Government Stuff 

 Culture Stuff 

Arts & Culture 
The 21st Serpentine Pavilion designed by artist Theaster Gates - the first non-architect to take the reins - has opened its large black doors.  

According to The Art Newspaper, the UK’s Cultural Protection Fund - administered by the British Council to protect heritage at risk globally - has yet to designate funding to Ukraine.  

Over a million people attended events in Coventry during its year-long stint as UK City of Culture. Woo.  

The Wallace Collection has been named as Europe’s best free gallery by the Knowledge Academy. Double woo.  

Research commissioned by Sky Arts suggests that children could benefit from 65 minutes dedicated to the arts each day.  

Tate is returning a bunch of Francis Bacon sketches and documents, once valued at £20m, over authenticity concerns. I’ll have ‘em. 

Arts organisation 64 Million Artists is among 70 companies piloting a four-day week for the next six months. I’m aiming to get down to zero myself.   

Design 
The V&A Museum and RIBA are to end their two-decade long architecture partnership.  

A traditional croft house in Stornoway has been crowned as Scotland’s Home Of The Year 2022. Store me away there any time.  

Wow. The Guardian with a lunchtime long read on the Spanish former monk who spent 60 years building his own cathedral before his death last year. 

Theatre & Dance 
The Welsh government is investing £1m over the next five years to relaunch the Welsh language national youth theatre. Pob lwc!  

Classical Music & Opera 
The Beeb is set to explore alternative funding for its orchestras as part of cost-cutting measures.  

The English National Opera is to release a TV show on Sky to introduce children to opera. Nice idea.  

Tourism & Heritage  
A wreck of a warship which sank in 1682 off Norfolk with a future king onboard has been found… but in 2007? And we only find out now?! What else are you hiding down there?! 

Museums  
A new report commissioned by ICOM has highlighted an ‘astonishing, almost absurd’ amount of political interference in central European museums. 

Press, Books & Libraries 
Press Gazette examines how GB News is faring one year on from launch.  

Richard Osman’s The Thursday Murder Club was the most-borrowed book from British libraries last year. Killing it.  

Exhibitions and Events  
Edinburgh Book Festival is going (partially) online in August, with speakers including Brian Cox (the Succession one, not the space one).  

Queercircle, a new LGBTQ+ cultural space in Greenwich’s Design District, has just opened to the public with a year-round programme of exhibitions and events. 

Eat my goal. A programme of arts events has been announced for cities across the UK this summer to run alongside the Women’s EURO 2022. 

As part of Yorkshire Sculpture Garden’s big 4-5, they’re about to kick off a series of events exploring relationships called The Summer of Love. Groovy, baby.  

 Creative Industries & Tech Stuff 

Film & TV 
Sir David? That’s Sir Sir David to you, thanks very much. David Attenborough has been given a second knighthood for services to TV and conservation. 

The new Jurassic Park is out and reviews range from “time to drop the dead dino” (The Guardian) to “worst of the franchise” (NME). I’m sold. Off to Peckhamplex. 

BUT critics are rather fond of the new Disney+ series Ms Marvel - Marvel’s first Muslim superhero story. Change of plan. Staying in now instead. 

Fashion 
London’s Steven Stoke Daley has been awarded this year’s LVMH Prize for young designers. Vogue explores how he won.  

Amazon’s luxury fashion site has gone online across Europe after success in the US.  

Profits at Zara have risen by 80% in the first quarter of this year. Not bad.  

Music & Radio 
More than 50 music organisations, including the Ivors Academy and AIM, have called for a halt to proposed cuts to new music funder PRS Foundation. 

A new app has launched with Universal Music which aims to help dementia patients recall important memories using music. Amazing. 

Foo Fighters have announced two shows in September in London and LA to mark the life of drummer Taylor Hawkins. 

Music Venue Trust has launched a crowdfunder for their campaign for the live music community to own, protect and improve grassroots music venues.  

Spotify reckons it’s on track to reach a billion users by 2030. Same with the newsletter. 

Katie Phillips, who has over 20 years of experience in entertainment PR, has launched a new podcast about living with cancer.  

The Guardian picks its best albums of 2022 so far. No place for the Disney album of lo-fi beats curated by Minnie Mouse? Cowards.

Gaming 
557 new video game studios formed in the UK between 2020 and 2021, according to TIGA stats. Great stuff.  

Microsoft’s new Xbox TV app will allow buyers of new Samsung TVs to stream games without a console. Futuristic.  

Tech & Telecoms 
All new smartphones, tablets and laptops in the EU will be required to use a USB-C charger by 2024. But the UK is ‘not currently considering’ copying the plans.  

Look out Klarna et al. Apple has just unveiled its own ‘buy now, pay later’ function and announced iOS 16 plans like the ability to unsend texts. Handy.  

Oh and did you know Apple’s iOS app economy now supports more than 440,000 jobs in the UK alone. 

New Ofcom rules will save at least 1,400 phone boxes from closing in rural areas with patchy signal. Hoorah!  

Good to see. UKRI and British Academy are teaming to provide a total of £4.5m over three years to enhance research on diversity and inclusion in innovation. 

Uber is now powering emergency food deliveries in Ukraine.  

Multiverse, the start-up for apprenticeships from Euan Blair, has just hit a £1.4bn valuation and plans to scale up to 100,000 apprentices from 8,000.  

Water under the bridge. Five years after fighting in courts, Waymo and Uber are teaming up on autonomous trucking.  

Twitter is set to comply with Elon Musk’s demand for data on fake accounts after he threatened to walk away from the deal. Like a soap opera you can’t turn off.  

TikTok is adding the option for screen-time controls to stop us scrolling and scrolling and “oh it’s Binley Mega Chippy” and scrolling and…  

Ford is aiming to go 100% online for sales. On the internet? It’ll never catch on. 

NASA is putting together a research team to study UFOs if anybody is keen? 

THERE’S STILL TIME! Forbes on the Italian tech founder who started a microchip testing business aged 60 and became a billionaire at 87.  

 Appointments & Movers 

Mark Pemberton is stepping down as chief exec of the Association of British Orchestras after 15 years; ex-ASOS chief exec Nick Beighton is joining online fashion platform Secret Sales; Sue Barker is stepping down as Wimbledon presenter on the Beeb; Ros Atkins has been appointed as analysis editor for BBC News; Allegra Stratton has joined Bloomberg as UK contributing editor; Inc Arts founding chief exec Amanda Parker is stepping down; Richard Morris has been appointed as audio comedy director at the Beeb; Amy Vaughan has joined Battersea Arts Centre as exec director; Marcus Ryder has joined the board of kids indie Bright Little Labs 

Ed Stuff

Spoke in the House of Lords during the second reading of the Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Bill 

...And Finally

Size of the thing! A former Bake Off winner has just made the world’s biggest Jaffa Cake and it’s almost 2m wide. Full moon. Half moo… Ok, I’m full up now.  

Size of the thing! The world’s largest whiskey bottle, the size of 444 standard bottles, has sold for over £1m. Pretty neat but whiskey business trying to pour a glass.