That, or what you think, they ought to want to hear?
Exactly. Excellent point. Whenever the subject of music comes up, you always get the freaky clove-smoking oddballs who claim that radio doesn't play OBSCURE BAND X. The implication, of course, is that OBSCURE BAND X on OBSCURE LABEL Y is objectively (no questions asked) "better" music than NOT-OBSCURE BAND A.
And what usually happens, once the freaky clove-smoking oddball launches into the first attack, several additional attacks follow -- all of which list more OBSCURE BANDS from OBSCURE LABELS. Subtext here -- always -- is: gee, if only folks would listen to this music, we'd all be "better off".
Most of the music -- from where I sit, at least -- listed is wretched. This is my opinion, of course, but for whatever reason, the clove-smoking oddballs don't seem to understand the idea of "subjectivity" in art. I don't either, but I pretend I do -- and by pretending, I'm at least making an effort at being charitable and understanding that usually the reason that obscure bands are on obscure labels is that the music isn't appealing to a large audience. It may appeal to a small audience, but the commercial potential probably isn't there. So, okay: fair enough.
But I suspect -- and have no proof, of course -- that the only reason the clove-cig smoking oddballs list the obscure bands is to say, hey, look at me, I have distinct musical tastes and now this little band out of Idaho called the Blue Fonzies that plays *real* punk music, blah blah blah. I also suspect that the clove-crowd is pretty narcissistic and isn't able to think that, well, some folks *do* like Britney and Usher and Justin and that's okay. Personally, I don't -- I abhor the hip-hop stuff, yet (paradoxically) I have a hard time latching onto the Blue Fonzie-like bands from Idaho for (mostly) ideological reasons. They piss me off -- not tha band, but what band stands for -- and the sort of clove-cig smoking idiots that use art as ideology in order to drive home an uncharitable, narcissistic point that says nothing about the music industry, music in general, the band, or even the state of contemporary culture.
It says: hey, look at me, I like the Blue Fonzies. Ergo, I'm hippy-dippy cool.
Frankly, this is bullshit. Just like last year's bullshit about TIVO hooking up with XM radio and the bullshit TIVO implementing some sort of burn-to-dvd capability (yes, I know they've been talking with the studios to work on some sort of TIVOGuard capability for DRM. Whatever.)
I love my TIVO -- don't get me wrong -- but I'll believe the TIVO/Netflix VOD stuff when I see it. And, frankly, I don't think I'll be seeing it -- ever.
What I remember is the *Sears* branded Atari console. I'm not sure why, but the Sears console was my first exposure to non-pong video games. I remember our old Sears, too -- it had that Sears smell (which exists to this day in any Sears store) -- and I remember the Sears Atari rigged up in the "sporting goods" section of the store -- which seemed to have a lot of tennis rackets, tennis balls, and lawnmowers -- surrounding the big television.
We'd plant ourselves in Sears, play Combat for hours, sip Orange Julius's, and eventually make our way to Aladdin's Castle (with the requisite 'Aladdin's Castle smell'), get 20 (25?) tokens for five bucks, and play stuff like Pac Man, Tron, Pole Position, and that "Journey" game -- they released it during their 'Frontiers' tour, I think -- where you hopped Steve Perry over rock formations and guided Neil Schon (sp?) up and down some weird cave without touching the side.
Sadly, I find myself unable, in good conscience, to continue to use or recommend Creative products and will recommend against using or purchasing Creative products, as the patent tactics being used by Creative to maintain/increase revenue/marketshare are unacceptable to me.
How come when people try to write "business letters" they sound like stuffy guys in top hats?
Forget about trying to come up with 250+ syllables of "business-ese" for one basic sentimet. All this equates to a simple: "Fuck you, Creative."
And if the dingbat, Lexus-driving, Big Bertha golf buying, cheap Italian suits at Creative are too timid or too dainty to read "Fuck you, Creative" and figure out what it means, then fuck 'em. Two times.
I'm going to do some more research on this, see if it's DRM'd, what movies they have on there. Kudos to Real for listening to customers!
It's protected by HELIX DRM (will google later for info on Helix).
