It has been asked and talked about before: but the real question is just what exactly is in SDMI for the consumer? The average consumer, I mean. Not the guy that has a home LAN, digital sound cards, and 100+ CDRs of MP3s.
I'm talking about the family who goes to Best Buy on a Saturday to buy a new CD player or buy a couple of CDs.
What's SDMI gonna do for these people? Nothing.
Jack Valenti (the MPAA, not RIAA) has been spouting off about "ethics" for the past week or so. "We need to change our culture so that people realize that downloading audio/video is stealing. We need to adjust people's ethics and make them aware that, yes, stealing is bad. You cannot be a good person and steal."
Now, Valenti is a prick. There's no doubt about it. He's an old guy of the worst sort: a guy who thinks he's "in touch" but, of course, is woefully out of touch. He thinks he's in touch because he's "been around" for something like 40 years -- wining and dining with Jack Kennedy, setting up the current MPAA rating system, (boy, when I was 11 and blocked out of Apocalypse Now because of Valenti's 'R' rating, I was furious. I even wrote a letter to the guy -- he didn't answer -- and attempted to explain that it should be up to my parents about whether or not I should be able to see Apocalypse Now or the Deer Hunter and not Jack Valenti and his out of touch band of decrepit geezers who have managed for years to wine and dine and subsequently get in bed with all of the politicos. But I digress...) and acting as the rabid lobbyist for the interests of the Motion Picture Industry.
The problem with the MPAA -- and by extension the RIAA -- isn't Napster or DIVX (the video codec, not the failed Circuit City venture) or peer-to-peer networking -- it's one of perception.
True, a new business model would help matters -- a business model in which the RIAA and MPAA figure out how to exploit technology, leverage it, and still give the consumer a sense of empowerment -- but the real issue is one of perception. The RIAA and MPAA are vile whores.
I don't say this lightly, either. Not too long ago I was at an 'eGovernment' conference (one of the dumbest conferences I'd ever attended -- government, for sure, has no clue when it comes to understanding the way business and tecnology have shifted, but, again, I digress...) and the keynote speaker was some higher-up on the US Internet Council. (Some non-profit US group out of Washington DC who go around the globe and attempt to get everybody to buy into the global benefits of the internet). This guy -- a fantastic speaker, by the way -- was asked a question about Napster and about pending litigation against Napster and Scour and guess what? The first words out of his mouth was this: "The RIAA is vile."
No kidding. It was a joke -- and he switched into his serious "Well, okay, not vile, but you know..." mode, but it was a telling moment.
The audience cheered. For me, it was the high point of a dumb conference. (Can someone explain to me why the government -- state and local, especially -- don't get dot-com speakers to speak at these things instead of government webheads? I mean, if the government is gonna learn anything about "leveraging" the internet, the place they should for instruction is into the private sector and not back into the public sector, where -- except for some academic wonks, perhaps -- they will find only cluenessness piled upon more cluelessnes, but, okay, I digress...)
My point is this: that the RIAA and MPAA both need better PR if anyone is gonna buy into Valenti's ethical arguments. It's as if a pimp complains to a Congressman about how his "business has been bad lately because the ladies been giving it up for free. Man, I gotta install computerized chastity belts and issue encrypted keys!"
No one listens to the pimp because he's a pimp. The other pimps praise the first pimp's ethics -- Yeah, man, there is an Ethics of Pimping -- but everybody else gives the pimp a crazy look: Ethics? You're not serious, right?
That's what Valenti is fighting against. He's in a PR war for getting Joe Consumer to buy into the Ethics of the Pimp.
Because the CD player you bought 2 years ago doesn't have the hardware to decrypt and encrypted file.
Computer software -- or new CD players -- could be equipped with such hardware, but, uh, would you ditch a perfectly good CD player to 'upgrade' to a new one with less functionality?
I suspect the RIAA is toying with this idea: how much of an outcry would there be if, say, we urged labels to release CDs that could not be played on current CD players?
I'm sure there was (or still is) some bean counter sitting in a conference room somewhere talking to Bri ("Hi, call me 'Bri!'. It's short for Brian.") about whether or not it would be 'economically feasible' to scrap current CD technology and, well, force consumers to upgrade to new players.
In fact, I'm sure there were meetings and more meeting about this.
"Bri, whattya think?"
"Well, Joe COnsumer won't like it."
"Well, fuck Joe Consumer, Bri. Fuck him. Fuck them. Bri, let me ask you this --"
"Huh?"
"Your car? What kind is it?"
"I got a Lexus. And --"
"And you like it. Right? You like that Lexus."
"Yeah -- my wife, she's got --"
"A BMW?"
"A blue one, yeah."
Leaning close: "Bri, listen to me. Are you listening?"
"Yeah."
"You want your fucking Lexus. Your wife wants her BMW. You want a standard of living that you're used to. Right?"
"We got a big house."
"This is why, Bri. This is why."
"Why...?"
Jimmy whispers: "F. U. C. K. Joe Consumer. Fuck him. You understand? SDMI is good. SDMI will feed us, Bri."
"Yeah."
"Say it, Bri."
It's late afternoon. Bri is tired. He looks out the window. Gray skies.
"Say it, Bri."
"Fuck Joe Consumer, Jimmy."
"That's right."
Bri wants to leave. He wants to get in Lexus and go to his big house. "Fuck him," says Bri.
"Say it, Bri."
"Fuck Joe Consumer!"
"That's it."
"And the hackers. Fuck them, too."
"You're okay, Bri. You're a good guy, Bri."
"Fuck the consumer! fuck the hackers!"
"All of it."
"Everything."
"That's right."
"Thank you."
"You feel better?"
"Yeah."
"Are you on board?"
"Yeah."
"No go home, Bri. Go home and remember what we talked about."
"Okay."
"Take tomorrow off. Will you do that?"
"Tomorrow?"
"Hit the links, Bri. Go and have a nice day. Take it all in. 9 holes, 18 holes -- it's up to you."
Hey, if I could get my 3 TIVOs to talk to my Indrema via Linux, I'd be very interested in this thing -- especially with the Indrema's ethernet and the TIVO's conspicuous lack of any easy-to-implement ethernet connectivity.
(The TIVO army on the avsforum, of course, maintains that TIVO doesn't need any sort of broadband support -- it's become a sort of mantra for them -- but I wonder what sort of possbilities might exist when indrema meets TIVO. Anything to prove that rabid, fanboy TIVO army that they're a bunch of kissass TIVO fanboys, but I digress...)
Yes, that's true. At this point, it does not matter that it's cracked.
The RIAA is losing the PR war -- the back and forth between Salon is proof of that -- by not handling things correctly.
If they want people to respect, fear, or otherwise appreciate SDMI, they need to be up front about the whole thing.
Was it cracked? Yes.
What's next? We're not sure. Stay tuned.
Pretty simple. I'd still think the RIAA are a bunch of money grubbing whores, but at least if they had cajones enough to admit defeat -- and admit that, yeah, it's a tough nut to crack, if not downright impossible to crack -- I'd realize that the suits in charge of the RIAA are savvy enough to realize that new media is different than the old media.
That in itself would be a minor victory: a suit admitting that, hey, maybe we can't pimp our wares the same way we've been pimping it in the past. Maybe, uh, we need to sit down and examine this "internet" stuff. But they won't admit that.
Leo won't admit that.
And Jack Valenti -- the decrepit MPAA dude -- is convinced that he, too, can win the battle with PR spin. ("Hey, pal, I know movies! Me and Jack Kennedy loved movies!")
Watching and listening to Valenti is like watching Boffo the Unemployed Clown parading around a smoke-filled room trying to score laughs with Don Rickles jokes -- "Heh, heh, that old hag was so ugly she even deflated my tires!! Ba da bing!"
It's funny in a pathetic way. Like you're watching some old geezer unravel on the spot. Poor Jack.
Poor Leo.
Hey, guys, here's a tip: take your golden parachute retirement bonus, head to Martha's Vineyard to your country houses, and shut the fuck up.
I dunno. I suspect the candidates didn't write the answers -- I'm sure they "spoke" the answers. They sound more like spoken answers than written answers.
But I must say that Bush's answer is vintage Shrub: lotsa words but completely devoid of content. Kinda like the dazed-and-confused look he had at last night's debate: eager for the attack but, um, we're not really sure about the specifics yet, Jim, so, er, we're just gonna explain why, ah, why... heh... well, we're gonna explain what makes a good leader, heh heh, because, er, as you know... a good -- the best leaders lead, yeah, they lead, and you know leading is important when, uh... heh... when you're a leader... heh heh.
In all fairness, Gore's answer to the Napster controversy isn't much better but at least he indicates how the issue will (I'm 100% sure) be solved: licensing. Maybe the licensing is something Napster, Inc. will pay. Maybe it's something that will be passed onto the consumers.
But I'm sure -- I'm positive, in fact -- that licensing (ala ASCAP) is how Napster will ultimately be resolved.
Part of the problem with Gore and Bush -- and certainly with the creepy veeps -- is that they fail to realize that in order to get the "youth vote" they have to have some emotional investment in the youth they're attempting to persuade.
It's the generation gap, yes, but it strikes me these days that it's more than just a "generation" gap. Technology -- and that includes stuff like film and music -- has brought about an enormous "knowledge" gap -- or "emotion" gap -- between politicians and their young constituents.
Sure, Gore has his daughter as one of his top advisors. Okay, but that's not enough.
It doesn't take a genius to dive into Napster these days, pull up some popular music tracks -- Bush, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Kid Rock, you name it -- and realize there's a lot of "rage" out there. Rock and Roll and Rap are certainly good vehicles for expressing that rage.
For once, I'd love to hear candidate talk about music and realize that rock and roll (for example) is a verb and not a noun. It's not a *thing*. The key to rock and roll isn't the words of the songs themselves -- it's what those words are pointing and leading to.
Rock music (and film) are only cultural vehicles for deep human impulses. I mean, I'd love it if, for example, Lieberman would rail against *bad* movies instead of just the standard things like violence and sex.
I'd love it if a candidate stood up and, for once, said: "Look, instead of trying to get Hollywood (or rock and roll or whatever) to stop violence and sex, let's get them to start making *better* movies. The real danger is in the dumbing down of America. It's not of the propagation of impulses that are in our biology (i.e. sex and violence.)"
