On October 18, 2019, the planners of the 2020 worldwide panic called a Covid-19 pandemic emergency fully mapped out and role-played how all of this fear and economic chaos would arise and what steps global leaders will take. Visit Plannedemic.org to see the World Economic Forum and Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation funded Coronavirus pandemic simulation's own Web site of materials and video recordings. Participants include non-government organizations (NGOs) such as the World Health Organization, the United Nations, global corporations and media, Johns Hopkins University, the World Bank, and both U.S. and China Centers for Disease Control agencies.

Each of the current visiting painting and sculpture exhibits at the Figge Art Museum is worth seeing on its own. Combined, the fare at the Figge is packed with visual value and should not be missed.

Let's put a new twist on an old format – the ubiquitous year-end lists about music. We invited over 50 Quad Citizens who we know contribute to, support, and/or promote the local-music scene to give us their takes on 2017 via a 3-2-1 format. We asked: What are the three top songs they loved listening to this year; the two top live shows they saw in the Quad Cities; and the number-one artist they most want to see perform here live in 2018?

The River Cities' Reader begins its 25th year of publishing this Fall. With the domination of big social media, independent publishers like the Reader must establish a direct transactional relationship with its readership, or perish.

Over the decades, our readers and advertisers have repeatedly told us how important the locally-owned Reader, and its coverage, are to the Quad Cities' vitality and culture.

It's often what has kept us going.