I just subscribed today -- see my thread below -- but after downloading the Real 10 player, you go to the Starz video page, and you're asked to wait while Helix DRM is downloaded. It's tiny -- a couple seconds worth of downloading -- and you can immediately start downloading movies.
Folks here think the 'Buffering' joke is funny (it seems to be the most common comment here), but there's no buffering with this. You simply download the protected REAL video file. It defaults to be saved in your 'My Music' folder.
The films have to be watched in a couple weeks -- each one has an expiration date -- but apparently they can be watched as many times as you want -- and can even be watched offline.
My first download was 'Night of the Living Dead' (before folks pointed out that it was available for free anyway), but I also downloaded 'Welcome to Sarajevo'. Anyway, DotD was around 450 megs. (I had to leave before WtS started downloading, so I didn't catch the file size.)
I've got 6.0/768 DSL, so the download was really speedy. Took about 15 minutes to download. (It wasn't maxing out my connection.)
You can also schedule your downloads -- so if your bandwidth is a little more limited, your connection doesn't max out all of a sudden.
No streaming. Very painless, actually. Not a superb selection -- around 100 or so at the moment -- but there was a mix of stuff -- blockbusters, small films, etc. etc. I was hoping for a lot more recent stuff, but this is okay.
14 day free trial. Don't know yet if once my time is up, I'll start paying. It might be worth it to see some stuff that's currently in my Netflix queue -- especially flicks that I know aren't that great but that I'm curious about (i.e. guilty pleasures).
I gotta say, though: despite the limited selection, this is definitely the way to do it. I'm willing to put up with the DRM and the expiration dates if I'm able to snag stuff spur-of-the-moment -- especially, as I say, stuff I'm curious about but can't bring myself to put in my Netflix queue and go through the whole order-wait-watch-return cycle for Netflix (which is my case is about 3-4 days.)
Well, I signed up for the free trial and am downloading 'Night of the Living Dead' and 'Welcome to Sarajavo.'
Anyone know what the quality is? I notice that Night of the Living dead is around 450 megs or so. I realize it's black and white and not the greatest quality to begin with -- so I expect that to be small. But I'm curious if the newer films -- 'Punch Drunk Love' for example -- will have DD51 soundtracks. Doubt it. But we'll see.
I'm a obsessive movie-watcher, so this -- combined with Netflix for the more obscure stuff -- really interests me. And, yes, Real is evil, but I noticed that their newest player just installed with a minimum of fuss and intrusiveness. So maybe they're trying to redeem themselves.
Frankly, I'll believe it when I see it. As much as I love my tivo -- and I've got both an SA and a DTivo -- it rankles me hear about this stuff and know that it's probably still six, eight, ten months away.
Just once, I'd like these places to make the announcment and then immediately have the functionality. I mean, didn't tivo three months ago announce something about XM radio and the ability to burn programs to DVD?
Where is it? Where's my XM radio on the tivo? Where's the software I can download to burn some stuff on DVD?
It's nowhere.
This isn't so much about announcing new technology as it is trying to regain (or hold) marketshare from the directv sell off. Tivo is admirable in that they have vision enough to make an endrun around both satellite and cable -- and assume (probably correctly) that *eventually* the internet will be the repository for most content.
But this ain't gonna happen anytime soon, that's for sure. And that bothers me. Enough already with the announcements and demos. Just put it out and let the market use it.
There's also the Holga -- sorta like an analog version of the camera phone. All plastic camera, a single aperture, uses 120 film. It's low-tech, but sometimes low-tech is good -- especially because it forces you to concentrate on the composition as opposed to all the bells and whistles.
Beware, though: the Holga is controversial. People don't like it because the photos tend to look similar. I'll agree with that. They're similar -- but sometimes they're pretty interesting.
Enough with listing the most obscure stuff you can think of. I mean, I can play that game, too. I could tell you everything you listed is bullshit because the only record company out there that's releasing *important* music -- as opposed to pretentious indie music ("My band's more obscure than yours -- ergo, I understand more of what music really is.") -- is Fat Possum.