As wacky as that would sound, it would (to my mind at least) signal a kind of understanding.
Well, there's also more flexible hardware than the Rios and Nomads out there: the MiniDisc.
For whatever reason MD hasn't caught on here like Japan, but if you want a *flexible* MP3 player (and recorder) that can handle *any* format, the obvious choice is a MD player/recorder.
And, yes, I know MD uses a compression scheme but I think most will agree with the ATRAC is pretty damn near undetectable.
It surprises me actually that more people haven't latched onto MD players in light of the (amazing) amount of music now available digitally.
The irony of this mess is this: Napster's user list -- containing e-mail addresses -- is probably worth more than the RIAA or MPAA or Jackie Valenti is willing to admit.
The gold isn't in the music itself. The gold is there for the taking, but no one is moving to take it: it's Napster's gazillion user e-mail addresses.
Why isn't Napster dangling their databases more "publically" in front of the RIAA and MPAA. Why aren't they saying: Screw the content. We've got something better. We've got gazillions of users with e-mail addresses who crave your product??
Anyone want to take bets on how long it'll take Freeboxen to get cease-and-desisted because someone (or several people) start offering modified hardware (or illegally copied software) that violates EULA agreements, TOS's, etc?
I'm thinking specifically of the jokers at Digital Convergence swooping down on Freeboxen once someone posts a "Hey, I've got a modified CueCat -- free for anyone blah blah blah..."
You watch. I think Freeboxen is a *great* idea -- I'm going to list my old Mac stuff -- but, yeah, I'm sure someone is gonna attempt to sue them for listing software that isn't actually "owned" by the person listed or whatever.
[Sometimes the only way to make one's point is to make it very, very crystal clear. Whether that means calling Valenti a cocksucker ]
Um, excuse me RadicalMan, but calling Valenti a cocksucker (or smashing a Starbucks) isn't much more than flipping a dictator the bird as he's driving along in a limo.
Get fucking real. If you're sick of the passive-aggressive "civil disobedience" as you (seem) to claim: then it's gonna take more than name calling and "Starbucks" bashing to get your point across.
Besides, smashing up a Starbucks is "radical chic". It's for losers who actually think "Fight Club" is a good movie and for whiners who think Ikea is the scourge of the earth.
Actually, this is a pretty funny article -- especially toward the end where the author describes the way to cobble together your CD: download the music, buy the glossy liner paper, print it out, then burn the CD.
Yeah, a real riot. Let me at those albums. There's nothing I'd like better than to (a) spend more for an electronic download than the "physical" counterpart and (b) get to spend my time (which these days -- for most of all us, I'm sure -- is more valuable than these bozos at AlbumDirect realize) to put together the whole kit-and-kaboodle.
Lessee. First, I gotta download the songs.
I got a DSL modem -- 1.05/1.05M -- so, no, not too bad, but, ya know, 15 minutes is still 15 minutes.
Then I gotta print the liners on special paper? (No, you can use normal paper -- but, yeah, you gotta print the liner notes.) And, um, I get to burn the CD myself? The whole CD? No kidding? Lessee, I got a burner about a year old. Still takes around 15 minutes to burn the CD. (And if I get a coaster? Well, hell, just burn it again! CDs are cheap. My time is not cheap -- but CDs -- yeah 79 cents each, no prob.)
And then, when it's all done, I have, er, a custom CD that I burned and printed out the labels for and that, um, looks like I cobbled together myself. Yeah! That's sooooooo cool.
But wait! It wasn't really cheap because it cost more than the "physical" CD!
Oh yeah. Great idea.
Come on you dumbass suit-wearing, cellphone talking, consult-the-business-model, Viper driving, 30-something, "Hey, Bob, look at us: we're executives!" weenies: no one is gonna buy your idea! No one is going to buy your idea!
It's like going to a restaurant -- Benihana, whatever those places are called that force you to stand in line with a bunch of dirty-fingernailed, snivelling little shits who touch the glass and then cough all over the green peppers and water chestnuts -- and pay *them* for the privilage of making your own food. What a great idea! (Executive-speak: "Well, friend, you have to understand. We're not selling the product as much we're selling the experience. We feel that customers appreciate the fact that they're in charge of their own product, er, dinner and that they've been given the ability to tinker and tailor with the food to create a singularly satisfying, one of a kind dining experience. If you'd like, I can give you a prospectus describing Benihana's philosophy and perhaps you'll appreciate why we are able to set ourselves apart from the competition.)
Actually, making the things "damn near worthless if hacked" seems to be the point of loss-leader products -- iOpener, CueCat, TIVO, etc.
But the irony of it all is that this "damn near worthless" situation is exactly what drives the so-called "hackers" in the first place. When you have a piece of hardware sterilized by lack of software (or lack of a monthly 'hookup' in the case of the TIVO or iOpener), it's only human nature to examine closely the relationship between the hardware and the software that some business guy says we need to operate it.
Moreover, this loss-leader shit does expose some pretty lousy business models. TIVO is an exception here because they actually take a pretty generous view of their boxes and the hackers that tweak them -- but take a look at the iOpener, for example: why in the world would they seriously expect everyone to just sit back, not touch their boxes, and pay their US$21.95 a month for internet service when (in most cases) the people who take the most interest in their boxes are people who (a) already have an ISP subscription, (b) probably already have a home LAN, and (c) don't like to be told what they can and can't do with hardware once it's in the confines of their own home?
It's a lousy business plan -- and that's why (despite the fact that iOpener continues to try to be generous to the "open-source" community) iOpener substantially raised the price of their hardware. (They have other reasons, of course -- service reasons -- but I think it's pretty obvbious that they raised the prices because their initial business plan was a piece of shit, they realized it, and now they want to, uh, 'reposition' [as the suits love to say] themselves in the market.)
What, do these companies expect a bunch of "laws" to stop hackers? (I say this tongue in cheek -- and while I know they *do* expect laws to stop the hackers, they can't *really* expect the laws to stop hackers.)
What's even more insidious is the fact that -- if you look at this stuff in a more general, big picture sort of way -- these companies -- iOpener, Dig Converg -- are really attempting to 'reposition' themselves into our private spaces. And by that, I mean that they're attempting to control their products even when their products -- and I'm talking hardware here, the physical stuff -- are in the confines of our private bedrooms, living rooms, and kitchens.
What's at stake here isn't some dumb lawyer letter from a dumb, corporate lawyer paid by the dumb corporate shitheads at DC -- or wherever -- what's at stake here is control of our private space and far the corporations (thanks to the government) will be allowed to intrude upon our private space.
I'm not talking 'privacy' here as it is traditally used -- privacy of information like our names, credit card numbers, and medical records -- I'm talking about our private spaces: the walls in which we live, eat, breed, and sleep. This isn't about some dumb reverse engineered algorith that would take a freshman compsci student 45 minutes to crack -- it's about how far are we (consumers, slashdotters, geeks, whatever) going to let business control our physical, private space.
That's what's at stake here. And, IMHO, it's even more insidious than information -- the bits and bytes that make up our identity and our credit history and the files on our computers, etc -- it's the actual, physical space that -- up until recently -- we've considered our homes.
It's clear that the government -- at least in the past few months -- is siding with the corporations: the government (our fat cat elected officials) is saying, look, we know stuff like copyright and intellectual property is important, so, um, we'll keep passing legislation so that you (Big Business) can keep making profits.
But what are the implications of these laws? The implications are simple: the physical space that I consider my private space -- my home, my car -- is being given away, given up, and sold down the river by government to big business. We'll soon not be able to 'touch' hardware inside our homes.
I mean, for chrissake: imagine what would have happened if 40, 50, 60 years ago, Henry Ford declared the engines of automobiles off limits. "If you fuck with my engine, I'm gonna sue your ass so hard and so deep you won't be able to feed yourself and your family, much less ride around town in my automobile. You can ride in my automobile, Pal, and you can *pay me* for my automobile, but god dammit almighty: if you so much as pop the hood and clean those valves, I'll get my lawyers on your ass and make you weep. You can't look at that engine or touch that engine. Why? Because that's my life. That's my livelihood. And, come to think of it, not only can you not touch it, I want US$21.95 a month before I allow you to take the gas cap off to fill it with gas. Hell, I'll be generous: I'll give you one free tank of gas. But once that's gone, it's $21.95 a month for rights to unscrew that gas cap." (Which translates -- in the case of legal MP3s, for example -- into this: you pay me a monthly fee so that you won't get sued.)
Another way of battling Napster -- and probably more effective than what Barenaked Ladies are doing -- is the Pearl Jam Method: simply give fans what they want and price it reasonably.
Pearl Jam is releasing 25 "bootlegs" -- obviously not bootlegs since they're "official", but that's beside the point -- of their European tour shows. The sound quality on these things -- all of which have been pre-released to fans of Pearl Jam's Ten-Club for around US$10.98 each [for 2 CDs!] -- is fantastic -- just the right mix of band and audience so that (if you're a PJ fan) the shows are pretty damn electrifying.
Moreover, the shows are largely uncut. No post-concert fiddling -- overdubbing, editing -- they even include long stretches of applause, fan-chanting, lyric-flubbing, etc.
Now I realize this doesn't mean much if you're not a Pearl Jam fan -- and to release 25 live concerts, well, that's a hell of a lot of music.
A few of the PJ bootlegs have been "blessed" by the band as their favorites of the 25 (there are little symbols on the backs of the "blessed" concerts) so you can at least zero in on what the band considers to be their better performances (but all the performances -- at least the 10 that I've heard thus far -- are fantastic.)
But it dawned on me when I ordered 10 of these of things at once that, yeah, these are the first CDs that I've bought in over a year. And not only did I not mind spending the 100+ US$ to get the 10 concerts, but I did it with pleasure. I couldn't wait to buy these things. The thought of getting the MP3s on Napster just filled me with repulsion: I mean, not only would I not get the full concerts on Napster, but I'd have to contend with bad rips and crappy normalization by neophyte rippers who wouldn't take the time to carefully rip the tracks.
I hope all this Napster-mania puts pressure on labels not so much to get with the program and start releasing official MP3s (I mean, there is nothing drearier, in my mind, than paying $2.99 for an official MP3) but to realize that the problem isn't Napster, isn't the internet, isn't fans wanting something for nothing -- the problem is the chokehold on product.
