Why fight for the right to buy expensive gear and to consume lots of electricity to broadcast over a small geographic area, when you could reach the whole world by setting up a station on the Internet?
Until pretty much every car has internet connectivity, this won't work. At least here, people mostly listen to the radio only when driving. Some others listen to it at work. Most sysadmins don't exactly like somewhat bandwidth hungry audio broadcasts.
Here, our radio stations are garbage, littered with Canadian Content enforced programming, playing pretty much the same content every day, and targeting a much-too-large demographic of teenagers right through to retired cottagers, but it's a little impossible to listen to a shoutcast/icecast in my car, right now, so I'll stick to my CD Changer and the Radio.
Now, to avoid everyone calling me a karma whore, here's my insight on the whole thing:
USSR labs decided that they would hold back details until MS produced a fix. Understandable, I mean, they wouldn't want everyone to be developing exploits for the vulnerability while MS sits on it (Yes, I understand that security through obscurity doesn't work, but I'm sure that USSR would've released details if MS had refused to comply in a timely fashion). Anyway, I think that the problem is people actually getting/using the patch.
Sure, sysadmins will probably do corporate work to clear this up, but people do worse jobs maintaining software than they do their cars. At least with cars, they know that the oil needs to be changed every 5000 or so KM, and that when the tread on the tires is bare, those need to be replaced. People are still using IE 3.0! Users generally too lazy to upgrade software, even if there's a known security issue.
But I imagine that even if we had twelve papers, the front pages would be identical.
It's true. While not "identical" they're very similar. Here, in NB, Canada, we have four newspapers for the province. Three are english, and one en francais. They're all owned by the same people.
I don't even find it odd that there's rarely any negative publicity for JD Irving (the owner) in the paper(s).
My uncle owns a '68 Road Runner and a '69 Dart. My father is reconstructing his '72 Challenger, and my brother just bought a '72 Demon.
Unfortunately, it's a little hard to enjoy those vehicles for more than three or four months a year, here. I live in NB, Canada, and winter is terrible.
My point was not to say that SUVs are the most fun vehicle in the world to drive, but they're a great all-around vehicle for the power hungry familyman/soccermom. They get through snow (if you're not an idiot), the can tow the family tent trailer, and they have enough room to get groceries AND pick up "the kids", some of which you've never met, yet eat most of your food.
Plus, you feel empowered by the size/height/power of the thing.
Why can't you charge for provision of closed source drivers, providing functionality, documentation, support and an increasing level of product maturity with driver revisions ?
Simple. Nobody would pay for drivers. Think about it: I buy a new video card, it works great, I install a new sound card, and the video card's drivers keep crashing. There's no WAY I'd shell out a bunch of cash to my video card vendor to fix their software.
Sure, most other software can follow this model. Software breaks, company releases another major/semi-minor version with a couple extra features, and people shell out thousands to get the latest. But that doesn't work for drivers. People won't buy drivers.
SUVs are FUN to drive. Sure. They're not so great for the environment, and they're expensive to buy, and hard on gas, but they're FUN. Seriously, if you think that driving is ONLY about transportation, you should buy a bus pass, and use public transportation.
Why did I just dump a bunch of cash on a dolby digital receiver for my home theatre setup? Because I like the sound. I like to hear the sub woofer. Sure, my TV has built in speakers, and my amp burns power like crazy, but it's much more enjoyable to listen to music/movies now.
SUVs are a blast to drive. It's not about a NEED for that power, it's about wanting to be able to pass whoever you want, or tow whatever you want, or drive wherever you want, or toss whatever you want into the back. People like the feeling of power their SUV's size and height gives. Period.
Yeah, this is true, but I could write a script in perl that makes perpetual requests to a mailserver, and distribute it to users on my linux network with the same results. It's easy to exploit user privileges. Users are stupid.
what measures are beeing taken to ensure that VP does not expose *nix to some of the same problems that plauge Windows.
If I'm not mistaken, the real problem(s) with VBScript don't lie within the language, but within the security 'sandbox'. If, for instance, Outlook had a properly set up security sandbox, melissa, and IloveYou would never have happened. We can't blame a LANGUAGE for this.