If you've heard T-Model Ford or Junior Kimbrough, then you've heard real American modern blues -- and not the pretentious crap played out across the prairie on 110 watt college radio stations. (And no, I'm not gonna launch into some pretentious rant about how fortunate I was to actually DJ at a couple of these college stations and how I tried -- really, really tried boo-hoo, boo-hoo, to make a difference in my listener's aural landscape by, you know, dude, mixing a little Montrose with Black Sabbath and then heading into the mellow-yellow middle ground with a little Joe Walsh playing slide guitar and then be-bop-a-loo-doo smoothing mah eve-in-ing out with a little funk from Mr. Funk Machine himself, George Clinton.
Whatever. I had maybe three listeners, two of whom were stoned and the other one was maybe twelve and probably making out with his sister's best friend and the radio just *happened* to be on in the background.
I could give a shit about indie music either. "CloudNine Records makes some of the best music you've never heard of."
Whatever. Didn't hear of it because it most likely appeals to a pretty limited audience, not because my tastes are limited or my brain is somehow defective because my chilly-willy is not as cool as your chilly-willy.
Here's a dime, pal. Call a wanker, talk about Heidegger, and pretend everyone else is stupid. If you want music, you're not gonna find it with a couple Mormon-turned-rock-singers doing a slow-fi version of 'Down by the River. Or a bunch of tools from the heartland who used to do punk but started listening to Hank Williams Sr. one night because their daddy's van ran out of gas on I-80 and they had nothing to do but sit in an Iowa corn patch, listen to Hank, and try to perfect their own honky-tonk warble.
It's like a movie: teams of retroriggers with dusty snapcases and old computers descend upon sleek new media and crack it open with forbidden circuitboards from the 1990s.
No, the *end* of everything is when the old stuff is forbidden -- when the government decides to take Jack Valenti's advice (he hasn't given it yet, but he will -- before he retires) and ban all computer equipment made before 2004. Then the only people left are the retroriggers.
I'm surprised no one is mentioned that 100% uncrackable DRM: refusal to release.
If more record companies would simply *NOT RELEASE* music, there would be nothing to crack. In fact, I'd urge record companies to examine this carefully. Take Janet Jackson, for example. If they *refused to release* 'Damita Jo' -- or, better yet, refused to record it -- there would be nothing to crack, nothing to leak, and no filesharing problem.
The fact that record companies have recorded Damita Jo and actually released it indicates (to me, at least) that the record companies are as complicit in the problem as anyone else.
The interesting thing about all this -- and about MS's responses to the user "questions" in the document -- is that MS has convinced itself that MS Office is more than just a tool to facilitate writing. All this colloboration shit just makes me woozy.
I mean, MS goes off about OO's lack of database connectivity, lack of formatting, lack of Office compatibility -- but they (MS) don't acknowledge that for some of us, all we need is a tool that enables us to *write*.
I mean, there are writers writing out there who are not part of an "enterprise" and who do, in fact, operate in a vacuum (much as MS would like to pretend that this isn't -- or can't be -- the case.)
When I sit and write, I sit down in a quiet room for a long, long period of time. My computer runs, and I type. It's fucking simple. I don't need to spend $500 every other year to get software that does, essentially, the same thing.
Slashdot Mirror
Isn't "Me Too!" related to "*bump*"?
That, or what you think, they ought to want to hear?
Exactly. Excellent point. Whenever the subject of music comes up, you always get the freaky clove-smoking oddballs who claim that radio doesn't play OBSCURE BAND X. The implication, of course, is that OBSCURE BAND X on OBSCURE LABEL Y is objectively (no questions asked) "better" music than NOT-OBSCURE BAND A.
And what usually happens, once the freaky clove-smoking oddball launches into the first attack, several additional attacks follow -- all of which list more OBSCURE BANDS from OBSCURE LABELS. Subtext here -- always -- is: gee, if only folks would listen to this music, we'd all be "better off".
Most of the music -- from where I sit, at least -- listed is wretched. This is my opinion, of course, but for whatever reason, the clove-smoking oddballs don't seem to understand the idea of "subjectivity" in art. I don't either, but I pretend I do -- and by pretending, I'm at least making an effort at being charitable and understanding that usually the reason that obscure bands are on obscure labels is that the music isn't appealing to a large audience. It may appeal to a small audience, but the commercial potential probably isn't there. So, okay: fair enough.