Fans of any good band -- PJ, Springsteen, Dylan, Neil Young, you name it -- love live performances. And, yes, getting a CD of the performance is not the same thing as actually being there but my hope is that this move by Pearl Jam will make the companies realize that battling Napster -- and winning against Napster --- starts not with fucking around with stifling technology but with simply giving the fans more of what they actually want: more music and better prices.
It seems *really* simple. I wonder if anyone is inside these record companies preaching this kind of (what I assume to be) common sense. Fans want product -- and they'll pay for more product -- and because of an increased emphasis on performance (thanks to Napster) there is no excuse for not releasing more product since (for the most part) fans (and even casual fans) really dig the live stuff.
Hey don't underestimate the power of a "you suck" note.
A lot of companies do suck -- DC is certainly one of them -- and they often need to be reminded that they do, in fact, suck.
Everyone tries to be nice-nice. "Dear Sir, It has come to my attention that your bar code device... blah blah blah"
Just tell them they suck and be done with it.
People underestimate the power of simple, honest language. Everybody tries to throw in 10-cent words when a few, choice 5-cent words will do just fine.
Besides, I'm tired of all these companies talking at my head. "You can do this, you can do that, you can't do this, blah blah blah."
It's high time consumers -- or whomever -- just dispense with the niceities and get down to brass tacks: more and more corporations suck, period.
Corporations want to fuck us over, take our money, and move on to the next sucker, er, consumer at our expense.
That *does* suck. And the corporations that do this *do* suck. And no amount of "pretty" language (or professional) will hide this. I'm tired of being a "nice" consumer when these not-so-nice corporations want to order me around, and spit me out for dead when they feel like it.
This is a dumb question -- off-topic, yes -- but do you usually buy your dickies in pairs?
My understanding of a dickie is that little half-shirt-half-sweater thing women sometimes wear underneath blouses and what-not.
I know this because once -- a long time ago -- my grandmother used to talk about her dickies. I was confused (and disturbed) until she later offered clarification.
And I remember once -- not longer after she first started to talk about her dickies -- that we (my grandmother and I and probably my grandfather) went to Marshall Fields (a big Chicago department store like Macy's or Bloomingdales) in search of a dickie -- one -- singular.
The implication was that, yes, you could buy more than one dickie -- two dickies, three dickies, four -- but that you bought them separately (and only combined them at the checkout carrier for 'dickies' -- plural) but that you didn't buy them in pairs -- as in: "Dammit, the matching dickie is missing! I only have one dickie!"
Anyway, my understanding of dickies -- plural, singular, or whatever else -- is, as I say, limited pretty much to the events I describe above, but perhaps -- and I mean this honestly -- there is another meaning for "dickies" that you could share with us -- a meaning in which dickies are bought, sold, bartered (whatever) in pairs -- much like slacks or socks are.
And, yes, corporations are taking over way too much of our lives. I speak about this at some length in the 'Amazon' thread that was posted earlier today.
Dude, my point is this (and believe me, I understand it's captalism at work): if there's a coupon for something -- and I'm able find it -- then, fine, I'll use the coupon.
I know Buy.com is running a deal for free shipping now for orders over a certain amount. Great! I'll get that Palm V and get free shipping. Great! That makes me happy.
I know techbargains.com has a pretty decent tally of the latest coupons and bargains. Super! I'll check techbargains, see if there's a coupon I like, and then use it to buy something. In fact, I'll use it to lower the price of an already low item. Great!
Why is this great? Because it empowers me as a consumer. It empowers me to take 10% off the top of an already low bargain. It empowers to me to know that for certain shops I can get *even more* by going to ebates.com and getting another 2% or whatever off the top.
And believe me, I'm the first to admit that it requires some effort to get the lowest price -- and oftentimes the sheer effort simply obviates the bargain because my time (and yours, and anyone else's) is generally worth more than the dinky bargains that I can keep skimming off the "list" price if I know how to shop.
Kinda like those idiotic coffee coupons that Seattle's Best makes you carry around (buy 10 get 1 free). Those things annoy because (a) why can't they just give me a fucking low price instead of making me work for it and earn it by carrying around stupid cards that (b) need to be stamped by bored clerks and their little first grade stampads. But I digress...
My point here -- and even with the reference to Seattle's Best -- is that as a consumer you should *know how* to get a good price. (You may not now in what specific newspaper a specific coupon exists for a specific discount, but you know that if you searched around and spent a little time, you could page through the Sunday supplements and probably find a coupon for 30 cents off Pledge cleaner and your local supermarket.)
What Amazon did wasn't "consumer empowerment." They didn't seed coupons around for repeat customers or for loyal customers or for new customers -- they simply did back office tricks to see who'd bite on what.
And yes, yes, yes -- I understand this is how capitalism works -- at least "consumer capitalism" -- the law of supply and demand -- the idea of fscking with prices to see what's the "target" price or the "trigger" price by the "target demographic". And, yes, this is what I meant by Microsoft drones (even though Amazon isn't an MS shop): everybody is touting "personaliztion" as the panacea for the coming internet consumer economy.
But the goal wasn't better pricing or (god forbid, I mean: what the fuck are you talking about?) goodwill toward the (eek!) consumer!
The goal was get data for their personalization database. (Whether it's MS or not -- whatever -- hence the MS crack -- drones gathering data -- blah blah blah)
"Imagine this: you can log on and WE'LL tell you what we THINK you might like to read! We'll keep track of your newborn's age and TELL you that at 3 months your newborn will probably need item X or item Y and at 4 months [hello! it's us again, we'd just though you'd like to know...] that your newborn needs item Z and [hello! it's us again] we notice that you've bought items from X and Y shops and thought you'd like to know that Z and A and B and C is on sale and [hello! just a quick note] that other people in Centerville USA are really grooving to the new sounds of Y Band or reading the latest Oprah book or that [hello! it's us and we'd thought you'd like to know that] all of your friends and neighbors are reading Harry Potter and that [hello! guess what? it's US!] because they're reading Harry Potter and they're between the ages of 25 and 30 and were born under the sign of Saturn on a Wednesday and are predominantly male post-graduates who attended Yale in the 80's and had friends who went to Michigan who, at one time [hello! we're sending this out to all your friends, too!] participated in a seminar taught by Prof Z who once [hello! Did you know] knew a Black Panther by the name of [books about the 1960's? you bet!] Argentinia P. Cheek who had a child murdered by a police mob [and -- hello! -- did you know Argentinia now sells a cookbook and how-to book for people in the suburbs] that was also at Kent State [books about politics and Vietnam? You bet!] and stood behind a tree while the National Guard murdered the students [hello! it's us. Did you know that other liberals on your block once fought and died for their brothers and sisters and stood against the pigs that hawked the war in Vietnam] and you [hello! we know you! we know! we know who you are, how much you make, and based on our statistics] and you, standing behind that tree, watched it all unfold and didn't do a damn thing but that 30 years later, you still made it into our database of aggregate consumers who wear clothing, speak a language, and live and breath because that heart in your chest is enabling your soul to want our stuff, to buy our products buy our stuff buy buy, yes, yes, buy buy buy our shit."
I mean, for fuck's sake: enough.
Personalization is insane. Just give me a low price.
I walk out the door I'm either dead or alive. I don't need statistics. I don't need the latest MS commerce server or site server or SOAP or XML to coordinate my location with the number of gallons left in my gas tank with my income lost last year to bad corporate decisions by 20 year old whiz-bang CEO's.
Just give me a good price, take my money quickly, and get the fuck out of my face.
Maybe I'm not "getting" it, but why would Amazon conduct this sort of test in the first place?
If I were a retailer -- especially a big one like Amazon -- the only "testing" I'd do would be something along the lines of the Frank Zappa test: either you're dead or not. (Or, in the case, of Amazon: either we have the lowest price or we don't, period)
Zappa once joked (and I'm paraphrasing badly here -- if someone knows the complete context or quote, I'd appreciate it) that all the "probability" testing for crashing in an airplane or getting in accident or falling off a building is fucking absurd: the only real test for "survival" is a 50-50 chance: either you walk out the door and die, or you walk out the door and live. It's pretty simple.
I'm not a math guy, but I think about Zappa's Law lot -- especially these days when everybody is citing statistics about the chances they'll lose money, the chances they'll go out of business, the chances Napster will cut their business by X% -- whatever.
The only thing Amazon is doing by conducting the tests -- and, yes, even by refuding the money in an *enormous* gesture of goodwill and humanitarian appreciation (this is sarcasm, for those so impaired) is saying: look, we're not offering the lowest price, we're offering a *price* -- and with our price, you can take it or leave.
As a competing business -- B&N, whatever -- I'd jump on this and say, "Look, we won't fuck around with your head or your pocketbook. We'll give you the lowest price. No games, etc. etc."
To me, that'll earn my business. I don't care about personalization (contrary to what Microsoft says I *should* care about), I don't care about targetted e-mail, targetted advertising (contrary to what *sigh* even my beloved TIVO thinks) I care about the lowest price.
How come none of these places are asking me, Joe Consumer, what really matters? How come they think that if they send me advertising "targetted" to my demographic that I'm gonna think, gee whiz, thanks for the e-mail! I'll get right on your site and buy something?
How come they don't think: okay, consumers are savvy, let's not muck around with all this personalization stuff, let's just give them the goods, give it to them cheap, and make it easy to return if they don't like it.
These fucking ad men (and women) are Microsoft drones. They'll buy the latest commerce site server and think they're doing everybody a favor.
Well fuck that. They don't do *everybody* a favor because I'm someone and I don't give a shit about all this stuff. I just want the lowest prices. I don't need a "web experience". I don't need videos and snazzy graphics. I want low prices.
Talk to me, you ad men and women. Talk to me, you market testers.
I'll tell you want I want, and what (I'd bet) a good chunk of consumers want. I don't want frills, I don't want flash (Macromedia -- or the more general kind) -- all I want is a little savings of both time and money.
That will make me smile. That will make me happy. And that will keep me coming back.
The TIVO "model" is a good one: personally, I'd be very interested in an intelligent version of Napster -- something that could search available songs, compile a local "playlist" (with both suggestions and songs that I've selected) which I could then listen to, archive, or trash at will.
After working with the TIVO for several weeks now, I'm pretty convinced that it's the greatest gadget I own. (And I say this just at the TIVO "base" functionality level -- the fact that I can crack the case and add another hard drive makes it just about the greatest gadget I have *ever* owned.)
