Jordan Sayle

Neon signage has been around for exactly a century, but today the glowing lights face competition from cheaper LED technology. Physics professor Eric Schiff and Jeff Friedman, of New York's Let There Be Neon studio, explain what's behind neon's everlasting glow. Produced by Jordan Sayle.

A new play opened recently that had a very exclusive audience: patrons had to go to Sing Sing Correctional Facility to see it. It's called "Starting Over," and prisoners wrote and performed it. Produced by Jordan Sayle and Studio 360's Pejk Malinovski.

This weekend, Studio 360 broadcasts its special time travel show, recorded in front of a live audience at WNYC's Jerome L. Greene Performance Space.  And with this decade coming to an end, it seems like a good opportunity to revisit some of the events and trends from the 2000's that we'll always remember.

At this point, just two days before Christmas, you're probably waking up at odd hours with 'O Little Town of Bethlehem' playing on that radio station inside your head.  Some songs never seem to go away.  And then there are those that really don’t.

Did you miss that performance of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” at the arts center last month? Or the oboe concerto recital at the concert hall? Well it looks like you weren’t the only one.

This week, 15,000 delegates and 110 heads of state from 192 nations are in Copenhagen to (we hope) negotiate a treaty to address the causes of climate change. It turns out that a number of artists have also arrived in the Danish capital, intent on delivering their own messages about what is at stake.

Who knew procrastination could be so fruitful?  Smith (White Teeth) wrote the essays collected here while missing deadlines for her novels. Among them: her father's experiences during the invasion of Normandy; thoughts on E.M. Forster and David Foster Wallace; and idolizing the women Katherine Hepburn played.  The biggest surprise is her movie reviews -- nothing's stale about her takes on 'Munich,' 'Capote,' and 'Shopgirl.' And so much better than the films you never saw in the first place.

Twenty years ago today, at a press conference aboard the Russian cruise ship Maxim Gorky, the end of the Cold War was officially declared.  And yet the fear accompanying nuclear weaponry remains, as evidenced by President Obama's explanation of the stakes in Afghanistan on Tuesday night: “We know that al Qaeda and other extremists seek nuclear weapons, and we have every reason to believe that they would use them.”

Graphic nonfiction achieves a new level of elegance in a very rarefied subject: the career of Bertrand Russell – mathematician, philosopher, and educator -- and his search for the logical foundation of mathematics.  Against the backdrop of two world wars, Russell tries to argue for humans to base their behavior on reason; but the cruelty of his fellow logicians gives the book its skeptical edge.

Here's a Black Friday deal that the big-box retailers can't beat.  Buy the new album from the up-and-coming indie band Ezra Furman and the Harpoons and you'll get a personalized song thrown in, for no extra charge.  Just send them a letter with your life story (or a condensed version, perhaps), and they’ll churn out a folk-rock ditty with your name on it.

British poet Ruth Padel shares Charles Darwin's DNA -- she's his great-great granddaughter.  Inspired by the life of her (relatively) early relative, this descendant of the Descent of Man author pays tribute to her forefather in verse to commemorate the 150th anniversary of On The Origin of Species and the 200th anniversary of Darwin’s birth.

Kids never do as they’re told.  The lauded novelist Vladimir Nabokov asked that his unfinished manuscript The Original of Laura be burned upon his death.  But lucky for us, his son Dmitri didn’t listen.  This week marks Laura’s inflammatory publication, which means that fans of Nabokov's will now have to decide whether to respect the master's wishes or run to the nearest bookstore to crack open the spine of this much-anticipated book and bite into some forbidden fruit.

Errant kid-carrying balloons, planes that overshoot the runway by 150 miles -- these days, preternatural occurrences are the stuff of cable news. But 50 years ago, viewers tuned in to 'The Twilight Zone' to get their weekly eeriness fix. Before the 'The Twilight Saga,' and before 'Paris Hilton’s My New BFF' became the creepiest show in TV history, Rod Sterling's groundbreaking sci-fi series premiered on a Friday night in October 1959. Not only did it offer far-fetched premises and unexpected twists; there was also a heavy dose of social commentary shrouded in all of the fantasy and suspense.

Even if you don't know it, you've probably already heard the music of Orba Squara. The New York City-based singer-songwriter Mitch Davis' one-man band is responsible for the effervescent tune featured in the iPhone commercials that have been blanketing the airwaves for the last couple of years. The song is called 'Perfect Timing (This Morning),' and it's one of many tracks from Orba's debut album that have popped up in unexpected places.

Seniority rules at Yale, but not entirely.  The Whiffenpoofs are the century-old men's a cappella ensemble, limited to 14 vocalists from each year's senior class – you’ll hear them on this week's show.  But there’s a noteworthy junior who’s hot on their heels.

Out of 1,262 artists from 41 states and 15 foreign countries, Ran Ortner was declared the winner at ArtPrize, the festival that took over Grand Rapids, Michigan for the last couple of weeks.  There were balloon sculptures and paper airplane demonstrations, but in the end, the public got behind Ortner's two-dimensional painting, 'Open Water no.24,' and made its creator $250,000 richer.  Ortner will be on the show next week to tell Kurt how his life as a struggling artist has been forever changed.

Handpicked by President Obama as the host city of last week's G-20 economic conference, Pittsburgh may finally be getting its due.

Most robots take millions of dollars and years of research to build – but you can get started today on your very own, without any grant writing. And some of the materials you'll need might be cluttering up your house right now.

Have you been acquainted with a Mr. Elyot Vionnet?