But I suspect -- and have no proof, of course -- that the only reason the clove-cig smoking oddballs list the obscure bands is to say, hey, look at me, I have distinct musical tastes and now this little band out of Idaho called the Blue Fonzies that plays *real* punk music, blah blah blah. I also suspect that the clove-crowd is pretty narcissistic and isn't able to think that, well, some folks *do* like Britney and Usher and Justin and that's okay. Personally, I don't -- I abhor the hip-hop stuff, yet (paradoxically) I have a hard time latching onto the Blue Fonzie-like bands from Idaho for (mostly) ideological reasons. They piss me off -- not tha band, but what band stands for -- and the sort of clove-cig smoking idiots that use art as ideology in order to drive home an uncharitable, narcissistic point that says nothing about the music industry, music in general, the band, or even the state of contemporary culture.
It says: hey, look at me, I like the Blue Fonzies. Ergo, I'm hippy-dippy cool.
I know it's more fun to bitch and moan about the original site being slashdotted, but if you want to RTFA, then simply go to mirrordot:
http://www.mirrordot.org
Enough already.
Frankly, this is bullshit. Just like last year's bullshit about TIVO hooking up with XM radio and the bullshit TIVO implementing some sort of burn-to-dvd capability (yes, I know they've been talking with the studios to work on some sort of TIVOGuard capability for DRM. Whatever.)
I love my TIVO -- don't get me wrong -- but I'll believe the TIVO/Netflix VOD stuff when I see it. And, frankly, I don't think I'll be seeing it -- ever.
The TIVO's dead. Long live the TIVO.
Off-topic, but nostalgic:
What I remember is the *Sears* branded Atari console. I'm not sure why, but the Sears console was my first exposure to non-pong video games. I remember our old Sears, too -- it had that Sears smell (which exists to this day in any Sears store) -- and I remember the Sears Atari rigged up in the "sporting goods" section of the store -- which seemed to have a lot of tennis rackets, tennis balls, and lawnmowers -- surrounding the big television.
We'd plant ourselves in Sears, play Combat for hours, sip Orange Julius's, and eventually make our way to Aladdin's Castle (with the requisite 'Aladdin's Castle smell'), get 20 (25?) tokens for five bucks, and play stuff like Pac Man, Tron, Pole Position, and that "Journey" game -- they released it during their 'Frontiers' tour, I think -- where you hopped Steve Perry over rock formations and guided Neil Schon (sp?) up and down some weird cave without touching the side.
Wow. It's all coming back now.
Here:
e gory=14980&item=5718056425&rd=1
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&cat
You happy now? Cripes.
What's scary isn't the application itself -- it's the idea that a company can demand the list of purchasers.
WTF? They're going to go after people recording songs off the radio now?
Whoops:
. html
Linkified for clicking:
http://biz.yahoo.com/rc/040824/bizfeature_radio_1
There is. It's called TimeTrax. It records from the XMPCR. It works *wonderfully*.
_ 1. html
Problem? The RIAA is attempting to shut him down.
Info:
http://biz.yahoo.com/rc/040824/bizfeature_radio
Several folks have tried to submit this story to Slashdot, but, alas, it has been rejected.
Sadly, I find myself unable, in good conscience, to continue to use or recommend Creative products and will recommend against using or purchasing Creative products, as the patent tactics being used by Creative to maintain/increase revenue/marketshare are unacceptable to me.
How come when people try to write "business letters" they sound like stuffy guys in top hats?
Forget about trying to come up with 250+ syllables of "business-ese" for one basic sentimet. All this equates to a simple: "Fuck you, Creative."
And if the dingbat, Lexus-driving, Big Bertha golf buying, cheap Italian suits at Creative are too timid or too dainty to read "Fuck you, Creative" and figure out what it means, then fuck 'em. Two times.
Well, I'd call it the "Namby Pampon."
Of course, I'd probably shorten it to the "Pampon" if marketing insisted.
So, you really think you can decide on the merits of an argument just based on who partially funded the research?
Um. Yes.
And that's part of the point of Moore's film in the first place.
I'm going to do some more research on this, see if it's DRM'd, what movies they have on there. Kudos to Real for listening to customers!
