Google Hot Trends can be a thoroughly depressing page. Unfortunately, Google insist on only having the Hot Trends for the USA, which is doubly depressing as there is no comparison with other countries. Celebrities, sport and stupidity seem to be its main staple. Admittedly, this only shows sudden bursts of interest outside of the normal fare of sex and money, health and celebrities, sport and stupidity. Today's menu includes multiple helpings of golf; a game designed to dislocate various joints in the body when a stroll in the park would be more pleasurable.
The only thing that caught my eye today was "it’s okay. i wouldn’t remember me either." The way the results are organised means it is impossible to tell what people were actually searching for. No, one doesn't have to be a psychic as Google has the data of what these explorers actually clicked.
Not really rich in keywords, but two entries stood out. One was a wannabe starlet MySpace profile - it's OK (or okay), you can click it and be her friend. The other was a line from American Beauty, which I then figured is where everybody else got the quote from.
For Hollywood, American Beauty was a good film. Kevin Spacey was perfect as the seemingly mild-mannered suburban drone who was thrown off the up-escalator and realised that his life really sucked. However, the moral of the film must be that anybody who bucks the system has to pay a price. They just couldn't have Lester Burnham ride off in his 1970 Pontiac Firebird waving one finger at his wife - there are probably far too many Lesters who'd take the cue. Instead, he has to suffer for his short spell of freedom. In the end, nobody really learns anything as tragedy scythes the film to a close. The suburbs may be rotten but a fresh lick of paint should suffice to hide all the cracks.
Showing posts with label Entertainment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Entertainment. Show all posts
Interview with Forbidden Science Creator: Do Clones Have More Fun?
Forbidden Science is a sexy, late-night series somewhat like a low budget mashup of Flash Gordon campiness and contemporary posthuman scifi. Julia, the clone of a dead woman, searches for her place in a world where you can inherit somebody's identity and memories, but not their property. A sex droid named Max is abused by his demanding owner. And Bethany, a new hire at mysterious clone and android development company 4Ever Innovations, is more than a little disturbed by some her company's secret projects. Meanwhile, chief geek Penny keeps trying to invent the ultimate sexbot (erm... what's the point when there are flesh-and-blood clones?)
This is an interview with Doug Brode, creator of Forbidden Science, currently showing on Cinemax.
This is an interview with Doug Brode, creator of Forbidden Science, currently showing on Cinemax.
My Life is Meaningless Says Shia LaBeouf
This is a refreshingly candid point of view from Shia LaBeouf, 22-year old star of "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen." he has money, he has fame, his parents love him, but deep inside is a little voice that tells him it's all a fluke.
"Most actors on most days don’t think they’re worthy. I have no idea where this insecurity comes from, but it’s a God-sized hole. If I knew, I’d fill it, and I’d be on my way." Well, it's obvious why actors are insecure - they crave recognition but sadly they get it by being someone else. Insecurity is an actor's number one best buddy; after all, people watch you for being someone you're not. Don't give up the day job as you'll miss the money, but just do something else on the side, then fans will love you for yourself. Jeez, that was hard!
“Actors are dependent on being validated by other people’s opinions. I don’t understand what it is I do that people want. [...] I don’t know what I’m doing. To my mind, talent doesn’t really exist. Talent is like a card player’s luck. It is motivation, ambition, and luck. I think acting is a con game.”
Hey, I like this guy! Who is he?
"Most actors on most days don’t think they’re worthy. I have no idea where this insecurity comes from, but it’s a God-sized hole. If I knew, I’d fill it, and I’d be on my way." Well, it's obvious why actors are insecure - they crave recognition but sadly they get it by being someone else. Insecurity is an actor's number one best buddy; after all, people watch you for being someone you're not. Don't give up the day job as you'll miss the money, but just do something else on the side, then fans will love you for yourself. Jeez, that was hard!
“Actors are dependent on being validated by other people’s opinions. I don’t understand what it is I do that people want. [...] I don’t know what I’m doing. To my mind, talent doesn’t really exist. Talent is like a card player’s luck. It is motivation, ambition, and luck. I think acting is a con game.”
Hey, I like this guy! Who is he?
Edgar Allen Poe 3D Film - The Fall of the House of Usher
Indie company Green Knight Ventures will be producing a remake of Edgar Allan Poe’s ‘The Fall Of The House Of Usher’ according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Published in 1839, this gothic short story centres on the crumbling spirit of Roderick Usher as he is haunted by the burial of his sister, only to succumb to his worst nightmare.