What's surprising about TIVO -- and what consistently shocks me day in and day out -- is TIVO's ability to record "suggestions" -- most of which are right on the mark.
I use the TIVO exclusively to watch and archive to VCR old movies from channels like TCM and AMC, and I'm surprised nearly every day at how TIVO is able -- after only a few weeks of suggestions -- to pick movies that I've overlooked in the guide data or didn't realize that I wanted to see.
Now, I may be generous with TIVO praise because I like movies in the first place -- and TIVO oftentimes functions as that oddball teacher in Film Studies 101 who decides to create a syllabus of shit that you've never heard of but that once you watch all the way through, you slap your forehead, lean back in your chair, and think: Film is Fucking Awesome! But I digress...
I suppose if MP3s are embedded with metadata -- like the sort of metadata that TIVO has from the daily guide download from the Tribune -- it would be a cinch to get Napster to do the exact same thing.
Metadata is always the thing that makes me stand up and take notice. Me, I forget how nifty metadata is.
I can go into Border's and receive 10% off any book because I'm a teacher. I have a card that identifies me as such.
A woman in line in front of me bought Elmore Leonard's "Pagan Babies" for the sale price. I bought "Pagan Babies" for sale price less 10 %. We got different prices on the same day for the same book purely based on some arbritrary criteria.
Another example: I go into Seattle's Best Coffee. A man in front of me gets a latte for list price. I go in, plunk down my frequent buyer's card, get the latte for free because I've bought ten lattes.
Same day, same item, same clerk, different prices.
Since we don't know Amazon's criteria, I'm not sure we can accuse them of discriminating against certian *people*, right? I mean, I've bought a lot of stuff at Amazon, and over the past few days as I've been following this story, I've noticed that I'm received the lowest prices for all the DVDs that they're listing.
They're not lowering the prices because my hair is brown, my eyes are blue, and I write left-handed, right?
They're not lowering it because I'm a democrat and I think the Shrub (Bush) is a dumb, loud-mouthed boor.
They're lowering the price based on whatever information I've given them, my ordered habits over the years, and the books (and DVDs) that I've ordered in the past.
Obviously, they've got some sort of criteria that they've established -- repeat customers, money spent over the past year, orders over the last month, whatever -- and they're applying it to me.
Or maybe they're setting random prices and seeing if it's enough to "catch" me based on my demographic.
Whatever.
But I know that I take one look at the list price, one look at the sale price, and make my decision there. If the sale price is too close to the list price, I won't buy it, period.
If the sale price is 30, 40% of the list price, I'll probably buy it.
I think the issue here isn't that they're doing it -- charging less for some customers, more for others -- but that we don't *know* the criteria.
And of course because we're all good little paranoid Pynchonians (see 'The Crying of Lot 49' or 'Gravity's Rainbow' to see what I mean) we suspect the worst -- that not only are they screwing us and fucking with our privacy -- they're also fucking with our heads.
Understand that one thing that's happening is that "news" is losing the meaning it once had.
I can remember sitting down with my dad every night at 5:30pm and watching Walter Cronkite. "And that's the way it is," Cronkite would say at the end of each broadcast. And for millions of viewers, that's the way it was -- that's the way Vietnam was reported, Watergate, you name it. Cronkite's was the voice of the "news".
"News" was what happened during the day and what was wrapped at 5:30pm or 6pm or whenever folks got their Cronkite fix.
I'm not particularly nostalgic for those days. I mean, I was very young at the time -- maybe 4,5, 6 years old -- but I have vivid memories of Cronkite's Vietnam reporting, as well as the Watergate hearings. To me -- up until 10 or 11 years ago -- news was what these guys -- rarely women -- reported at the end of each day. I'm not nostalgic because I realize (or *think* I realize) that that sort of "news" was very, very sanitized and manipulated. (And, yes, today's "news" is just as manipulative -- but it's also more widespread and pervasive. I'm not sure if this is a good or bad thing -- just something I've noticed.)
I still get momentary flashes of memory when I hear Cronkite's voice -- I remember him talking about Tet and the Viet Cong and the body counts and all that sort of stuff. For a young kid it was very powerful.
"News" today loses much of its power thanks to the immediacy with which it is delivered. There was something mysterious about Cronkite -- the fact that, well, stories were wrapped up at a specific time each day. Sure, there was Paul Harvey on the AM radio -- "And now... the REST of the story!" -- but his was always a mix of vaccum cleaner commercials mixed with news that never seemed as important as what Cronkite was reporting. It was as though Cronkite functioned as the "validator" for the news. If he reported it, it was, indeed, news and, by extension, important. (It was for this reason, of course, that he was -- and possible is -- "the most trusted man in America").
Today we don't have those kinds of validators. Sure, Dan Rather and Tom Brokaw try to pass themselves off as cultural critics. "Hey, we're more than just talking heads -- we've got a critical slant on American culture, too."
But they don't have the same "truck" that Cronkite had.
So "news" doesn't carry the sort of baggage that it once had. It isn't just something that happens at the end of each day. It isn't just endless talk about Tet and My Lai and Nixon and Cambodia. Now it's constantly shifting, ephemeral, hard to pin down. What's news now might not be news a minute from now -- and it might not even be news, period, thanks to corporate spin and government manipulation. You never know. And you can't know, because there's no one (for good or bad) like Cronkite to validate it.
Really, I'm serious: I'm not nostalgic for that sort of thing. I'm not sure it's in the best interests of American culture these days to have a force like Cronkite validating the cultural awareness of ourselves. We need what we now have: the mercurial nature of truth, the shifting alliances, the layers of deception.
Everything is gray now. There's no John Wayne to scout out the bad guys, wipe 'em out, and explain why we should appreciate what we have. That sort of thing is funny now -- it's trite, too simplistic.
This complexity is reflected, no doubt, in the way we view ourselves through "news" media. It's no wonder that "news" junkies are on their way out. Who has time to keep up?
Part of the problem with all this is that everyone (especially Jack Valenti) is constantly trying to draw up some fucking analogy for all these legal problems.
"This is just like someone driving you to another person's home to burglarize it."
Or:
"This is just like... blah blah blah."
The danger lies in these stupid analogies that everyone is trying to use. I mean, I don't know if this the case or not -- but is it possible that what's going on here -- linking to DeCSS, sharing music with Napster -- is it just possible that, well, this sort of stuff isn't really analagous to other non-internet things?
I don't mean this as flamebait or a troll. I'm serious: couldn't this one of those odd moments where everything that we're talking about *can't* be reduced to some cut-and-dried analogy because, well, this kind of stuff is really "like" nothing we've ever seen before?
It's not the music that people are after. That's part of it, yes.
But while I agree with you that, sure, we should pick our battles -- and, sure, "human life" is more important than music -- understand that what's at stake here is freedom of expression -- and the last time I checked, freedom of expression -- freedom of speech, however you want to spin it -- is a fundamental freedom that is constantly in danger of being snapped up not by government itself, but by corporations manipulating technology, manipulating government, and, ultimately, manipulating consumers.
The battle isn't about music. It's about the way in which art is controlled by corporate interests. For fuck's sake: it's no secret that in America (at least) government more often than not is in the pocket of big corporations. Sure, Microsoft lost their battle against the government, but it doesn't take a MacArthur Fellow to realize that no matter what the outcome of big business versus big governement, the winner will *always* be big business.
It's for that reason that people are concerned about music. Sure, human rights are important. No one here will deny it. But, as you say, you gotta pick your battles. Fundamental intellectual freedoms are as fundamental to human life as any other freedom. Please don't assume that all Slashdotters are so short-sighted to believe that all we're doing is bypassing encryption or trying to get something for nothing.
In this case -- the USB topic -- what's at stake is control and the extent of said control. Corporations -- RIAA, MPAA, whatever -- what absolute and total control. They don't have foresight enough to predict technologies, but they sure as shit know the "bad" technologies from the "good" technologies once the technologies start to threaten their profits. This is not about music. This is not about USB. This is not even about the poor schmuck of a artist who makes the music.
It's about corporate profits. Corporations will throw all their economic might against anything that threatens their profits -- or threatens their *potential* profits.
So don't get all holier-than-thou and pretend that music doesn't count. Or pretend that that on one side there's human life and the "real issues" and on the other side there's the crazy Slashdotters who care only about encryption and getting something for nothing.
Freedom is something -- and it's not for nothing that freedom in any form is something that must be fiercely protected and vigilently maintained.
Corporations will have you believe otherwise. Corporations will have you believe that your entitled to what they *give* you -- and believe me, pal, that ain't much. They want you to believe in their version of freedom. Freedom of the corporations to "grant" consumers what they (the corporations) think the consumers need. And the corporations think we should be grateful -- because without big business controlling and manipulating the consumers, we'd be (to paraphrase David Mamet) a bunch of savage shitheads in the wilderness.
Corporations want you to believe in the second coming of Acme, Incorporated. They want you to believe and be grateful because, boy, Acme Incorporated has what you need.
Well fuck you and fuck Acme Incorporated. That's what all this about. Fuck Acme Incorpoated why? Because fuck their profits. Their profits are dollars and pounds and marks and francs out of our own fucking pockets.
We're buying the Porsche's for the suits who run these corporations. We're buying the luxury apartments of the CEOs who get their golden parachutes when the stockholders suddenly realize that Zippy the Second Coming of Christ isn't pulling in the sort of profits we, er, think might be appropriate.
So fuck the music. Fuck the USB. This is about insuring that everyone gets a fair shake. This is about making sure that corporations know their boundaries. They can't just walk the fuck into our living rooms and kitchens and open our refrigerators and take our fucking bread.
This is about saying, wait just a fucking minute: the buck stops here. You and your band of corporate bad-breath-startac-talking-Porsche-driving-italian -suit-wearing-pinheads just can't plunder every fucking dollar I earn and take the food from my mouth.
That's what this is about. And, yes, it's as important as any fundamental human issue.
Slashdot Mirror
It has been asked and talked about before: but the real question is just what exactly is in SDMI for the consumer? The average consumer, I mean. Not the guy that has a home LAN, digital sound cards, and 100+ CDRs of MP3s.
..." mode, but it was a telling moment.
I'm talking about the family who goes to Best Buy on a Saturday to buy a new CD player or buy a couple of CDs.
What's SDMI gonna do for these people? Nothing.