We don't blame perl if the admin are stupid enough to set perl suid root. We blame the admin.
Also, as you mentioned, no, users don't get root. So, a user takes a big risk any time (s)he runs untrusted code, but at least it's impossible for this code to screw over other users.
I usually wave off users who insist on posting "This story has been covered" or "this isn't news" or "slashdot sucks". I usually completely ignore them. Feel free to do the same to this post.
I clicked on the article. It looked interesting. Being Canadian, I wanted to know what my government/censoring bodies had to say, and I must say that I was disgusted as I read further and further into the slashdot article.
I do understand that it's Jamie's job to give his opinion, and to editorialize on concepts, but as I read the article, it quickly became nothing but a pro-vegan article, with a twist back to the headline at the end. I have no problem with vegans. I don't pressure them to try and change their point of view on meat, just as I expect them to leave me alone when I'm about to chow down on a nice piece of steak. I enjoy eating meat as much as vegetarians and vegans enjoy NOT eating meat.
If I had've known that the article was going to go from video game violence into a short list of reasons why it's evil to eat cows and pigs, I never would've clicked on the article. And I'm sure that if the title of the article been focused on this, and not on video games, a lot of other users would never have clicked on the article.
Don't get me wrong. Feel free to say your piece. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but please let us know it's coming, so I can ignore it. I hate hearing about how meat is evil, and not because I feel guilty, but because it's tired. I have my own reasons that you would call justifications why I don't think it's bad to eat meat. Leave me alone.
The penalty for leaking of this information to any partty would be the the payment of say - $50
I'm assuming you just pulled that number ($50) out of your head, and I'm not trying to call you on it, here, but how would we put a price on this?
To my next-door neighbor, his personal information might not be worth anything, maybe he LIKES getting tons of junk mail, and has fun forwarding spam to his 'buddy list.' Perhaps to my other neighbor, personal information would be invaluable.
I know that we've put a price on many invaluable commodities already, but where would we even start on this?
I feel that in this day and age, I should be free to decide what music I like on my own.
That's the key. You SHOULD be free to decide, but, being very general, society loves being told what to buy and how much to buy it. The idea of falsely overpopularising music and pretending that this fluff has purpose, for the sake of profit, is repulsive.
If you sincerely enjoy [insert genre] music, then, by all means, go buy the CD. But if the only reason you enjoy this music and are buying the CD is because you've been drawn in by some HUGE marketing campaign, then you're merely a pawn in the record companies' collective hand, helping them turn huge profits from commercial music.
I'm sure I'll get flamed for this, but I don't think it's so wrong that you're not allowed to resell OEM Windows. I do think it's evil that they force their OEMs to bundle windows though.
Many products are like this. Retailers aren't allowed to split up their family-size packages of.. say, shampoo(ie 2 bottles shrink wrapped together, and sold as a unit), and sell them individually, why should this be different for software?
If an artist wants to make millions of dollars, be prepared to sell out. There is no way to avoid it.
Generally this is true, but not always. I have utmost respect for bands like the Dave Matthews Band, the Greatful Dead, and Phish. These bands built a fanbase by playing shows, and appealing to their audience. Not by buying a 30second slot at EVERY commercial break (this pisses me off). Their fans are dedicated to the band, their show changes every night of the tour, and it's very easy to tell the difference between a live show and their latest CD. And they're huge.
My roommates are driving from Moncton, NB, Canada for 11 hours (each way) to Foxborough, Mass. this weekend to see a DMB show where there will be 60,000 people. The show will be amazing. We watch the Listener Supported DVD on a regular basis, but we know that the show will be so much different. You can't get that with manufactured music. The show will sound exactly like the CD because often, it IS the CD.
Manufactured music is (obviously) one of my biggest pet peeves.
I suppose I did sound quite negative in my original post. I agree that the record label machine has churned out a lot of music that I do enjoy, and that I do BUY and listen to.
My point was that they do turn out tons of crap for the sole purpose of making money.