The working title of the film is 'The Ushers'. The Ushers? What possessed them to change a famous title? Is this a film about an escort or usherette? Or is it going to be turned into the Munsters? Let's wait and see if this project ever sees the light of day or gets buried alive.
In the meantime, you can always read The Fall of the House of Usher at poestories.com.
Published in 1839, this gothic short story centres on the crumbling spirit of Roderick Usher as he is haunted by the burial of his sister, only to succumb to his worst nightmare.
The working title of the film is 'The Ushers'. The Ushers? What possessed them to change a famous title? Is this a film about an escort or usherette? Or is it going to be turned into the Munsters? Let's wait and see if this project ever sees the light of day or gets buried alive.
In the meantime, you can always read The Fall of the House of Usher at poestories.com.
Crap Names For Pubs
OK, you're bored, you're tired, you've had a hard day at work, or a hard night's sleep. What you want is some mindless amusement that still tickles a few braincells. Well, join the wags at Twitter to come up with some really crap names for pubs.
In the UK there is this trend for corporate pubs to come up with ever-more stupid names for their drinking dens.
The whole thing may indeed be funnier if you already have a bottle of your favourite tipple open. Cheers!
In the UK there is this trend for corporate pubs to come up with ever-more stupid names for their drinking dens.
The whole thing may indeed be funnier if you already have a bottle of your favourite tipple open. Cheers!
Happy Star Wars Day! May The Fourth Be With You!
May the 4th is Star Wars Day.
Was the first Star Wars film released on 4 May 1977? Nope! The whole thing is one big joke based on a pun. The first film was actually released on 25 May 1977 and, believe it or not, the Los Angeles City Council declared this day in 2007 as Star Wars Day, thereby ruining the joke. But a good joke is hard to kill, and any excuse to replay the whole Star Wars saga.
May The Force Be With You!
There are supposed to be events marking this slightly tongue-in-cheek celebration - if you know of any then let us know. The alternative is to invite a few friends round and enjoy those DVDs!
Downloaders of Free Music Are Also the Most Likely to Pay Too
This bit of news is no news at all if one looks all the way back to vinyl records. The people most likely to download from free P2P services are also the very same people most likely to pay for new music. People who enjoy music... enjoy music! People will pay for what they feel is worth paying.
I can remember the days of vinyl records and cassette tapes. Friends would each buy a record and then make copies for each other. The simple fact is that we couldn't individually afford to buy the whole collection. Without the tapes we would probably each have the same number of records. Both mediums were lossy, in that records got scratched and tape quality deteriorated over time. Those same people paid to upgrade to CD when they became available - Dark Side of the Moon being the most famous example. Now those same people have the same music downloaded to their MP3 player. How many times must one pay for the same song?
The research now says exactly the same thing as it did back in those analogue days. Music lovers will have a mixture of paid and copied content. Remove the copied content and they will not necessarily pay for it. The real problem globally is in those countries where apparently genuine products are actually themselves copies. But why go for the real targets when music corporations can try to make individuals feel like criminals?
And by doing so they alienate their fans even further. Music lovers enjoy the music, they don't really care what the record label is. There is further research showing that online sales are growing especially in the direct channels with musicians and fans enjoying a closer relationship and therefore bypassing the music industry channels.
As technology increases the distribution of the creative arts so corporations always try to grab back control to further their profits. Nobody will remember this, but there was a time when there was no recorded music - everything was live, or silence ruled. Enjoy the music!
I can remember the days of vinyl records and cassette tapes. Friends would each buy a record and then make copies for each other. The simple fact is that we couldn't individually afford to buy the whole collection. Without the tapes we would probably each have the same number of records. Both mediums were lossy, in that records got scratched and tape quality deteriorated over time. Those same people paid to upgrade to CD when they became available - Dark Side of the Moon being the most famous example. Now those same people have the same music downloaded to their MP3 player. How many times must one pay for the same song?
The research now says exactly the same thing as it did back in those analogue days. Music lovers will have a mixture of paid and copied content. Remove the copied content and they will not necessarily pay for it. The real problem globally is in those countries where apparently genuine products are actually themselves copies. But why go for the real targets when music corporations can try to make individuals feel like criminals?