Jack Valenti (the MPAA, not RIAA) has been spouting off about "ethics" for the past week or so. "We need to change our culture so that people realize that downloading audio/video is stealing. We need to adjust people's ethics and make them aware that, yes, stealing is bad. You cannot be a good person and steal."
Now, Valenti is a prick. There's no doubt about it. He's an old guy of the worst sort: a guy who thinks he's "in touch" but, of course, is woefully out of touch. He thinks he's in touch because he's "been around" for something like 40 years -- wining and dining with Jack Kennedy, setting up the current MPAA rating system, (boy, when I was 11 and blocked out of Apocalypse Now because of Valenti's 'R' rating, I was furious. I even wrote a letter to the guy -- he didn't answer -- and attempted to explain that it should be up to my parents about whether or not I should be able to see Apocalypse Now or the Deer Hunter and not Jack Valenti and his out of touch band of decrepit geezers who have managed for years to wine and dine and subsequently get in bed with all of the politicos. But I digress...) and acting as the rabid lobbyist for the interests of the Motion Picture Industry.
The problem with the MPAA -- and by extension the RIAA -- isn't Napster or DIVX (the video codec, not the failed Circuit City venture) or peer-to-peer networking -- it's one of perception.
True, a new business model would help matters -- a business model in which the RIAA and MPAA figure out how to exploit technology, leverage it, and still give the consumer a sense of empowerment -- but the real issue is one of perception. The RIAA and MPAA are vile whores.
I don't say this lightly, either. Not too long ago I was at an 'eGovernment' conference (one of the dumbest conferences I'd ever attended -- government, for sure, has no clue when it comes to understanding the way business and tecnology have shifted, but, again, I digress...) and the keynote speaker was some higher-up on the US Internet Council. (Some non-profit US group out of Washington DC who go around the globe and attempt to get everybody to buy into the global benefits of the internet). This guy -- a fantastic speaker, by the way -- was asked a question about Napster and about pending litigation against Napster and Scour and guess what? The first words out of his mouth was this: "The RIAA is vile."
No kidding. It was a joke -- and he switched into his serious "Well, okay, not vile, but you know
The audience cheered. For me, it was the high point of a dumb conference. (Can someone explain to me why the government -- state and local, especially -- don't get dot-com speakers to speak at these things instead of government webheads? I mean, if the government is gonna learn anything about "leveraging" the internet, the place they should for instruction is into the private sector and not back into the public sector, where -- except for some academic wonks, perhaps -- they will find only cluenessness piled upon more cluelessnes, but, okay, I digress...)
My point is this: that the RIAA and MPAA both need better PR if anyone is gonna buy into Valenti's ethical arguments. It's as if a pimp complains to a Congressman about how his "business has been bad lately because the ladies been giving it up for free. Man, I gotta install computerized chastity belts and issue encrypted keys!"
No one listens to the pimp because he's a pimp. The other pimps praise the first pimp's ethics -- Yeah, man, there is an Ethics of Pimping -- but everybody else gives the pimp a crazy look: Ethics? You're not serious, right?
That's what Valenti is fighting against. He's in a PR war for getting Joe Consumer to buy into the Ethics of the Pimp.
Because the CD player you bought 2 years ago doesn't have the hardware to decrypt and encrypted file.
...?"
Computer software -- or new CD players -- could be equipped with such hardware, but, uh, would you ditch a perfectly good CD player to 'upgrade' to a new one with less functionality?
I suspect the RIAA is toying with this idea: how much of an outcry would there be if, say, we urged labels to release CDs that could not be played on current CD players?
I'm sure there was (or still is) some bean counter sitting in a conference room somewhere talking to Bri ("Hi, call me 'Bri!'. It's short for Brian.") about whether or not it would be 'economically feasible' to scrap current CD technology and, well, force consumers to upgrade to new players.
In fact, I'm sure there were meetings and more meeting about this.
"Bri, whattya think?"
"Well, Joe COnsumer won't like it."
"Well, fuck Joe Consumer, Bri. Fuck him. Fuck them. Bri, let me ask you this --"
"Huh?"
"Your car? What kind is it?"
"I got a Lexus. And --"
"And you like it. Right? You like that Lexus."
"Yeah -- my wife, she's got --"
"A BMW?"
"A blue one, yeah."
Leaning close: "Bri, listen to me. Are you listening?"
"Yeah."
"You want your fucking Lexus. Your wife wants her BMW. You want a standard of living that you're used to. Right?"
"We got a big house."
"This is why, Bri. This is why."
"Why
Jimmy whispers: "F. U. C. K. Joe Consumer. Fuck him. You understand? SDMI is good. SDMI will feed us, Bri."
"Yeah."
"Say it, Bri."
It's late afternoon. Bri is tired. He looks out the window. Gray skies.
"Say it, Bri."
"Fuck Joe Consumer, Jimmy."
"That's right."
Bri wants to leave. He wants to get in Lexus and go to his big house. "Fuck him," says Bri.
"Say it, Bri."
"Fuck Joe Consumer!"
"That's it."
"And the hackers. Fuck them, too."
"You're okay, Bri. You're a good guy, Bri."
"Fuck the consumer! fuck the hackers!"
"All of it."
"Everything."
"That's right."
"Thank you."
"You feel better?"
"Yeah."
"Are you on board?"
"Yeah."
"No go home, Bri. Go home and remember what we talked about."
"Okay."
"Take tomorrow off. Will you do that?"
"Tomorrow?"
"Hit the links, Bri. Go and have a nice day. Take it all in. 9 holes, 18 holes -- it's up to you."
"Thank you."
"You're okay, Bri. You're a good guy."
Hey, if I could get my 3 TIVOs to talk to my Indrema via Linux, I'd be very interested in this thing -- especially with the Indrema's ethernet and the TIVO's conspicuous lack of any easy-to-implement ethernet connectivity.
(The TIVO army on the avsforum, of course, maintains that TIVO doesn't need any sort of broadband support -- it's become a sort of mantra for them -- but I wonder what sort of possbilities might exist when indrema meets TIVO. Anything to prove that rabid, fanboy TIVO army that they're a bunch of kissass TIVO fanboys, but I digress...)
Yes, that's true. At this point, it does not matter that it's cracked.
The RIAA is losing the PR war -- the back and forth between Salon is proof of that -- by not handling things correctly.
If they want people to respect, fear, or otherwise appreciate SDMI, they need to be up front about the whole thing.
Was it cracked? Yes.
What's next? We're not sure. Stay tuned.
Pretty simple. I'd still think the RIAA are a bunch of money grubbing whores, but at least if they had cajones enough to admit defeat -- and admit that, yeah, it's a tough nut to crack, if not downright impossible to crack -- I'd realize that the suits in charge of the RIAA are savvy enough to realize that new media is different than the old media.
That in itself would be a minor victory: a suit admitting that, hey, maybe we can't pimp our wares the same way we've been pimping it in the past. Maybe, uh, we need to sit down and examine this "internet" stuff. But they won't admit that.
Leo won't admit that.
And Jack Valenti -- the decrepit MPAA dude -- is convinced that he, too, can win the battle with PR spin. ("Hey, pal, I know movies! Me and Jack Kennedy loved movies!")
Watching and listening to Valenti is like watching Boffo the Unemployed Clown parading around a smoke-filled room trying to score laughs with Don Rickles jokes -- "Heh, heh, that old hag was so ugly she even deflated my tires!! Ba da bing!"
It's funny in a pathetic way. Like you're watching some old geezer unravel on the spot. Poor Jack.
Poor Leo.
Hey, guys, here's a tip: take your golden parachute retirement bonus, head to Martha's Vineyard to your country houses, and shut the fuck up.
The funniest part about this new piece in Salon is Leo's reponse that, see, the anonymous source can't be correct because, uh, he shifts tenses!
One of the more pathetic (and bizarre) spin jobs I've seen in a long time.
I dunno. I suspect the candidates didn't write the answers -- I'm sure they "spoke" the answers. They sound more like spoken answers than written answers.
... heh ... well, we're gonna explain what makes a good leader, heh heh, because, er, as you know ... a good -- the best leaders lead, yeah, they lead, and you know leading is important when, uh ... heh ... when you're a leader... heh heh.
But I must say that Bush's answer is vintage Shrub: lotsa words but completely devoid of content. Kinda like the dazed-and-confused look he had at last night's debate: eager for the attack but, um, we're not really sure about the specifics yet, Jim, so, er, we're just gonna explain why, ah, why
In all fairness, Gore's answer to the Napster controversy isn't much better but at least he indicates how the issue will (I'm 100% sure) be solved: licensing. Maybe the licensing is something Napster, Inc. will pay. Maybe it's something that will be passed onto the consumers.
But I'm sure -- I'm positive, in fact -- that licensing (ala ASCAP) is how Napster will ultimately be resolved.
If you forget forgetting, does that mean you remember?
Maybe amnesiacs misremembered their dreams? Or they forgot they forgot their memories thereby remembering their dreams?
I dunno.
Part of the problem with Gore and Bush -- and certainly with the creepy veeps -- is that they fail to realize that in order to get the "youth vote" they have to have some emotional investment in the youth they're attempting to persuade.
It's the generation gap, yes, but it strikes me these days that it's more than just a "generation" gap. Technology -- and that includes stuff like film and music -- has brought about an enormous "knowledge" gap -- or "emotion" gap -- between politicians and their young constituents.
Sure, Gore has his daughter as one of his top advisors. Okay, but that's not enough.
It doesn't take a genius to dive into Napster these days, pull up some popular music tracks -- Bush, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Kid Rock, you name it -- and realize there's a lot of "rage" out there. Rock and Roll and Rap are certainly good vehicles for expressing that rage.
For once, I'd love to hear candidate talk about music and realize that rock and roll (for example) is a verb and not a noun. It's not a *thing*. The key to rock and roll isn't the words of the songs themselves -- it's what those words are pointing and leading to.
Rock music (and film) are only cultural vehicles for deep human impulses. I mean, I'd love it if, for example, Lieberman would rail against *bad* movies instead of just the standard things like violence and sex.
I'd love it if a candidate stood up and, for once, said: "Look, instead of trying to get Hollywood (or rock and roll or whatever) to stop violence and sex, let's get them to start making *better* movies. The real danger is in the dumbing down of America. It's not of the propagation of impulses that are in our biology (i.e. sex and violence.)"