Music is art. There are tons of starving musicians who won't sell out, same as there are starving painters, writers, sculptors, etc. Music is entertaining, but it should have a purpose. And that purpose shouldn't be greed, or lust for fame.
Sure, the great musicians and composers were often commissioned, but they were commissioned because of their talent, not because of the media machine.
Manufactured Music is, IMHO, no higher on the music food chain than advertising jingles. It makes me sick.
Two words: collaborative filtering. You find a song you like or don't like, click somewhere to tell mp3.com your opinion.
This is a great idea. At risk of harvesting too much information, and turning away the paranoid, it would be great to set up demographic groups, so that the user could figure out what other people like them enjoy.
Or perhaps set up trusted opinion groups. If you discover that you happen to have similar music tastes with certain users, you could easily see what they've rated possitively, and vice versa.
An open, community based filter would be the only way of determining what people actually enjoy listening to, rather than what the little glass-fronted box in front of the couch [I'm Canadian.. couch is a word] tells them to buy. It would have to be open so that users would trust others evaluations. What's to stop labels, or distributors, or the musicians themselves to falsely rate music in order to turn a profit on a closed system?
Here's an excerpt from an e-mail conversation I had with someone I met on/.:
I think it has a few major roles: 1) The label serves as a distribution channel, paying for the actual, physical media, the physical packaging, shipping to its retail outlets. 2) The label pays for artwork. The intellectual property that apears on the traycard, cdlabel and jacket. 3) The label pays for studio time and recording media for the band to actually get their music down into a reproducable form. This includes production, engineering, mastering, mixing, etc. 4) The label pays for advertisements, television, PoP displays, radio spots, free distributions of singles to media outlets, internet ads, etc. 5) The label promotes and pays for tours, and special events/appearances which in turn, sell more CDs. They find sponsors, venues, do bookings, arrange transportation, and all the other fun stuff that comes with touring. 6) The label pays for other media production such as videos, websites, and CDRoms. 7) The label provides management and public relations for the band. 8) The label serves as a screen, filtering out the music that won't sell, and contracting that which will. This gets rid of a lot of crap, but filters out some really good stuff. (I might be missing something...)
The real kicker is #8. The others are a matter of money. #8 is a matter of function.
I think you mentioned mp3.com in your post on/. mp3.com is a GREAT idea. It's great because it's purpose is to provide a medium for independent artists to be heard. But it doesn't work. It doesn't work because there's WAY too much crap on mp3.com. I've spent hours and hours searching the HUGE archives of indie content on that site, and I've come away with maybe 3 bands that I actually found worth listening to. Others were plagued with poor recordings, sub-amateur production value, and pathetic musicianship and vocalization. When a label functions as a screen, it gets rid of these 'musicians' who think they're great, but are actually terrible, and promotes music that sells.
Now, this has always worked for a label. It's great that a label can screen, but there has always been an element of greed, which usually produces a mediocre product, at best. This has always been a theme that has plagued the music industry, but has become more dominant in recent years. Think of the Monkeys and the New Kids on the Block, Milli Vanilli (sp?). Those bands were money makers.
If labels were eliminated, who would serve the function of filter? The role of the label will CHANGE in the near future. Perhaps they won't even be called a label.
It's also very expensive to lay down tracks in the studio. Studio time is REALLY expensive, but this is a matter of money, so it isn't as important to me.
--- [end excerpt]
The person who figures out how to make money from recordings without selling the music will be very very wealthy. There is already a great distribution infrastructure (the net) in place, but I believe that the key is filtering the crap.
I'm sure this is going to sound stupid until you think about it. Remember playing playform scroller games? Like Super Mario Bros. The play control in the 'Mario' games was decent -- you could do things like adjust your trajectory in the middle of a jump or fall, but remember all those other games where it was impossible to move while not on the ground? Where if you jump forward, the direction buttons do nothing until you're back on the ground?
Without a way to adjust your destination, mid-flight, wouldn't these things be incredibly dangerous? This would be somewhat like running on ice, or losing the brakes on your car while driving.