It's protected by HELIX DRM (will google later for info on Helix).
I just subscribed today -- see my thread below -- but after downloading the Real 10 player, you go to the Starz video page, and you're asked to wait while Helix DRM is downloaded. It's tiny -- a couple seconds worth of downloading -- and you can immediately start downloading movies.
Folks here think the 'Buffering' joke is funny (it seems to be the most common comment here), but there's no buffering with this. You simply download the protected REAL video file. It defaults to be saved in your 'My Music' folder.
The films have to be watched in a couple weeks -- each one has an expiration date -- but apparently they can be watched as many times as you want -- and can even be watched offline.
My first download was 'Night of the Living Dead' (before folks pointed out that it was available for free anyway), but I also downloaded 'Welcome to Sarajevo'. Anyway, DotD was around 450 megs. (I had to leave before WtS started downloading, so I didn't catch the file size.)
I've got 6.0/768 DSL, so the download was really speedy. Took about 15 minutes to download. (It wasn't maxing out my connection.)
You can also schedule your downloads -- so if your bandwidth is a little more limited, your connection doesn't max out all of a sudden.
No streaming. Very painless, actually. Not a superb selection -- around 100 or so at the moment -- but there was a mix of stuff -- blockbusters, small films, etc. etc. I was hoping for a lot more recent stuff, but this is okay.
14 day free trial. Don't know yet if once my time is up, I'll start paying. It might be worth it to see some stuff that's currently in my Netflix queue -- especially flicks that I know aren't that great but that I'm curious about (i.e. guilty pleasures).
I gotta say, though: despite the limited selection, this is definitely the way to do it. I'm willing to put up with the DRM and the expiration dates if I'm able to snag stuff spur-of-the-moment -- especially, as I say, stuff I'm curious about but can't bring myself to put in my Netflix queue and go through the whole order-wait-watch-return cycle for Netflix (which is my case is about 3-4 days.)
Well, I signed up for the free trial and am downloading 'Night of the Living Dead' and 'Welcome to Sarajavo.'
Anyone know what the quality is? I notice that Night of the Living dead is around 450 megs or so. I realize it's black and white and not the greatest quality to begin with -- so I expect that to be small. But I'm curious if the newer films -- 'Punch Drunk Love' for example -- will have DD51 soundtracks. Doubt it. But we'll see.
I'm a obsessive movie-watcher, so this -- combined with Netflix for the more obscure stuff -- really interests me. And, yes, Real is evil, but I noticed that their newest player just installed with a minimum of fuss and intrusiveness. So maybe they're trying to redeem themselves.
Dunno. We'll see.
Frankly, I'll believe it when I see it. As much as I love my tivo -- and I've got both an SA and a DTivo -- it rankles me hear about this stuff and know that it's probably still six, eight, ten months away.
Just once, I'd like these places to make the announcment and then immediately have the functionality. I mean, didn't tivo three months ago announce something about XM radio and the ability to burn programs to DVD?
Where is it? Where's my XM radio on the tivo? Where's the software I can download to burn some stuff on DVD?
It's nowhere.
This isn't so much about announcing new technology as it is trying to regain (or hold) marketshare from the directv sell off. Tivo is admirable in that they have vision enough to make an endrun around both satellite and cable -- and assume (probably correctly) that *eventually* the internet will be the repository for most content.
But this ain't gonna happen anytime soon, that's for sure. And that bothers me. Enough already with the announcements and demos. Just put it out and let the market use it.
cripes.
Just fyi for those on the clock...
Yes. Thanks for catching that. I'd forgotten about their contest. Apologies. (The photos are still pretty interesting, though -- but, yes, it's NSFW.)
There's also the Holga -- sorta like an analog version of the camera phone. All plastic camera, a single aperture, uses 120 film. It's low-tech, but sometimes low-tech is good -- especially because it forces you to concentrate on the composition as opposed to all the bells and whistles.
Some cool sites:
www.toycamera.com
http://www.digitalsucks.com
http://www.eyecaramba.com
http://www.metaincognita.com (Disclaimer: this is some of my own stuff)
Beware, though: the Holga is controversial. People don't like it because the photos tend to look similar. I'll agree with that. They're similar -- but sometimes they're pretty interesting.
