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This ia brilliant video of Stephen Fry discussing technology and how it has affected culture. A recommended 12 minutes.
28 Wednesday Oct 2009
Posted Technology
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This ia brilliant video of Stephen Fry discussing technology and how it has affected culture. A recommended 12 minutes.
28 Wednesday Oct 2009
Posted Music, Technology
inDespite a lot of opposition is looks like the current government are going to force the 3 strikes and your connection is cut off approach as an attempt to cut down piracy (more details at the NME). With ISPs reporting that the process is very difficult and costly to implement I can several scenarios playing out of a lot of incorrect cut offs, service pricesses increasing and/or service quality dropping as ISPs try to claw back the investment (and reduced revenue as they can’t earn from a cut off service).
Aside from what happens with ISPs I think the process is likely to stiffle media development, consider how the Arctic Monkey’s got going – a lot of buzz generated by allowing people to download live performances, and who easy that will be to mixup with illegal material. Those who are intent on sharing will find means to defeat the ISP checks – more sophisticated file hiding etc. The fact that technology will always run faster than legislation has been missed. What the industry needs to wake up to is to make it more attractive to people to pay for music. This doesn’t mean bigger and heavier prouncements about piracy, look at the anti taping campaigns of the 70s and 80s to see what that did, or didn’t do.
Fortunately a few artists have started to try and develop their approach such as the Nine Inch Nails. The record industry shoul look to develop the ‘long tail’ by supporting more smaller artists as the proportion of copyright theft drops as you move down the tail. So rather than pooring millions into a big ad campaign for one artist, whos ‘product’ is then panned by a fickle audience (to be a little more blunt – a poor quality product trying to cash in on a fad or fashion), costing lots and resulting in labels simply blaming piracy for dumb thinking.
We’ll see what happens in July 2011. I hope to be proven wrong, but I suspect it will all endup being a repeat of RIAA mess, and we’ll see court battles about being denied people’s inealiable right to surf the web etc.
27 Tuesday Oct 2009
Posted Music
inAs a sweetner to get people to sign up to the immenent face lift of the official Faithless website there is a free download song (all part of the promo machine for the forthcoming new album). The song is called Sun To Me. As a track the lyrics are pretty weak; but musically this a real club/gig number that will have the place bouncing like a bunch of nutters in the same way as God Is a DJ does (yes I’ve been to a few Faithless gigs). All of which looks promising for the new album. But what is also really cool is that as there isn’t an official video to go with the track a fan has created one, which has been picked up by the blog Arjan Writes. The video is in some ways rather reminicent of I Want More.
Fingers crossed of a top album, and another tour.
26 Monday Oct 2009
Posted Music
inTags
album, Amazon, cd, Dear Lover, download, iTunes, matthew ryan, Music
Matthew Ryan has a new album out called Dear Lover, if you cant wait then the digital release is available from now from Amazon, iTunes and via his own website here. I what suggested that if you want an old fashioned CD then you would have to wait until next year. But the latest check on the website is saying ordering from the website and you’ll get it as quickly as the US Postal service can deliver it.
26 Monday Oct 2009
Posted Music
inAs many are currently doing, DJ Shadow has just released a deluxe edition of their classic Psyence Fiction album. The special edition is available through DJ shadow’s site here. In addition to download version, he has followed Radiohead with the exclusive special pack of CDs, t-shirts etc – although they’ve already sold out. Atleast DJ Shadow isn’t just trying to extract money from old rope, he is also regularly releasing live performance recordings and remixes as well. Although I’ve yet to try such a recording (I didn’t enjoy the last studio work) his last live CD was a brilliant piece of work. The album includes brilliant vocal performances from Thom York and Richard Ashcroft.
21 Wednesday Oct 2009
Posted General
inThe Prodigy are giving away a free download of a remix of the title track of their recent album ‘Invaders Must Die’ from their official website, Theprodigy.com. The free download will be availbe until the 28th Octber – so get in there quickly.
19 Monday Oct 2009
Posted Music
in16 Friday Oct 2009
Posted Music
inMoby seems to have a sussed the nice balance between record label managed websites for artists which tend towards the dull with just announcements for releases and tours, or the other extreme where artists blog about every little detail of life in the studio. not to mention there is the regular sweetener of free tracks. The latest being a remix of ‘One time We lived’ which can be found via Moby’s site here.
In addition to the remix, NPR (US National Public Radio) have got a full Moby gig that can streamed or downloaded here.
12 Monday Oct 2009
Posted Music
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