I guess I worded that wrong. Anyone in his position would scare me. Anyone in Bill Gates' position would scare me. Steve Balmer scares me.
It's not a personal thing, I've never met Znaimer, or anything, but a man with his power must be respected.
Maybe 'FEAR' is a better word. I fear him.
Aside: does he have this weird obsession with NEVER being on camera? I've never seen the guy. ('cept here)
The CBC would be great, if it wasn't for, as you put it, the mediocrity. It's like "There isn't anything good to air, so we'll show.. uh.. [blows dust off an old UMATIC tape] this. Yeah, we'll show this." Do they even CARE about ratings?
Another aside: does your cable get simulcast all over the place when a Canadian station is showing the same thing as an American station? ie: Fox is showing the Simpsons. So is Global. Switch over to the fox channel, and sure enough, the global logo is in the bottom corner, not the fox one. The commercials are global commercials, not fox commercials. The only real time I have a problem with this is during the Superbowl. I'm not a big football fan, but, being a 'media guy', I LOVE Superbowl commercials. It's too bad that I end up watching Robin's Donuts and Mr. Sub commercials during this prime advertising time, because of this whole simulcasting thing.
Slashdot Mirror
Why fight for the right to buy expensive gear and to consume lots of electricity to broadcast over a small geographic area, when you could reach the whole world by setting up a station on the Internet?
Until pretty much every car has internet connectivity, this won't work. At least here, people mostly listen to the radio only when driving. Some others listen to it at work. Most sysadmins don't exactly like somewhat bandwidth hungry audio broadcasts.
Here, our radio stations are garbage, littered with Canadian Content enforced programming, playing pretty much the same content every day, and targeting a much-too-large demographic of teenagers right through to retired cottagers, but it's a little impossible to listen to a shoutcast/icecast in my car, right now, so I'll stick to my CD Changer and the Radio.
Link on securityfocus is here
Also, bugtraq archived here
Now, to avoid everyone calling me a karma whore, here's my insight on the whole thing:
USSR labs decided that they would hold back details until MS produced a fix. Understandable, I mean, they wouldn't want everyone to be developing exploits for the vulnerability while MS sits on it (Yes, I understand that security through obscurity doesn't work, but I'm sure that USSR would've released details if MS had refused to comply in a timely fashion). Anyway, I think that the problem is people actually getting/using the patch.
Sure, sysadmins will probably do corporate work to clear this up, but people do worse jobs maintaining software than they do their cars. At least with cars, they know that the oil needs to be changed every 5000 or so KM, and that when the tread on the tires is bare, those need to be replaced. People are still using IE 3.0! Users generally too lazy to upgrade software, even if there's a known security issue.
That said, I'm as guilty as most of them.
But I imagine that even if we had twelve papers, the front pages would be identical.
It's true. While not "identical" they're very similar. Here, in NB, Canada, we have four newspapers for the province. Three are english, and one en francais. They're all owned by the same people.
I don't even find it odd that there's rarely any negative publicity for JD Irving (the owner) in the paper(s).
Yes, I have heard of sports cars.
My uncle owns a '68 Road Runner and a '69 Dart. My father is reconstructing his '72 Challenger, and my brother just bought a '72 Demon.
Unfortunately, it's a little hard to enjoy those vehicles for more than three or four months a year, here. I live in NB, Canada, and winter is terrible.
My point was not to say that SUVs are the most fun vehicle in the world to drive, but they're a great all-around vehicle for the power hungry familyman/soccermom. They get through snow (if you're not an idiot), the can tow the family tent trailer, and they have enough room to get groceries AND pick up "the kids", some of which you've never met, yet eat most of your food.
Plus, you feel empowered by the size/height/power of the thing.
I drive a Neon, heh.
Why can't you charge for provision of closed source drivers, providing functionality, documentation, support and an increasing level of product maturity with driver revisions ?
Simple. Nobody would pay for drivers. Think about it: I buy a new video card, it works great, I install a new sound card, and the video card's drivers keep crashing. There's no WAY I'd shell out a bunch of cash to my video card vendor to fix their software.
