over 90% of €500 notes owned by criminals

A BBC story by Dominic Casciani reports that “more than 90% of the 500 euro notes that are provided in the UK have actually gone into the hands of serious organised criminals.”

A story by James Boxell in the Financial Times headlined “UK bars €500 note imports over crime fear” says banks and currency exchanges will be banned from importing the denomination. It isn't clear if individuals may still import €500 notes. Boxell reports that “... it has not been criminalised and people will still be able to pay them into UK bank accounts.”

Strangely, Boxell's report says that although the finance industry doesn't mind the restriction “... there were some objections from banknote makers.” Really? I would suspect banknote makers would applaud the new move, as criminals will now need five times as much of their product!

Call for papers on the destruction of casts of ancient art

Via Rogue Classicism: September 24-25, 2010
Cornell University, Ithaca, New York DESTROY THE COPY! A WORKSHOP ON THE FATE OF PLASTER CAST COLLECTIONS

... Plaster cast collections of ancient Greek and Roman sculpture and architecture usually formed a core part of royal, museum, and finally university collections. Their heyday is marked by the nineteenth century when the cast collections—by now including other periods— constituted universal museums in Europe and in the United States. However, the nineteenth century marks also the beginning of a decline in the reputation of plaster casts that eventually ended in entire collections being dispersed and discarded, if not actively demolished. Our workshop aims to inquire the reasons for these destructive acts...