As wacky as that would sound, it would (to my mind at least) signal a kind of understanding.
Well, there's also more flexible hardware than the Rios and Nomads out there: the MiniDisc.
For whatever reason MD hasn't caught on here like Japan, but if you want a *flexible* MP3 player (and recorder) that can handle *any* format, the obvious choice is a MD player/recorder.
And, yes, I know MD uses a compression scheme but I think most will agree with the ATRAC is pretty damn near undetectable.
It surprises me actually that more people haven't latched onto MD players in light of the (amazing) amount of music now available digitally.
The irony of this mess is this: Napster's user list -- containing e-mail addresses -- is probably worth more than the RIAA or MPAA or Jackie Valenti is willing to admit.
The gold isn't in the music itself. The gold is there for the taking, but no one is moving to take it: it's Napster's gazillion user e-mail addresses.
Why isn't Napster dangling their databases more "publically" in front of the RIAA and MPAA. Why aren't they saying: Screw the content. We've got something better. We've got gazillions of users with e-mail addresses who crave your product??
10,000 bucks is a paltry amount of money. These codebreakers have saved the RIAA much, much, much more than a pitiful 10 grand.
Someone should have offered twice that for the codebreakers to keep their mouths shut.
Anyone want to take bets on how long it'll take Freeboxen to get cease-and-desisted because someone (or several people) start offering modified hardware (or illegally copied software) that violates EULA agreements, TOS's, etc?
I'm thinking specifically of the jokers at Digital Convergence swooping down on Freeboxen once someone posts a "Hey, I've got a modified CueCat -- free for anyone blah blah blah..."
You watch. I think Freeboxen is a *great* idea -- I'm going to list my old Mac stuff -- but, yeah, I'm sure someone is gonna attempt to sue them for listing software that isn't actually "owned" by the person listed or whatever.
Um, excuse me RadicalMan, but calling Valenti a cocksucker (or smashing a Starbucks) isn't much more than flipping a dictator the bird as he's driving along in a limo.
Get fucking real. If you're sick of the passive-aggressive "civil disobedience" as you (seem) to claim: then it's gonna take more than name calling and "Starbucks" bashing to get your point across.
Besides, smashing up a Starbucks is "radical chic". It's for losers who actually think "Fight Club" is a good movie and for whiners who think Ikea is the scourge of the earth.
Sorry to bust your bubble, RadicalMan. (tee hee)
Actually, this is a pretty funny article -- especially toward the end where the author describes the way to cobble together your CD: download the music, buy the glossy liner paper, print it out, then burn the CD.
Yeah, a real riot. Let me at those albums. There's nothing I'd like better than to (a) spend more for an electronic download than the "physical" counterpart and (b) get to spend my time (which these days -- for most of all us, I'm sure -- is more valuable than these bozos at AlbumDirect realize) to put together the whole kit-and-kaboodle.
Lessee. First, I gotta download the songs.
I got a DSL modem -- 1.05/1.05M -- so, no, not too bad, but, ya know, 15 minutes is still 15 minutes.
Then I gotta print the liners on special paper? (No, you can use normal paper -- but, yeah, you gotta print the liner notes.) And, um, I get to burn the CD myself? The whole CD? No kidding? Lessee, I got a burner about a year old. Still takes around 15 minutes to burn the CD. (And if I get a coaster? Well, hell, just burn it again! CDs are cheap. My time is not cheap -- but CDs -- yeah 79 cents each, no prob.)
And then, when it's all done, I have, er, a custom CD that I burned and printed out the labels for and that, um, looks like I cobbled together myself. Yeah! That's sooooooo cool.
But wait! It wasn't really cheap because it cost more than the "physical" CD!
Oh yeah. Great idea.
Come on you dumbass suit-wearing, cellphone talking, consult-the-business-model, Viper driving, 30-something, "Hey, Bob, look at us: we're executives!" weenies: no one is gonna buy your idea! No one is going to buy your idea!
It's like going to a restaurant -- Benihana, whatever those places are called that force you to stand in line with a bunch of dirty-fingernailed, snivelling little shits who touch the glass and then cough all over the green peppers and water chestnuts -- and pay *them* for the privilage of making your own food. What a great idea! (Executive-speak: "Well, friend, you have to understand. We're not selling the product as much we're selling the experience. We feel that customers appreciate the fact that they're in charge of their own product, er, dinner and that they've been given the ability to tinker and tailor with the food to create a singularly satisfying, one of a kind dining experience. If you'd like, I can give you a prospectus describing Benihana's philosophy and perhaps you'll appreciate why we are able to set ourselves apart from the competition.)
Actually, making the things "damn near worthless if hacked" seems to be the point of loss-leader products -- iOpener, CueCat, TIVO, etc.
But the irony of it all is that this "damn near worthless" situation is exactly what drives the so-called "hackers" in the first place. When you have a piece of hardware sterilized by lack of software (or lack of a monthly 'hookup' in the case of the TIVO or iOpener), it's only human nature to examine closely the relationship between the hardware and the software that some business guy says we need to operate it.
Moreover, this loss-leader shit does expose some pretty lousy business models. TIVO is an exception here because they actually take a pretty generous view of their boxes and the hackers that tweak them -- but take a look at the iOpener, for example: why in the world would they seriously expect everyone to just sit back, not touch their boxes, and pay their US$21.95 a month for internet service when (in most cases) the people who take the most interest in their boxes are people who (a) already have an ISP subscription, (b) probably already have a home LAN, and (c) don't like to be told what they can and can't do with hardware once it's in the confines of their own home?
It's a lousy business plan -- and that's why (despite the fact that iOpener continues to try to be generous to the "open-source" community) iOpener substantially raised the price of their hardware. (They have other reasons, of course -- service reasons -- but I think it's pretty obvbious that they raised the prices because their initial business plan was a piece of shit, they realized it, and now they want to, uh, 'reposition' [as the suits love to say] themselves in the market.)
What, do these companies expect a bunch of "laws" to stop hackers? (I say this tongue in cheek -- and while I know they *do* expect laws to stop the hackers, they can't *really* expect the laws to stop hackers.)
What's even more insidious is the fact that -- if you look at this stuff in a more general, big picture sort of way -- these companies -- iOpener, Dig Converg -- are really attempting to 'reposition' themselves into our private spaces. And by that, I mean that they're attempting to control their products even when their products -- and I'm talking hardware here, the physical stuff -- are in the confines of our private bedrooms, living rooms, and kitchens.
What's at stake here isn't some dumb lawyer letter from a dumb, corporate lawyer paid by the dumb corporate shitheads at DC -- or wherever -- what's at stake here is control of our private space and far the corporations (thanks to the government) will be allowed to intrude upon our private space.
I'm not talking 'privacy' here as it is traditally used -- privacy of information like our names, credit card numbers, and medical records -- I'm talking about our private spaces: the walls in which we live, eat, breed, and sleep. This isn't about some dumb reverse engineered algorith that would take a freshman compsci student 45 minutes to crack -- it's about how far are we (consumers, slashdotters, geeks, whatever) going to let business control our physical, private space.
That's what's at stake here. And, IMHO, it's even more insidious than information -- the bits and bytes that make up our identity and our credit history and the files on our computers, etc -- it's the actual, physical space that -- up until recently -- we've considered our homes.
It's clear that the government -- at least in the past few months -- is siding with the corporations: the government (our fat cat elected officials) is saying, look, we know stuff like copyright and intellectual property is important, so, um, we'll keep passing legislation so that you (Big Business) can keep making profits.
But what are the implications of these laws? The implications are simple: the physical space that I consider my private space -- my home, my car -- is being given away, given up, and sold down the river by government to big business. We'll soon not be able to 'touch' hardware inside our homes.
I mean, for chrissake: imagine what would have happened if 40, 50, 60 years ago, Henry Ford declared the engines of automobiles off limits. "If you fuck with my engine, I'm gonna sue your ass so hard and so deep you won't be able to feed yourself and your family, much less ride around town in my automobile. You can ride in my automobile, Pal, and you can *pay me* for my automobile, but god dammit almighty: if you so much as pop the hood and clean those valves, I'll get my lawyers on your ass and make you weep. You can't look at that engine or touch that engine. Why? Because that's my life. That's my livelihood. And, come to think of it, not only can you not touch it, I want US$21.95 a month before I allow you to take the gas cap off to fill it with gas. Hell, I'll be generous: I'll give you one free tank of gas. But once that's gone, it's $21.95 a month for rights to unscrew that gas cap." (Which translates -- in the case of legal MP3s, for example -- into this: you pay me a monthly fee so that you won't get sued.)
It's madness.
Another way of battling Napster -- and probably more effective than what Barenaked Ladies are doing -- is the Pearl Jam Method: simply give fans what they want and price it reasonably.
Pearl Jam is releasing 25 "bootlegs" -- obviously not bootlegs since they're "official", but that's beside the point -- of their European tour shows. The sound quality on these things -- all of which have been pre-released to fans of Pearl Jam's Ten-Club for around US$10.98 each [for 2 CDs!] -- is fantastic -- just the right mix of band and audience so that (if you're a PJ fan) the shows are pretty damn electrifying.
Moreover, the shows are largely uncut. No post-concert fiddling -- overdubbing, editing -- they even include long stretches of applause, fan-chanting, lyric-flubbing, etc.
Now I realize this doesn't mean much if you're not a Pearl Jam fan -- and to release 25 live concerts, well, that's a hell of a lot of music.
A few of the PJ bootlegs have been "blessed" by the band as their favorites of the 25 (there are little symbols on the backs of the "blessed" concerts) so you can at least zero in on what the band considers to be their better performances (but all the performances -- at least the 10 that I've heard thus far -- are fantastic.)
But it dawned on me when I ordered 10 of these of things at once that, yeah, these are the first CDs that I've bought in over a year. And not only did I not mind spending the 100+ US$ to get the 10 concerts, but I did it with pleasure. I couldn't wait to buy these things. The thought of getting the MP3s on Napster just filled me with repulsion: I mean, not only would I not get the full concerts on Napster, but I'd have to contend with bad rips and crappy normalization by neophyte rippers who wouldn't take the time to carefully rip the tracks.
I hope all this Napster-mania puts pressure on labels not so much to get with the program and start releasing official MP3s (I mean, there is nothing drearier, in my mind, than paying $2.99 for an official MP3) but to realize that the problem isn't Napster, isn't the internet, isn't fans wanting something for nothing -- the problem is the chokehold on product.
