On Monday, July 6, the British government announced a £1.5 billion effort to help hard-hit arts organizations in the UK through the pandemic. Art institutions like the National Gallery have only just begun reopening, but performance venues still probably have months to go before they can resume operating at their normal occupancy levels. Several major […]
Months into the pandemic’s grasp, Mumbai remains one of the worst-affected cities in India by COVID-19, with over 60,000 current cases overrunning hospitals. Staff and facilities are overwhelmed, their workload far greater than they have supplies, time, space, or stamina for. Shahnawaz Shaikh is not a doctor or an EMT, just a businessman. But for […]
When Earvin “Magic” Johnson retired from playing professional basketball in 2000, it was already obvious that he was not the sort of man who would just retire and ride out his substantial fortune for the rest of his days. He’d already tried his hand at coaching, and at hosting a television show, and starting a […]
In 2015 on the birthday of their daughter, pediatrician Priscilla Chan and her husband, Mark Zuckerberg, set up the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub to fight disease worldwide. In the past 5 years, most of their activities have been towards securing funding beyond the $1 billion in yearly funds coming from Facebook […]
The Last Dance, which began airing on ESPN on Sunday, April 19th, is a ten-part documentary series about the career of athlete Michael Jordan. Using 106 interviews and excerpts from over 10,000 hours of sports footage of Jordan, the series will juxtapose Jordan’s rookie year in 1984 with his ‘last dance,’ his final season with […]
Robyn Fenty, better known as the celebrity music artist Rihanna, is on the philanthropic front lines of the COVID-19 impact on the world. In March, her charity the Clara Lionel Foundation (named for her grandparents) donated $5 million to relief efforts both in the U.S. and the Caribbean. She also donated an unknown quantity of […]
An act of corporate philanthropy in dire times
Jack Dorsey founded Twitter, perhaps the most impactful of all the social media giants, in 2006 when he was 30 years old. He followed it up by developing Square, a banking company facilitating e-payments via smart phone. Seven years later, only hours after Twitter went public, Dorsey became a billionaire. Now in 2020, his net […]
Now that many U.S. states have issued guidances recommending against any gathering greater than 250, fifty, or even ten people, of course the industries reliant on massive crowds are suffering. For instance, the NBA suspended its 2019-2020 season as of March 11th, with no date set to recommence this year. 65 of the 82 games […]
Imagination Library is a nonprofit founded by Dolly Parton in 1995, with the goal of giving free books to children. It began in Sevier County, Tennessee, where Dolly was raised by a father who could not read. In its early stages, the organization sent one free book a month to every child registered from birth […]