And by doing so they alienate their fans even further. Music lovers enjoy the music, they don't really care what the record label is. There is further research showing that online sales are growing especially in the direct channels with musicians and fans enjoying a closer relationship and therefore bypassing the music industry channels.
As technology increases the distribution of the creative arts so corporations always try to grab back control to further their profits. Nobody will remember this, but there was a time when there was no recorded music - everything was live, or silence ruled. Enjoy the music!
YouTube Goes RealTime - Get an Invitation and Share Videos Live
YouTube has a new real-time product that adds an extra social layer to YouTube, allowing friends to share the videos they’re watching with each other in real time, without having to turn to outside chat programs or Twitter.
Before now, there was no particularly good reason to create friends on YouTube apart from subscribing to new uploads from a user whose videos you liked. The viral marketing of YouTube videos generally took place off-site through instant messaging, Twitter and social bookmarking websites. All that has now changed.
RealTime appears as a toolbar at the bottom of every YouTube page. The Online Friends tab shows which videos your friends are currently watching. It also allows you to send an invitation to come and watch the video you are currently watching. This invitation will pop up on their screen - and this feature can be turned off if annoying - thereby allowing instant sharing of videos.
RealTime is still in public beta and YouTube are using an invitation system, similar to the early days of Gmail, to spread the word. Every user to get invited gets 25 invites of their own. This means that as of now you'll need to beg for an invitation! This seems a strange marketing method but, on second thoughts, I wonder if this is also a way to test the system as it grows exponentially.
So... if you have a spare invite please post it below or, perhaps easier, if you want an invite just post your YouTube username and beg! :-)
Before now, there was no particularly good reason to create friends on YouTube apart from subscribing to new uploads from a user whose videos you liked. The viral marketing of YouTube videos generally took place off-site through instant messaging, Twitter and social bookmarking websites. All that has now changed.
RealTime appears as a toolbar at the bottom of every YouTube page. The Online Friends tab shows which videos your friends are currently watching. It also allows you to send an invitation to come and watch the video you are currently watching. This invitation will pop up on their screen - and this feature can be turned off if annoying - thereby allowing instant sharing of videos.
RealTime is still in public beta and YouTube are using an invitation system, similar to the early days of Gmail, to spread the word. Every user to get invited gets 25 invites of their own. This means that as of now you'll need to beg for an invitation! This seems a strange marketing method but, on second thoughts, I wonder if this is also a way to test the system as it grows exponentially.
So... if you have a spare invite please post it below or, perhaps easier, if you want an invite just post your YouTube username and beg! :-)
The Pirate Bay Found Guilty
The four co-founders of website The Pirate Bay have been found guilty of assisting the distribution of illegal content online by a Swedish court today and have been sentenced to a year in jail and a $3.6m (£2.4m) fine.
"Stay calm – nothing will happen to TPB, us personally or filesharing what so ever. This is just a theatre for the media," said one of the founders. They all plan to appeal. This seems like the kind of verdict where everyone claims some kind of victory and yet nobody is entirely happy.
Thing is, can't the charge of "assisting making available copyrighted content" be levelled at search engines too? What about Usenet? Anyway, with servers in Russia it is unlikely the corporate media will try a similar trial there. They actually held a party in Moscow to "celebrate". Why were they celebrating?
A nice timeline of the whole Pirate bay trial is here at Dipity.
Ashton Kutcher Overtakes CNN on Twitter
A marketing dream for Twitter, for Ashton Kutcher and, almost by accident, for CNN. With prizes now on offer to the millionth follower of either Kutcher or CNN, what was a genuine phenomenon has been turned into a manufactured competition. Thing is, one cannot now unfollow either of them.
This last aspect just illustrates how artificial the race has become. Many commenters at TechCrunch seem to think this is a good idea and that by not allowing users to unfollow these Twitts it avoids a mad frenzy of people quickly following and unfollowing in the desperate hope of being that one millionth follower. But this is completely dumb! All that will happen - and most probably already is - is that people will create multiple user accounts and follow both with each new account. Watch the followers plummet after the competition is over.
Surely Twitter's database is not so fragile that they can't figure out the millionth user from a simple query, even if people follow and unfollow quickly? It smells to me like a way to speed up reaching the million mark before people get bored. Twitter might have a problem counting up to a million as one screenshot shows CNN already having 1,963,482 followers, which one assumes is a million too many but also highlights a counting issue.