Sure, most other software can follow this model. Software breaks, company releases another major/semi-minor version with a couple extra features, and people shell out thousands to get the latest. But that doesn't work for drivers. People won't buy drivers.
Come on.
SUVs are FUN to drive. Sure. They're not so great for the environment, and they're expensive to buy, and hard on gas, but they're FUN. Seriously, if you think that driving is ONLY about transportation, you should buy a bus pass, and use public transportation.
Why did I just dump a bunch of cash on a dolby digital receiver for my home theatre setup? Because I like the sound. I like to hear the sub woofer. Sure, my TV has built in speakers, and my amp burns power like crazy, but it's much more enjoyable to listen to music/movies now.
SUVs are a blast to drive. It's not about a NEED for that power, it's about wanting to be able to pass whoever you want, or tow whatever you want, or drive wherever you want, or toss whatever you want into the back. People like the feeling of power their SUV's size and height gives. Period.
uh.
Yeah, this is true, but I could write a script in perl that makes perpetual requests to a mailserver, and distribute it to users on my linux network with the same results. It's easy to exploit user privileges. Users are stupid.
what measures are beeing taken to ensure that VP does not expose *nix to some of the same problems that plauge Windows.
If I'm not mistaken, the real problem(s) with VBScript don't lie within the language, but within the security 'sandbox'. If, for instance, Outlook had a properly set up security sandbox, melissa, and IloveYou would never have happened. We can't blame a LANGUAGE for this.
We don't blame perl if the admin are stupid enough to set perl suid root. We blame the admin.
Also, as you mentioned, no, users don't get root. So, a user takes a big risk any time (s)he runs untrusted code, but at least it's impossible for this code to screw over other users.
Well, I *could* build a mountain of mashed potatoes and call it Mount Spudmore, but is that a good reason to do it? Hell no.
_I'd_ check it out, if you took some snapshots and put it up on the web. And you could probably make slashdot quickies with something like that.
Heck, if you were Canadian, there'd probably be some sort of Can-Con art grant you could get, and tons of PEI farmers would donate the 'materials'.
[/me gets to thinking]
No, I don't think it's a derivative work.
Say I write a piece of C code, and compile it with gcc. Is the binary a derivative work? No.
I think there should be a new license set up for distributed output applications. The GPL doesn't really apply.
Oh, and I am not a vegetarian. If meat is murder, then murder makes good cookin'.
Amen to that! (-:
I love vegetarians. Some of my favourite foods are vegetarians.
I usually wave off users who insist on posting "This story has been covered" or "this isn't news" or "slashdot sucks". I usually completely ignore them. Feel free to do the same to this post.
I clicked on the article. It looked interesting. Being Canadian, I wanted to know what my government/censoring bodies had to say, and I must say that I was disgusted as I read further and further into the slashdot article.
I do understand that it's Jamie's job to give his opinion, and to editorialize on concepts, but as I read the article, it quickly became nothing but a pro-vegan article, with a twist back to the headline at the end. I have no problem with vegans. I don't pressure them to try and change their point of view on meat, just as I expect them to leave me alone when I'm about to chow down on a nice piece of steak. I enjoy eating meat as much as vegetarians and vegans enjoy NOT eating meat.
If I had've known that the article was going to go from video game violence into a short list of reasons why it's evil to eat cows and pigs, I never would've clicked on the article. And I'm sure that if the title of the article been focused on this, and not on video games, a lot of other users would never have clicked on the article.
Don't get me wrong. Feel free to say your piece. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but please let us know it's coming, so I can ignore it. I hate hearing about how meat is evil, and not because I feel guilty, but because it's tired. I have my own reasons that you would call justifications why I don't think it's bad to eat meat. Leave me alone.
No. I want the TLD "Dot". Please? With Sugar on Top?
aych tee tee pee colon slash slash slash dot dot dot
(http://slashdot.dot)
There's trouble.
The penalty for leaking of this information to any partty would be the the payment of say - $50
I'm assuming you just pulled that number ($50) out of your head, and I'm not trying to call you on it, here, but how would we put a price on this?