Come on, dude.
Enough with listing the most obscure stuff you can think of. I mean, I can play that game, too. I could tell you everything you listed is bullshit because the only record company out there that's releasing *important* music -- as opposed to pretentious indie music ("My band's more obscure than yours -- ergo, I understand more of what music really is.") -- is Fat Possum.
If you've heard T-Model Ford or Junior Kimbrough, then you've heard real American modern blues -- and not the pretentious crap played out across the prairie on 110 watt college radio stations. (And no, I'm not gonna launch into some pretentious rant about how fortunate I was to actually DJ at a couple of these college stations and how I tried -- really, really tried boo-hoo, boo-hoo, to make a difference in my listener's aural landscape by, you know, dude, mixing a little Montrose with Black Sabbath and then heading into the mellow-yellow middle ground with a little Joe Walsh playing slide guitar and then be-bop-a-loo-doo smoothing mah eve-in-ing out with a little funk from Mr. Funk Machine himself, George Clinton.
Whatever. I had maybe three listeners, two of whom were stoned and the other one was maybe twelve and probably making out with his sister's best friend and the radio just *happened* to be on in the background.
I could give a shit about indie music either. "CloudNine Records makes some of the best music you've never heard of."
Whatever. Didn't hear of it because it most likely appeals to a pretty limited audience, not because my tastes are limited or my brain is somehow defective because my chilly-willy is not as cool as your chilly-willy.
Here's a dime, pal. Call a wanker, talk about Heidegger, and pretend everyone else is stupid. If you want music, you're not gonna find it with a couple Mormon-turned-rock-singers doing a slow-fi version of 'Down by the River. Or a bunch of tools from the heartland who used to do punk but started listening to Hank Williams Sr. one night because their daddy's van ran out of gas on I-80 and they had nothing to do but sit in an Iowa corn patch, listen to Hank, and try to perfect their own honky-tonk warble.
There's enough taste to go around. La, la, la.
Um, no.
It's 'Boxi' -- second delclension plural as follows:
N: boxi
G: boxorum
D: boxis
Ac: boxum
Ab: boxis
Eunuch boxum Unix laudat.
("The eunuch praises Unix boxes.")
Something like that.
It's like a movie: teams of retroriggers with dusty snapcases and old computers descend upon sleek new media and crack it open with forbidden circuitboards from the 1990s.
No, the *end* of everything is when the old stuff is forbidden -- when the government decides to take Jack Valenti's advice (he hasn't given it yet, but he will -- before he retires) and ban all computer equipment made before 2004. Then the only people left are the retroriggers.
Look, if AOL is dumb enough to buy fish from someone like Frankel, they deserve what they get.
Microsoft bought my halibut, and I, for one, am happy as a clam.
Is that you Thomas Pynchon?
Damn.
What a crime. Woo needs to get back with CYF and make normal crime movies again. Someone oughta take away Woo's budget.
I'm surprised no one is mentioned that 100% uncrackable DRM: refusal to release.
If more record companies would simply *NOT RELEASE* music, there would be nothing to crack. In fact, I'd urge record companies to examine this carefully. Take Janet Jackson, for example. If they *refused to release* 'Damita Jo' -- or, better yet, refused to record it -- there would be nothing to crack, nothing to leak, and no filesharing problem.
The fact that record companies have recorded Damita Jo and actually released it indicates (to me, at least) that the record companies are as complicit in the problem as anyone else.
My two cents.
The interesting thing about all this -- and about MS's responses to the user "questions" in the document -- is that MS has convinced itself that MS Office is more than just a tool to facilitate writing. All this colloboration shit just makes me woozy.
I mean, MS goes off about OO's lack of database connectivity, lack of formatting, lack of Office compatibility -- but they (MS) don't acknowledge that for some of us, all we need is a tool that enables us to *write*.
I mean, there are writers writing out there who are not part of an "enterprise" and who do, in fact, operate in a vacuum (much as MS would like to pretend that this isn't -- or can't be -- the case.)
When I sit and write, I sit down in a quiet room for a long, long period of time. My computer runs, and I type. It's fucking simple. I don't need to spend $500 every other year to get software that does, essentially, the same thing.