Why is Ashton Kutcher so popular? Yeah, I looked up who he is in the vain hope of an interesting celebrity. I guess one moral lesson is to use your psychological problems to make a career in the media rather than in prison.
This last aspect just illustrates how artificial the race has become. Many commenters at TechCrunch seem to think this is a good idea and that by not allowing users to unfollow these Twitts it avoids a mad frenzy of people quickly following and unfollowing in the desperate hope of being that one millionth follower. But this is completely dumb! All that will happen - and most probably already is - is that people will create multiple user accounts and follow both with each new account. Watch the followers plummet after the competition is over.
Surely Twitter's database is not so fragile that they can't figure out the millionth user from a simple query, even if people follow and unfollow quickly? It smells to me like a way to speed up reaching the million mark before people get bored. Twitter might have a problem counting up to a million as one screenshot shows CNN already having 1,963,482 followers, which one assumes is a million too many but also highlights a counting issue.
Why is Ashton Kutcher so popular? Yeah, I looked up who he is in the vain hope of an interesting celebrity. I guess one moral lesson is to use your psychological problems to make a career in the media rather than in prison.
Which Films Are Better Second Time Around?
Xan Brooks, a film blogger on The Guardian, has asked this same question a second time around, perhaps trying to achieve some fractal structure, or more likely just forgot. Anyway, it remains an interesting enough topic that it can be recycled ad nauseam.
My first real problem here, however, is why would anybody watch a film a second time if they didn't like it on first viewing? So the chances of this happening are serendipitous at best; perhaps a friend or partner wants to watch it and you don't have the conviction to pick something else, or possibly it's on TV and the remote control has gone AWOL. Whatever the reason, I suspect this scenario is fairly rare. Having said that, its rarity value may well make such events more memorable. Watching a film with someone who is enjoying it may shine a new light on it... or on your friend. So which films come out better after a second viewing?
The above blog has a lot of votes for Starship Troopers, which I can relate to. The film's satirical undercurrent often gets blasted away by action scenes, not unlike Robocop and Total Recall - all of them by Paul Verhoeven. Films are often sold as something that they are not, thereby misdirecting one's expectations. Once the disappointment evaporates then perhaps one can re-view the film without the marketing lenses.
I tend to avoid big budget, over-hyped films with a linear storyline as I just expect them to be puffed up like candy floss and bad for my teeth. Indeed the three Star Wars prequels come into this category. I grew up with the first three so telling us how it all began is just a very long and dull journey into the obvious. I later decided to give up on the thin story and to just enjoy the special effects. The Lord of the Rings trilogy is similar in that the crust has been cut off the plot and then filled with long tedious battle scenes - what happened to the relationship between the two magicians? These films seem to make more sense watching them with children, so assume that was the target audience. In contrast, the Harry Potter films have just enough wit and cleverness to keep the adults awake.
I didn't say this was going to be easy! But which films have you grown to appreciate after hating them on first viewing?
My first real problem here, however, is why would anybody watch a film a second time if they didn't like it on first viewing? So the chances of this happening are serendipitous at best; perhaps a friend or partner wants to watch it and you don't have the conviction to pick something else, or possibly it's on TV and the remote control has gone AWOL. Whatever the reason, I suspect this scenario is fairly rare. Having said that, its rarity value may well make such events more memorable. Watching a film with someone who is enjoying it may shine a new light on it... or on your friend. So which films come out better after a second viewing?
The above blog has a lot of votes for Starship Troopers, which I can relate to. The film's satirical undercurrent often gets blasted away by action scenes, not unlike Robocop and Total Recall - all of them by Paul Verhoeven. Films are often sold as something that they are not, thereby misdirecting one's expectations. Once the disappointment evaporates then perhaps one can re-view the film without the marketing lenses.
I tend to avoid big budget, over-hyped films with a linear storyline as I just expect them to be puffed up like candy floss and bad for my teeth. Indeed the three Star Wars prequels come into this category. I grew up with the first three so telling us how it all began is just a very long and dull journey into the obvious. I later decided to give up on the thin story and to just enjoy the special effects. The Lord of the Rings trilogy is similar in that the crust has been cut off the plot and then filled with long tedious battle scenes - what happened to the relationship between the two magicians? These films seem to make more sense watching them with children, so assume that was the target audience. In contrast, the Harry Potter films have just enough wit and cleverness to keep the adults awake.
I didn't say this was going to be easy! But which films have you grown to appreciate after hating them on first viewing?