To my next-door neighbor, his personal information might not be worth anything, maybe he LIKES getting tons of junk mail, and has fun forwarding spam to his 'buddy list.' Perhaps to my other neighbor, personal information would be invaluable.
I know that we've put a price on many invaluable commodities already, but where would we even start on this?
I feel that in this day and age, I should be free to decide what music I like on my own.
That's the key. You SHOULD be free to decide, but, being very general, society loves being told what to buy and how much to buy it. The idea of falsely overpopularising music and pretending that this fluff has purpose, for the sake of profit, is repulsive.
If you sincerely enjoy [insert genre] music, then, by all means, go buy the CD. But if the only reason you enjoy this music and are buying the CD is because you've been drawn in by some HUGE marketing campaign, then you're merely a pawn in the record companies' collective hand, helping them turn huge profits from commercial music.
People don't think for themselves anymore.
No, following my analogy, you'd be able to resell the computer AND windows together, but not just windows.
I'm sure I'll get flamed for this, but I don't think it's so wrong that you're not allowed to resell OEM Windows. I do think it's evil that they force their OEMs to bundle windows though.
Many products are like this. Retailers aren't allowed to split up their family-size packages of.. say, shampoo(ie 2 bottles shrink wrapped together, and sold as a unit), and sell them individually, why should this be different for software?
Maybe I'm misunderstanding.
If an artist wants to make millions of dollars, be prepared to sell out. There is no way to avoid it.
Generally this is true, but not always. I have utmost respect for bands like the Dave Matthews Band, the Greatful Dead, and Phish. These bands built a fanbase by playing shows, and appealing to their audience. Not by buying a 30second slot at EVERY commercial break (this pisses me off). Their fans are dedicated to the band, their show changes every night of the tour, and it's very easy to tell the difference between a live show and their latest CD. And they're huge.
My roommates are driving from Moncton, NB, Canada for 11 hours (each way) to Foxborough, Mass. this weekend to see a DMB show where there will be 60,000 people. The show will be amazing. We watch the Listener Supported DVD on a regular basis, but we know that the show will be so much different. You can't get that with manufactured music. The show will sound exactly like the CD because often, it IS the CD.
Manufactured music is (obviously) one of my biggest pet peeves.
I suppose I did sound quite negative in my original post. I agree that the record label machine has churned out a lot of music that I do enjoy, and that I do BUY and listen to.
My point was that they do turn out tons of crap for the sole purpose of making money.
Music is art. There are tons of starving musicians who won't sell out, same as there are starving painters, writers, sculptors, etc. Music is entertaining, but it should have a purpose. And that purpose shouldn't be greed, or lust for fame.
Sure, the great musicians and composers were often commissioned, but they were commissioned because of their talent, not because of the media machine.
Manufactured Music is, IMHO, no higher on the music food chain than advertising jingles. It makes me sick.
Two words: collaborative filtering. You find a song you like or don't like, click somewhere to tell mp3.com your opinion.
This is a great idea. At risk of harvesting too much information, and turning away the paranoid, it would be great to set up demographic groups, so that the user could figure out what other people like them enjoy.
Or perhaps set up trusted opinion groups. If you discover that you happen to have similar music tastes with certain users, you could easily see what they've rated possitively, and vice versa.
An open, community based filter would be the only way of determining what people actually enjoy listening to, rather than what the little glass-fronted box in front of the couch [I'm Canadian.. couch is a word] tells them to buy. It would have to be open so that users would trust others evaluations. What's to stop labels, or distributors, or the musicians themselves to falsely rate music in order to turn a profit on a closed system?
We could definately be on to something here.
Here's an excerpt from an e-mail conversation I had with someone I met on /.:
/. mp3.com is a GREAT idea. It's great because it's purpose is to provide a medium for independent artists to be heard. But it doesn't work. It doesn't work because there's WAY too much crap on mp3.com. I've spent hours and hours searching the HUGE archives of indie content on that site, and I've come away with maybe 3 bands that I actually found worth listening to. Others were plagued with poor recordings, sub-amateur production value, and
I think it has a few major roles:
1) The label serves as a distribution channel, paying for the actual, physical media, the physical packaging, shipping to its retail outlets.
