One graphic novelist raised $600,000 on Kickstarter. Another team raised their money - and then promptly fell apart. What happens then? Publishers Weekly 02/10/12

"In prosperous societies, where social media is common, social lives are affordable and accessible, and families are no longer a financial necessity, is the era of communal living over and done? If so, are we losing our ability to be intimate, or are we simply evolving into creatures with different needs?" The New York Times 02/12/12

"We need to choose stories for that part of the human soul much more often than we do. We need to learn how to market those stories to people, too. We need to expand this city's understanding of what going to the theater can be: not only familiarity, but discovery; not only comfort, but a healthy rattling of the cages." Gwydion Suilebhan 02/13/12

No. In making movies, "the key factors are ideas and money - and both are currently in short supply." The Financial Times 02/10/12

"Christo sits stone-faced as they call him a liar, a cheater, a con man, a killer, as they politely suggest he is a fool, as they angrily denounce him as an enemy of nature. He is the world's most famous artist and this is what he must endure for these odd projects he dreams up." Denver Post 02/10/12

How Brenda Dixon Gottschild came to write the biography of Philadelphia's Joan Myers Brown, legend of African-American dance. Philadelphia Inquirer 02/12/12

"The day was warm and humid. The air was soft and thick. The very diverse audience included students and parents, rich and poor, children as young as 5. Attire could be anything: jeans and T-shirts, suits and mini-skirts. Kids carried musical instruments. Teenagers danced and necked on the plaza. Vendors sold delicious local chocolate wrapped with portraits of Gustav Mahler." Los Angeles Times 02/12/12

"Some organizations have invited audience members into the creative process. Others have altered their ticket policies, offering more liberal exchanges or hooking up with Groupon. Whatever the case, business as usual has lost its sense of usual." Chicago Tribune 02/11/12

Craig Watson: "In all of my early discussions around the state, it is clear the role the Arts Council played historically as a convener has been missed. We are getting back in that business where it makes sense." Barry's Blog 02/12/12

Craig Watson: "In all of my early discussions around the state, it is clear the role the Arts Council played historically as a convener has been missed. We are getting back in that business where it makes sense." Barry's Blog 02/12/12

The director: The "process includes readings, staged readings, the opportunity for a small production, and finally for a main stage production. I don't see this sort of development happening enough in these days of limited finances." Back Stage 02/10/12

As Scotland prepares for a vote on independence, some in the arts think a yes vote would be disastrous. Mezzo-soprano Karen Cargill: "For the arts in Scotland, funding is difficult. There is an audience for classical music, but it's very small, and we can't deny that people travel from south of the border to attend. I think we're stronger together." The Scotsman 02/12/12

"Architecture is also the stuff of construction, engineering, maths and science. Of philosophy, sociology, Le Corbusier and who knows what else. It is also, I can't help feeling, harder to create great buildings now than it was in the past. When Eridu or the palaces and piazzas of Renaissance Italy were shaped, architecture was the most expensive and prestigious of all cultural endeavours. Today we spread our wealth more thinly." The Guardian (UK) 02/12/12

Novelist Christopher Bram: "Even when gay books were the only game in town, there were plenty of gay people who didn't read. For them being gay was about sex and going to bars and dancing. There's still gay culture around and it takes different shapes and forms. Gay bars don't play the same role in gay life they once did 10-15 years ago. The Internet has changed that too. I miss the gay bookstores, but I like the difference and the variety." Salon 02/12/12

"The name of the pub is the Flying Duck. The name of the night is All The Young Nudes. It is a life-drawing club. Every Tuesday, for two hours, around 50 people gather here in a back room down a back lane with sketchpads and cans of cider. This is, perhaps, the only bar in Glasgow where a Stanley knife taken out and laid on the table implies not a threat of violence but an intention to sharpen one's pencils." The Scotsman 02/12/12

"The students had objected to the 'indecent' clothing ... and 'categorically refused' to let the filming continue unless the wardrobe was changed." Daily Star (Lebanon) 02/11/12

Sophie Kinsella, author of the Shopaholic books: "You can be highly intelligent, and also ditzy and klutzy. You can be unable to cook, you can like lipstick. And I think it's more realistic to represent women having all these facets, than to say, OK, you're intelligent, so I've got to write you as all competent, which I think is an unfair ideal." The Guardian (UK) 02/12/12

The BBC's Radio 3, during a an eight-day stretch entirely devoted to Schubert, will "finish" one of the several symphonies the composer left unfinished at his death. The Telegraph (UK) 02/12/12

"The Bristol Old Vic is finally getting a much-needed £19.28m refurbishment and refit. With the main auditorium out of action, the team at BOV had to come up with ingenious ways of keeping the theatre alive during the works." TheStage (UK) 02/10/12

"If any company should have recognized what 2012 would be like in, say, 1988, Kodak should have. After all, it pretty much invented 2012 in 1888. That was the year that company founder George Eastman introduced the Kodak No. 1, catalyzing a new way of looking at the world, a new mode of existence." The Smart Set 02/10/12