NASA to Launch New Module Name on Comedy Show
NASA is to officially name its new node for the International Space Station on Comedy Central's The Colbert Report, being screened later tonight in the US. Over a million people voted, with the whole marketing effort gaining momentum after being featured on Stephen Colbert's show.
NASA's own preferred name was "Serenity" but this has been relegated to the foothills of second place. NASA astronaut Sunita Williams is appearing on Stephen Colbert's show tonight to announce the new name. Some uncharitable souls have speculated that the new ISS module's toilet might be named after Colbert. "I certainly hope NASA does the right thing," said Colbert. "Just kidding, I hope they name it after me."
A marketing success for NASA and a marketing coup for Comedy Central. That's what it takes to push science into the celebrity market. Perhaps next time they should auction the name and sell advertising space on the module. Will the astronauts Twitter from space?
NASA's own preferred name was "Serenity" but this has been relegated to the foothills of second place. NASA astronaut Sunita Williams is appearing on Stephen Colbert's show tonight to announce the new name. Some uncharitable souls have speculated that the new ISS module's toilet might be named after Colbert. "I certainly hope NASA does the right thing," said Colbert. "Just kidding, I hope they name it after me."
A marketing success for NASA and a marketing coup for Comedy Central. That's what it takes to push science into the celebrity market. Perhaps next time they should auction the name and sell advertising space on the module. Will the astronauts Twitter from space?
Celebrity Pseudo-Science Exposed... kinda!
"Behold, the most serious challenge to the Royal Society in that august body's 350-year history - the medical musings of Madonna, Gwyneth Paltrow and Stella McCartney. These women are not just singers, or actresses, or fashion designers. They are distinguished professors at the University of Celebrity, and are coating your understanding of science like a totally amazing organic body oil.
On top of this, they are best friends, so we can say their pronouncements are peer-reviewed in the best sense of that term. Can you imagine their gatherings? It must be as if Isaac Newton were taking antioxidant tea with Robert Koch and Marie Curie." Strident stuff from Marina Hyde.
OK, we've got the picture, now where's the organic meat on the bone? Madonna's Kabbalah water... yep, that's flakey! "And then there's Stella, who launched her organic skincare range with the warning that "lots of skin products use the same petrochemicals as the antifreeze in your car!", and is one of those celebrities who thinks they eat "chemical-free" food and use "chemical-free" products. I beg you not to tell her that water and trees are made of chemicals. The shock could finish her off." Here Marina Hyde is on shakier ground. Surely anybody but the purest pedant knows that "chemicals" here stands as a short-hand for synthetic and most likely toxic chemicals. Yes, everything is made up of chemicals, it's just that some of them are not very good for human beings.
So what's Gwyneth Paltrow's crime? Well, her concern is, yet again, those nasty chemicals and the inability for young children and foetuses to metabolise them. "The research is troubling; the incidence of diseases in children such as asthma, cancer and autism have shot up exponentially ..." Hyde yet again shoots down our celeb by stating that "there has been very little change in the rate of childhood cancers detected in recent years". How "recent" is that then Professor Hyde? So the impression given is that we shouldn't worry ourselves about the environment being polluted to the point that it is unfit for human habitation. After all, our scientists are doing a jolly good job looking after us, so these celebs should just get back into character and stop impersonating science writers.
Science Punk also quotes the above story but adds that Kelly Osbourne believes that microwave ovens cause cancer. How we laugh at such superstitious nonsense! Except that the Soviet Union banned the sale of domestic microwave ovens because of their carcinogenic effects. Once the FSU turned capitalist they dropped the ban as sales are more important than health.
What strikes me is that most of these celebs are unable to properly articulate any science that they may have learnt and so it comes out as opinionated ramblings. Most of their concerns have legitimate scientific research to back them up - apart from Madonna, who is just morphing into a new species. That they may not always be mainstream views shows the power of corporate science rather than that those concerns are unfounded.
also posted at A World Beyond Belief.
On top of this, they are best friends, so we can say their pronouncements are peer-reviewed in the best sense of that term. Can you imagine their gatherings? It must be as if Isaac Newton were taking antioxidant tea with Robert Koch and Marie Curie." Strident stuff from Marina Hyde.
