The Music Industry Killed Itself

The current trial underway in Sweden is important to all consumers, especially those of us who are of the nerd persuasion. The outcome may decide how media is distributed and how much hold the music industry still has on your entertainment dollar (spoiler: not much).

The music industry, in particular the terrorist organization known as the RIAA, has been whining for years that piracy is stealing precious dollars from their coffers. Even when presented with clear statistics that file sharers purchase more music and media, they turn up their noses and turn the screws.

But as a recent article from Torrent Freak explains very clearly, the music industry killed itself. To quote the simple and elegant logic:

The fact is that the music industry’s revenues have been artificially inflated for decades because of limited consumer options. The last 15 years of innovation have lifted those limitations, effectively leaving the music industry with an obsolete, defective business model of monopolized production technology, forced album bundling, and almost nonexistent competition in the realm of home entertainment. What is happening now - the decline of music profits and the piracy witch hunt by the music industry - is merely the panicked struggle of a dying business model, a complacent industry’s refusal to accept its diminishing role in a digital world. The pirates are not the reason, and the decline is the not the disease. It is the cure.

We have been spending our heard-earned dollars elsewhere: computers, gaming consoles, MP3 downloads. The music industry refused to budge from their business model of CD unit sales, which were astronomically priced for years. Now they are suffering as a result of their stubbornness and trying to find scapegoats in innocent people in desperation.

What can you do? Support efforts to fight DRM, support digital freedom, and be a good guy.

I Told You So

Did I tell you? Yes, I told you.

The Blackberry Storm sucks, despite their best efforts, which also sucked. (You're trying to take on the iPhone? Everyone else failed: why are you different?) Users can't make calls, and they couldn't even figure out to do anything else. Consumers are returning them in droves.

Now, RIM's Blackberry Bold is having problems. The production process was held up by testing errors, and the thing gets hotter than an old laptop battery.

This happens a lot in consumer goods, a la Mercedes and Palm: a product gets popular, models are rushed to market, and quality takes a nose dive.

Please go back to making cheap phones that are best suited as freebies for signing up with providers. The iPhone is the new king; you're just a wannabe serf.

What Not to Sell in a Recession

Ralph's has high hopes, apparently.

The Sound of (Expensive) Silence

This is important, people.

Fantastic and necessary sites such as Pandora, SoMa FM and others are in dire peril of being shut down due to those greedy bastards at the RIAA and other music industry "advocates" (read: thugs). Instead of finding a reasonable way for small internet broadcasters to pay for broadcasting songs, these modern-day protection gangsters are trying to make them pay through the nose.

Bandwidth ain't cheap, and those costs alone can close down some smaller stations. But asking for 0.19 cents per song per listener is piracy on the airwaves. Thousands of listeners can shut it all down; millions will make it go away forever. Why should terrestrial, big-ticket, commercial radio stations be the only ones to play music, and bad music at that? The best music is being made available via small 'net broadcasters who care about their listeners and won't change formats to make a dollar, betraying their audience in the process.

We could get into a discussion on the statute of limitations for copyrights, et al, but I shan't. Read the clear article from The New York Times and see what the fuss is about.

So True

I'll just link to this gem from The Onion, since it's so freakin' funny, but no photo. It creeps me out.

Monkeys in Pants

Today is a perfect time to reflect on the discoveries of Charles Darwin: it's his birthday.

Darwin changed the world by realizing that the gradual slope of natural selection is the process through which all things furry, scaly and otherwise adapt and grow… or whither and die. Magic thinking or “intelligent design” is out of the question: it is not science, and it is not true.

Sadly, as with those who think net neutrality is bad, the idea of some Pink Unicorn Designer is not only still alive, it is spreading. Wired has taken the high road and published two important articles so that this issue does not get swept away or forgotten: The Crusade Against Evolution and On Darwin’s Birthday, Dover Still Isn’t Over.

It is now 2008, and while we would like to believe in a world that is full of smart, open-minded people, it turns out that many of us are still just monkeys in pants. Need more evidence? The Catholic church has brought back indulgences.

Inside, I'm screaming.

Happy Darwin's/Valentine's Day

Welcome to the Middle Ages... Again.

Oh, for the love of... I am absolutely sputtering over this, so just read it. I'll know you've started when I hear your forehead banging on the desk, just like I did.

My Nickname

The sound of rain on the roof is the perfect nap soundtrack.

The Dude

I am so happy to be working with HTML and CSS again. It feels real and solid.

heading home. g'night.

Being a recovering cookie addict is not as easy as it might sound. Want.