts do bring a lot of value which is not monetary. However, the arts generally has always been for those with enough disposable income. This has not really change in thousand years. Yes there were times in history when the arts were brought to the everyday person, but even then without lots of knowledge about the subject you may not be able to appreciate what the artist is doing. Then add in the fact you have artist who do things which lack of better word "off the wall" and call it art and get upset when others do not see or understand what they are doing. The US has lots of free museums and Art Galleries so and who is inclined to learn can go, but it takes desire. Whether your a person of means or not , there is lots of people who lack the desire as such it should not be the burden of the tax payer to fund something only very few tend to appreciate.

Over the years the wife and I have bough art from local artist where we have lived and traveled, we try to buy things which represent the area we are visiting or a unique way to make something that only that artist is doing which shows off their skills. We really try to avoid buying commercial art, we like buying directly from the person who made it when possible.

FYI, I do not thing Steve Jobs was inspired by artists, he was more of a person who tried to be connected with nature.

Just goes to shows you even when people are given what they need and scream have been screaming for, you still can not fix stupid.