OK, we've got the picture, now where's the organic meat on the bone? Madonna's Kabbalah water... yep, that's flakey! "And then there's Stella, who launched her organic skincare range with the warning that "lots of skin products use the same petrochemicals as the antifreeze in your car!", and is one of those celebrities who thinks they eat "chemical-free" food and use "chemical-free" products. I beg you not to tell her that water and trees are made of chemicals. The shock could finish her off." Here Marina Hyde is on shakier ground. Surely anybody but the purest pedant knows that "chemicals" here stands as a short-hand for synthetic and most likely toxic chemicals. Yes, everything is made up of chemicals, it's just that some of them are not very good for human beings.
So what's Gwyneth Paltrow's crime? Well, her concern is, yet again, those nasty chemicals and the inability for young children and foetuses to metabolise them. "The research is troubling; the incidence of diseases in children such as asthma, cancer and autism have shot up exponentially ..." Hyde yet again shoots down our celeb by stating that "there has been very little change in the rate of childhood cancers detected in recent years". How "recent" is that then Professor Hyde? So the impression given is that we shouldn't worry ourselves about the environment being polluted to the point that it is unfit for human habitation. After all, our scientists are doing a jolly good job looking after us, so these celebs should just get back into character and stop impersonating science writers.
Science Punk also quotes the above story but adds that Kelly Osbourne believes that microwave ovens cause cancer. How we laugh at such superstitious nonsense! Except that the Soviet Union banned the sale of domestic microwave ovens because of their carcinogenic effects. Once the FSU turned capitalist they dropped the ban as sales are more important than health.
What strikes me is that most of these celebs are unable to properly articulate any science that they may have learnt and so it comes out as opinionated ramblings. Most of their concerns have legitimate scientific research to back them up - apart from Madonna, who is just morphing into a new species. That they may not always be mainstream views shows the power of corporate science rather than that those concerns are unfounded.
also posted at A World Beyond Belief.
Kutner Suicide Sparks House Search
Nothing like a suicide to get tongues wagging and fingers tapping as the American portion of the internet seems to have erupted in a frenzy of speculation about the death a TV character. Lawrence Kutner (played by Kal Penn) committed suicide in tonight's episode of House, the immensely popular medical series starring Hugh Laurie as the sarcastic and brilliant doctor.
Good news for the producing network, Fox, but are plot stunts the best way to give oxygen to a series running out of puff? I like House. I've watched it since it was first aired in the UK. An inspired, and rare, character for mainstream television with all the flaws and successes of an eccentric genius inflicted upon patients who expect a tranquillizing bedside manner. But is it just me, or has the writing been going downhill for a long time? Stealing the format of The Apprentice felt lame and I looked forward to fast-forwarding all those obvious competitive clichés. The Apprentice itself works on a voyeuristic level because they are real people. The same format in a scripted series smells like writers without a clue.
Since then we have been subjected to a confusion of characters. House's old team has not left but breeze in and out like ghosts, meaning that the new team has not had a chance to lay claim to their characters. The question being dangled in front of the audience is whether the previous team would return, but isn't this just too obvious? We know Robert Chase, Allison Cameron and Eric Foreman; give the others a chance. Instead we're inflicted with Foreman hanging around like nemesis. House has a living team and a shadow team - perhaps a psychoanalytic metaphor but I don't think it works.
When you get the chance, have a look again at the first series. The writing was generally strong and the use of hallucinations, dreams and fantasies to manufacture faux suspense was not needed. Bring back some of the original writers like John Mankiewicz, or get the current writers to watch again why the series became a hit.
Should Downloaded Music Be Free?
I saw this little article on TechCrunch, and then clicked on a link to a BBC article, and then, well... Google is offering free downloads of licensed music tracks in China. Of all the places in the world, China! This is because the biggest search engine in China, Baidu, also offers links to free downloads and that 99% of all tracks distributed in China are unlicensed. The market value of China's legitimate music sales is a pathetic $76 million. Yes, millions, not billions!
So, are you still feeling guilty for downloading those music tracks from your favourite P2P file sharing platform? The days of paying for recorded music may be numbered. Google will share advertising revenue with those record labels that are partnering this programme, with some 350,000 tracks available. However,"Google said it had no plans to expand its music service beyond China." So, if you live in a part of the world where most music, and video, is copied and redistributed then you get rewarded for this by having the producers give it away for free anyway. If, on the other hand, you live in a country where you are told that it is immoral to copy material then you will just have to keep paying for it. Market capitalism is fantastic, isn't it?!