2) The label pays for artwork. The intellectual property that apears on the traycard, cdlabel and jacket.
3) The label pays for studio time and recording media for the band to actually get their music down into a reproducable form. This includes
production, engineering, mastering, mixing, etc.
4) The label pays for advertisements, television, PoP displays, radio spots, free distributions of singles to media outlets, internet ads, etc.
5) The label promotes and pays for tours, and special events/appearances which in turn, sell more CDs. They find sponsors, venues, do bookings,
arrange transportation, and all the other fun stuff that comes with touring.
6) The label pays for other media production such as videos, websites, and CDRoms.
7) The label provides management and public relations for the band.
8) The label serves as a screen, filtering out the music that won't sell, and contracting that which will. This gets rid of a lot of crap, but filters out some really good stuff.
(I might be missing something...)
The real kicker is #8. The others are a matter of money. #8 is a matter of function.
I think you mentioned mp3.com in your post on
pathetic musicianship and vocalization. When a label functions as a screen, it gets rid of these 'musicians' who think they're great, but are actually terrible, and promotes music that sells.
Now, this has always worked for a label. It's great that a label can screen, but there has always been an element of greed, which usually
produces a mediocre product, at best. This has always been a theme that has plagued the music industry, but has become more dominant in recent
years. Think of the Monkeys and the New Kids on the Block, Milli Vanilli (sp?). Those bands were money makers.
If labels were eliminated, who would serve the function of filter? The role of the label will CHANGE in the near future. Perhaps they won't
even be called a label.
It's also very expensive to lay down tracks in the studio. Studio time is REALLY expensive, but this is a matter of money, so it isn't as
important to me.
---
[end excerpt]
The person who figures out how to make money from recordings without selling the music will be very very wealthy. There is already a great distribution infrastructure (the net) in place, but I believe that the key is filtering the crap.
I'm sure this is going to sound stupid until you think about it. Remember playing playform scroller games? Like Super Mario Bros. The play control in the 'Mario' games was decent -- you could do things like adjust your trajectory in the middle of a jump or fall, but remember all those other games where it was impossible to move while not on the ground? Where if you jump forward, the direction buttons do nothing until you're back on the ground?
Without a way to adjust your destination, mid-flight, wouldn't these things be incredibly dangerous? This would be somewhat like running on ice, or losing the brakes on your car while driving.
Sure it's a cool idea, but is it practical?
Is there a business model to support this?
Whoever figures out a way for $7 popcorns to be delivered faster than the movie can be downloaded will be a rich rich (wo)man.
I guess I worded that wrong. Anyone in his position would scare me. Anyone in Bill Gates' position would scare me. Steve Balmer scares me.
It's not a personal thing, I've never met Znaimer, or anything, but a man with his power must be respected.
Maybe 'FEAR' is a better word. I fear him.
Aside: does he have this weird obsession with NEVER being on camera? I've never seen the guy.
('cept here)
The CBC would be great, if it wasn't for, as you put it, the mediocrity. It's like "There isn't anything good to air, so we'll show.. uh.. [blows dust off an old UMATIC tape] this. Yeah, we'll show this." Do they even CARE about ratings?
Another aside: does your cable get simulcast all over the place when a Canadian station is showing the same thing as an American station? ie: Fox is showing the Simpsons. So is Global. Switch over to the fox channel, and sure enough, the global logo is in the bottom corner, not the fox one. The commercials are global commercials, not fox commercials. The only real time I have a problem with this is during the Superbowl. I'm not a big football fan, but, being a 'media guy', I LOVE Superbowl commercials. It's too bad that I end up watching Robin's Donuts and Mr. Sub commercials during this prime advertising time, because of this whole simulcasting thing.
Ok, this is getting WAY offtopic, but I just had to thank you.
That's the funniest thing I've heard/read all day.
Thanks!
I'm still chuckling.