Fans of any good band -- PJ, Springsteen, Dylan, Neil Young, you name it -- love live performances. And, yes, getting a CD of the performance is not the same thing as actually being there but my hope is that this move by Pearl Jam will make the companies realize that battling Napster -- and winning against Napster --- starts not with fucking around with stifling technology but with simply giving the fans more of what they actually want: more music and better prices.
It seems *really* simple. I wonder if anyone is inside these record companies preaching this kind of (what I assume to be) common sense. Fans want product -- and they'll pay for more product -- and because of an increased emphasis on performance (thanks to Napster) there is no excuse for not releasing more product since (for the most part) fans (and even casual fans) really dig the live stuff.
Hey don't underestimate the power of a "you suck" note.
A lot of companies do suck -- DC is certainly one of them -- and they often need to be reminded that they do, in fact, suck.
Everyone tries to be nice-nice. "Dear Sir, It has come to my attention that your bar code device... blah blah blah"
Just tell them they suck and be done with it.
People underestimate the power of simple, honest language. Everybody tries to throw in 10-cent words when a few, choice 5-cent words will do just fine.
Besides, I'm tired of all these companies talking at my head. "You can do this, you can do that, you can't do this, blah blah blah."
It's high time consumers -- or whomever -- just dispense with the niceities and get down to brass tacks: more and more corporations suck, period.
Corporations want to fuck us over, take our money, and move on to the next sucker, er, consumer at our expense.
That *does* suck. And the corporations that do this *do* suck. And no amount of "pretty" language (or professional) will hide this. I'm tired of being a "nice" consumer when these not-so-nice corporations want to order me around, and spit me out for dead when they feel like it.
I'm sick and tired of it.
DC sucks. And their stupid bar code reader sucks.
This is a dumb question -- off-topic, yes -- but do you usually buy your dickies in pairs?
My understanding of a dickie is that little half-shirt-half-sweater thing women sometimes wear underneath blouses and what-not.
I know this because once -- a long time ago -- my grandmother used to talk about her dickies. I was confused (and disturbed) until she later offered clarification.
And I remember once -- not longer after she first started to talk about her dickies -- that we (my grandmother and I and probably my grandfather) went to Marshall Fields (a big Chicago department store like Macy's or Bloomingdales) in search of a dickie -- one -- singular.
The implication was that, yes, you could buy more than one dickie -- two dickies, three dickies, four -- but that you bought them separately (and only combined them at the checkout carrier for 'dickies' -- plural) but that you didn't buy them in pairs -- as in: "Dammit, the matching dickie is missing! I only have one dickie!"
Anyway, my understanding of dickies -- plural, singular, or whatever else -- is, as I say, limited pretty much to the events I describe above, but perhaps -- and I mean this honestly -- there is another meaning for "dickies" that you could share with us -- a meaning in which dickies are bought, sold, bartered (whatever) in pairs -- much like slacks or socks are.
And, yes, corporations are taking over way too much of our lives. I speak about this at some length in the 'Amazon' thread that was posted earlier today.
Dude, my point is this (and believe me, I understand it's captalism at work): if there's a coupon for something -- and I'm able find it -- then, fine, I'll use the coupon.
I know Buy.com is running a deal for free shipping now for orders over a certain amount. Great! I'll get that Palm V and get free shipping. Great! That makes me happy.
I know techbargains.com has a pretty decent tally of the latest coupons and bargains. Super! I'll check techbargains, see if there's a coupon I like, and then use it to buy something. In fact, I'll use it to lower the price of an already low item. Great!
Why is this great? Because it empowers me as a consumer. It empowers me to take 10% off the top of an already low bargain. It empowers to me to know that for certain shops I can get *even more* by going to ebates.com and getting another 2% or whatever off the top.
And believe me, I'm the first to admit that it requires some effort to get the lowest price -- and oftentimes the sheer effort simply obviates the bargain because my time (and yours, and anyone else's) is generally worth more than the dinky bargains that I can keep skimming off the "list" price if I know how to shop.
Kinda like those idiotic coffee coupons that Seattle's Best makes you carry around (buy 10 get 1 free). Those things annoy because (a) why can't they just give me a fucking low price instead of making me work for it and earn it by carrying around stupid cards that (b) need to be stamped by bored clerks and their little first grade stampads. But I digress...
My point here -- and even with the reference to Seattle's Best -- is that as a consumer you should *know how* to get a good price. (You may not now in what specific newspaper a specific coupon exists for a specific discount, but you know that if you searched around and spent a little time, you could page through the Sunday supplements and probably find a coupon for 30 cents off Pledge cleaner and your local supermarket.)
What Amazon did wasn't "consumer empowerment." They didn't seed coupons around for repeat customers or for loyal customers or for new customers -- they simply did back office tricks to see who'd bite on what.
And yes, yes, yes -- I understand this is how capitalism works -- at least "consumer capitalism" -- the law of supply and demand -- the idea of fscking with prices to see what's the "target" price or the "trigger" price by the "target demographic". And, yes, this is what I meant by Microsoft drones (even though Amazon isn't an MS shop): everybody is touting "personaliztion" as the panacea for the coming internet consumer economy.
But the goal wasn't better pricing or (god forbid, I mean: what the fuck are you talking about?) goodwill toward the (eek!) consumer!
The goal was get data for their personalization database. (Whether it's MS or not -- whatever -- hence the MS crack -- drones gathering data -- blah blah blah)
"Imagine this: you can log on and WE'LL tell you what we THINK you might like to read! We'll keep track of your newborn's age and TELL you that at 3 months your newborn will probably need item X or item Y and at 4 months [hello! it's us again, we'd just though you'd like to know...] that your newborn needs item Z and [hello! it's us again] we notice that you've bought items from X and Y shops and thought you'd like to know that Z and A and B and C is on sale and [hello! just a quick note] that other people in Centerville USA are really grooving to the new sounds of Y Band or reading the latest Oprah book or that [hello! it's us and we'd thought you'd like to know that] all of your friends and neighbors are reading Harry Potter and that [hello! guess what? it's US!] because they're reading Harry Potter and they're between the ages of 25 and 30 and were born under the sign of Saturn on a Wednesday and are predominantly male post-graduates who attended Yale in the 80's and had friends who went to Michigan who, at one time [hello! we're sending this out to all your friends, too!] participated in a seminar taught by Prof Z who once [hello! Did you know] knew a Black Panther by the name of [books about the 1960's? you bet!] Argentinia P. Cheek who had a child murdered by a police mob [and -- hello! -- did you know Argentinia now sells a cookbook and how-to book for people in the suburbs] that was also at Kent State [books about politics and Vietnam? You bet!] and stood behind a tree while the National Guard murdered the students [hello! it's us. Did you know that other liberals on your block once fought and died for their brothers and sisters and stood against the pigs that hawked the war in Vietnam] and you [hello! we know you! we know! we know who you are, how much you make, and based on our statistics] and you, standing behind that tree, watched it all unfold and didn't do a damn thing but that 30 years later, you still made it into our database of aggregate consumers who wear clothing, speak a language, and live and breath because that heart in your chest is enabling your soul to want our stuff, to buy our products buy our stuff buy buy, yes, yes, buy buy buy our shit."
I mean, for fuck's sake: enough.
Personalization is insane. Just give me a low price.
I walk out the door I'm either dead or alive. I don't need statistics. I don't need the latest MS commerce server or site server or SOAP or XML to coordinate my location with the number of gallons left in my gas tank with my income lost last year to bad corporate decisions by 20 year old whiz-bang CEO's.
Just give me a good price, take my money quickly, and get the fuck out of my face.
Maybe I'm not "getting" it, but why would Amazon conduct this sort of test in the first place?
If I were a retailer -- especially a big one like Amazon -- the only "testing" I'd do would be something along the lines of the Frank Zappa test: either you're dead or not. (Or, in the case, of Amazon: either we have the lowest price or we don't, period)
Zappa once joked (and I'm paraphrasing badly here -- if someone knows the complete context or quote, I'd appreciate it) that all the "probability" testing for crashing in an airplane or getting in accident or falling off a building is fucking absurd: the only real test for "survival" is a 50-50 chance: either you walk out the door and die, or you walk out the door and live. It's pretty simple.
I'm not a math guy, but I think about Zappa's Law lot -- especially these days when everybody is citing statistics about the chances they'll lose money, the chances they'll go out of business, the chances Napster will cut their business by X% -- whatever.
The only thing Amazon is doing by conducting the tests -- and, yes, even by refuding the money in an *enormous* gesture of goodwill and humanitarian appreciation (this is sarcasm, for those so impaired) is saying: look, we're not offering the lowest price, we're offering a *price* -- and with our price, you can take it or leave.
As a competing business -- B&N, whatever -- I'd jump on this and say, "Look, we won't fuck around with your head or your pocketbook. We'll give you the lowest price. No games, etc. etc."
To me, that'll earn my business. I don't care about personalization (contrary to what Microsoft says I *should* care about), I don't care about targetted e-mail, targetted advertising (contrary to what *sigh* even my beloved TIVO thinks) I care about the lowest price.
How come none of these places are asking me, Joe Consumer, what really matters? How come they think that if they send me advertising "targetted" to my demographic that I'm gonna think, gee whiz, thanks for the e-mail! I'll get right on your site and buy something?
How come they don't think: okay, consumers are savvy, let's not muck around with all this personalization stuff, let's just give them the goods, give it to them cheap, and make it easy to return if they don't like it.
These fucking ad men (and women) are Microsoft drones. They'll buy the latest commerce site server and think they're doing everybody a favor.
Well fuck that. They don't do *everybody* a favor because I'm someone and I don't give a shit about all this stuff. I just want the lowest prices. I don't need a "web experience". I don't need videos and snazzy graphics. I want low prices.
Talk to me, you ad men and women. Talk to me, you market testers.
I'll tell you want I want, and what (I'd bet) a good chunk of consumers want. I don't want frills, I don't want flash (Macromedia -- or the more general kind) -- all I want is a little savings of both time and money.
That will make me smile. That will make me happy. And that will keep me coming back.
The TIVO "model" is a good one: personally, I'd be very interested in an intelligent version of Napster -- something that could search available songs, compile a local "playlist" (with both suggestions and songs that I've selected) which I could then listen to, archive, or trash at will.