So, the question remains, not whether it is legal or not to copy and share files but whether you still feel... well... that it's somehow wrong! But even the record labels have given up on this argument, so why feel guilty when everyone has thousands of tracks on their computer? Also, with so much streamed music you can listen to what you want when you want so long as you have a decent broadband connection, and all for free (apart from the connection charge).
Let's look at it another way. Before recording media were available musicians made a living from playing live. That's all they could do. Some actually made money from their copyright on songs printed as sheet music so that other people could play the same tunes. Apart from that, it was either live, or you lived with silence.
Once music could be recorded as easily as printing a book then musicians suddenly became very rich. They just needed to record one song and have millions of copies made and they earnt money on every copy. Now, is one song worth millions of pounds? How many times would an artist have to play that same song live to earn the same million pounds? I'm not denying them the money, I just want to show that what was a live entertainment business had become a recorded entertainment business through technology, and that now the march of technology may well mean that it goes back to being a live entertainment business.
All of which means that we the consumers should also adjust our moral standpoint. Music means live music, with all the human interaction that comes with it. Recorded music is just what it is, an advertisement to get you to a live event. Enjoy the concert and enjoy the free music files.
So, are you still feeling guilty for downloading those music tracks from your favourite P2P file sharing platform? The days of paying for recorded music may be numbered. Google will share advertising revenue with those record labels that are partnering this programme, with some 350,000 tracks available. However,"Google said it had no plans to expand its music service beyond China." So, if you live in a part of the world where most music, and video, is copied and redistributed then you get rewarded for this by having the producers give it away for free anyway. If, on the other hand, you live in a country where you are told that it is immoral to copy material then you will just have to keep paying for it. Market capitalism is fantastic, isn't it?!
So, the question remains, not whether it is legal or not to copy and share files but whether you still feel... well... that it's somehow wrong! But even the record labels have given up on this argument, so why feel guilty when everyone has thousands of tracks on their computer? Also, with so much streamed music you can listen to what you want when you want so long as you have a decent broadband connection, and all for free (apart from the connection charge).
Let's look at it another way. Before recording media were available musicians made a living from playing live. That's all they could do. Some actually made money from their copyright on songs printed as sheet music so that other people could play the same tunes. Apart from that, it was either live, or you lived with silence.
Once music could be recorded as easily as printing a book then musicians suddenly became very rich. They just needed to record one song and have millions of copies made and they earnt money on every copy. Now, is one song worth millions of pounds? How many times would an artist have to play that same song live to earn the same million pounds? I'm not denying them the money, I just want to show that what was a live entertainment business had become a recorded entertainment business through technology, and that now the march of technology may well mean that it goes back to being a live entertainment business.
All of which means that we the consumers should also adjust our moral standpoint. Music means live music, with all the human interaction that comes with it. Recorded music is just what it is, an advertisement to get you to a live event. Enjoy the concert and enjoy the free music files.
Miss Universe has fun at Guantanamo Bay
For Miss Universe, the Venezuelan Dayana Mendoza, this surely must have been one of her more surreal engagements. Accompanied by her friend, Miss USA, the two sponsor girls paid a visit to the most notorious illegal detention centre in the world: Guantanamo Bay.
Now this doesn't sound like the kind of place to show off their swimwear or their love of animals, however, visions of the Playboy scene in Apocalypse Now duly vanished as Mendoza gushes,"We also met the military dogs, and they did a very nice demonstration of their skills."
"We visited the detainees' camps and we saw the jails, where they shower, how the[y] recreate themselves with movies, classes of art, books. It was very interesting." reports The Register.
Yes, she's 22 years old (and not 12) but, frankly, how many good things can a girl say about an interrogation centre. Mendoza also marvelled at the spectacular beach, perhaps forgetting that this is, after all, Cuba. They don't seem to have come face to face with any of the inmates as they were probably too busy "recreating themselves".
The joys of fame - but what was the point?
Well, the Miss Universe Organization is a Limited Partnership between Donald J. Trump and NBC Universal (itself owned by General Electric).
"The titleholders of the Miss Universe Organization personify the combination of beauty and intelligence that defines the 21st Century. In keeping with its global view and position as creator of role models, the Miss Universe Organization has a new corporate structure and enhanced corporate goals." And, of course,"These women are savvy, goal-oriented and aware." OK, this is starting to make sense: you too can look like Miss Mendoza if you would only just read more books.
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