After working with the TIVO for several weeks now, I'm pretty convinced that it's the greatest gadget I own. (And I say this just at the TIVO "base" functionality level -- the fact that I can crack the case and add another hard drive makes it just about the greatest gadget I have *ever* owned.)
What's surprising about TIVO -- and what consistently shocks me day in and day out -- is TIVO's ability to record "suggestions" -- most of which are right on the mark.
I use the TIVO exclusively to watch and archive to VCR old movies from channels like TCM and AMC, and I'm surprised nearly every day at how TIVO is able -- after only a few weeks of suggestions -- to pick movies that I've overlooked in the guide data or didn't realize that I wanted to see.
Now, I may be generous with TIVO praise because I like movies in the first place -- and TIVO oftentimes functions as that oddball teacher in Film Studies 101 who decides to create a syllabus of shit that you've never heard of but that once you watch all the way through, you slap your forehead, lean back in your chair, and think: Film is Fucking Awesome! But I digress...
I suppose if MP3s are embedded with metadata -- like the sort of metadata that TIVO has from the daily guide download from the Tribune -- it would be a cinch to get Napster to do the exact same thing.
Metadata is always the thing that makes me stand up and take notice. Me, I forget how nifty metadata is.
All hail the oddball!
All hail Metadata!
I can go into Border's and receive 10% off any book because I'm a teacher. I have a card that identifies me as such.
A woman in line in front of me bought Elmore Leonard's "Pagan Babies" for the sale price. I bought "Pagan Babies" for sale price less 10 %. We got different prices on the same day for the same book purely based on some arbritrary criteria.
Another example: I go into Seattle's Best Coffee. A man in front of me gets a latte for list price. I go in, plunk down my frequent buyer's card, get the latte for free because I've bought ten lattes.
Same day, same item, same clerk, different prices.
Since we don't know Amazon's criteria, I'm not sure we can accuse them of discriminating against certian *people*, right? I mean, I've bought a lot of stuff at Amazon, and over the past few days as I've been following this story, I've noticed that I'm received the lowest prices for all the DVDs that they're listing.
They're not lowering the prices because my hair is brown, my eyes are blue, and I write left-handed, right?
They're not lowering it because I'm a democrat and I think the Shrub (Bush) is a dumb, loud-mouthed boor.
They're lowering the price based on whatever information I've given them, my ordered habits over the years, and the books (and DVDs) that I've ordered in the past.
Obviously, they've got some sort of criteria that they've established -- repeat customers, money spent over the past year, orders over the last month, whatever -- and they're applying it to me.
Or maybe they're setting random prices and seeing if it's enough to "catch" me based on my demographic.
Whatever.
But I know that I take one look at the list price, one look at the sale price, and make my decision there. If the sale price is too close to the list price, I won't buy it, period.
If the sale price is 30, 40% of the list price, I'll probably buy it.
I think the issue here isn't that they're doing it -- charging less for some customers, more for others -- but that we don't *know* the criteria.
And of course because we're all good little paranoid Pynchonians (see 'The Crying of Lot 49' or 'Gravity's Rainbow' to see what I mean) we suspect the worst -- that not only are they screwing us and fucking with our privacy -- they're also fucking with our heads.
Bad Amazon! Bad! Bad! Bad!
Understand that one thing that's happening is that "news" is losing the meaning it once had.
... the REST of the story!" -- but his was always a mix of vaccum cleaner commercials mixed with news that never seemed as important as what Cronkite was reporting. It was as though Cronkite functioned as the "validator" for the news. If he reported it, it was, indeed, news and, by extension, important. (It was for this reason, of course, that he was -- and possible is -- "the most trusted man in America").
I can remember sitting down with my dad every night at 5:30pm and watching Walter Cronkite. "And that's the way it is," Cronkite would say at the end of each broadcast. And for millions of viewers, that's the way it was -- that's the way Vietnam was reported, Watergate, you name it. Cronkite's was the voice of the "news".
"News" was what happened during the day and what was wrapped at 5:30pm or 6pm or whenever folks got their Cronkite fix.
I'm not particularly nostalgic for those days. I mean, I was very young at the time -- maybe 4,5, 6 years old -- but I have vivid memories of Cronkite's Vietnam reporting, as well as the Watergate hearings. To me -- up until 10 or 11 years ago -- news was what these guys -- rarely women -- reported at the end of each day. I'm not nostalgic because I realize (or *think* I realize) that that sort of "news" was very, very sanitized and manipulated. (And, yes, today's "news" is just as manipulative -- but it's also more widespread and pervasive. I'm not sure if this is a good or bad thing -- just something I've noticed.)
I still get momentary flashes of memory when I hear Cronkite's voice -- I remember him talking about Tet and the Viet Cong and the body counts and all that sort of stuff. For a young kid it was very powerful.
"News" today loses much of its power thanks to the immediacy with which it is delivered. There was something mysterious about Cronkite -- the fact that, well, stories were wrapped up at a specific time each day. Sure, there was Paul Harvey on the AM radio -- "And now
Today we don't have those kinds of validators. Sure, Dan Rather and Tom Brokaw try to pass themselves off as cultural critics. "Hey, we're more than just talking heads -- we've got a critical slant on American culture, too."
But they don't have the same "truck" that Cronkite had.
So "news" doesn't carry the sort of baggage that it once had. It isn't just something that happens at the end of each day. It isn't just endless talk about Tet and My Lai and Nixon and Cambodia. Now it's constantly shifting, ephemeral, hard to pin down. What's news now might not be news a minute from now -- and it might not even be news, period, thanks to corporate spin and government manipulation. You never know. And you can't know, because there's no one (for good or bad) like Cronkite to validate it.
Really, I'm serious: I'm not nostalgic for that sort of thing. I'm not sure it's in the best interests of American culture these days to have a force like Cronkite validating the cultural awareness of ourselves. We need what we now have: the mercurial nature of truth, the shifting alliances, the layers of deception.
Everything is gray now. There's no John Wayne to scout out the bad guys, wipe 'em out, and explain why we should appreciate what we have. That sort of thing is funny now -- it's trite, too simplistic.
This complexity is reflected, no doubt, in the way we view ourselves through "news" media. It's no wonder that "news" junkies are on their way out. Who has time to keep up?
Part of the problem with all this is that everyone (especially Jack Valenti) is constantly trying to draw up some fucking analogy for all these legal problems.
... blah blah blah."
"This is just like someone driving you to another person's home to burglarize it."
Or:
"This is just like
The danger lies in these stupid analogies that everyone is trying to use. I mean, I don't know if this the case or not -- but is it possible that what's going on here -- linking to DeCSS, sharing music with Napster -- is it just possible that, well, this sort of stuff isn't really analagous to other non-internet things?
I don't mean this as flamebait or a troll. I'm serious: couldn't this one of those odd moments where everything that we're talking about *can't* be reduced to some cut-and-dried analogy because, well, this kind of stuff is really "like" nothing we've ever seen before?
You're wrong.
n -suit-wearing-pinheads just can't plunder every fucking dollar I earn and take the food from my mouth.
It's not the music that people are after. That's part of it, yes.
But while I agree with you that, sure, we should pick our battles -- and, sure, "human life" is more important than music -- understand that what's at stake here is freedom of expression -- and the last time I checked, freedom of expression -- freedom of speech, however you want to spin it -- is a fundamental freedom that is constantly in danger of being snapped up not by government itself, but by corporations manipulating technology, manipulating government, and, ultimately, manipulating consumers.
The battle isn't about music. It's about the way in which art is controlled by corporate interests. For fuck's sake: it's no secret that in America (at least) government more often than not is in the pocket of big corporations. Sure, Microsoft lost their battle against the government, but it doesn't take a MacArthur Fellow to realize that no matter what the outcome of big business versus big governement, the winner will *always* be big business.
It's for that reason that people are concerned about music. Sure, human rights are important. No one here will deny it. But, as you say, you gotta pick your battles. Fundamental intellectual freedoms are as fundamental to human life as any other freedom. Please don't assume that all Slashdotters are so short-sighted to believe that all we're doing is bypassing encryption or trying to get something for nothing.
In this case -- the USB topic -- what's at stake is control and the extent of said control. Corporations -- RIAA, MPAA, whatever -- what absolute and total control. They don't have foresight enough to predict technologies, but they sure as shit know the "bad" technologies from the "good" technologies once the technologies start to threaten their profits. This is not about music. This is not about USB. This is not even about the poor schmuck of a artist who makes the music.
It's about corporate profits. Corporations will throw all their economic might against anything that threatens their profits -- or threatens their *potential* profits.
So don't get all holier-than-thou and pretend that music doesn't count. Or pretend that that on one side there's human life and the "real issues" and on the other side there's the crazy Slashdotters who care only about encryption and getting something for nothing.
Freedom is something -- and it's not for nothing that freedom in any form is something that must be fiercely protected and vigilently maintained.
Corporations will have you believe otherwise. Corporations will have you believe that your entitled to what they *give* you -- and believe me, pal, that ain't much. They want you to believe in their version of freedom. Freedom of the corporations to "grant" consumers what they (the corporations) think the consumers need. And the corporations think we should be grateful -- because without big business controlling and manipulating the consumers, we'd be (to paraphrase David Mamet) a bunch of savage shitheads in the wilderness.
Corporations want you to believe in the second coming of Acme, Incorporated. They want you to believe and be grateful because, boy, Acme Incorporated has what you need.
Well fuck you and fuck Acme Incorporated. That's what all this about. Fuck Acme Incorpoated why? Because fuck their profits. Their profits are dollars and pounds and marks and francs out of our own fucking pockets.
We're buying the Porsche's for the suits who run these corporations. We're buying the luxury apartments of the CEOs who get their golden parachutes when the stockholders suddenly realize that Zippy the Second Coming of Christ isn't pulling in the sort of profits we, er, think might be appropriate.
So fuck the music. Fuck the USB. This is about insuring that everyone gets a fair shake. This is about making sure that corporations know their boundaries. They can't just walk the fuck into our living rooms and kitchens and open our refrigerators and take our fucking bread.
This is about saying, wait just a fucking minute: the buck stops here. You and your band of corporate bad-breath-startac-talking-Porsche-driving-italia
That's what this is about. And, yes, it's as important as any fundamental human issue.