RIAA Realizes... There is a Better Way
From the Chi Trib today. Apparently, the new boom in SACD / DVD-Audio formats (Elton John's Goodbye Yellow Brick Road has been re-released as a hybrid disc, by the way) is a way to discourage piracy by presenting better audio quality and more features in a physical format.
Brilliant.
This is good news all around. Hybrid discs are still rippable to the mp3 format, still unlimitedly burnable to new CDs, but the original discs have quality that is uncapturable. Sharers rejoice because they can have the freedom to share, to test drive music and to become more informed on what's out there without having their minds flogged by radio. Record companies hold onto sales even if people have downloaded an album. Audiophiles and music lovers reap the benefits of having a high quality audio format being pushed in the mainstream (and will have to replace their old Elton John CD's).
And if you're Sony right now... Keep crying about album sales and let no one realize the kind of money you've been minting with the sales of mp3-playing devices and now SACD-compatible players. You are so money and you know it.
Input by Mike at 10:27 AM
I guess Jack Kelley's involvement with WJI is a big was, because they have (in the very least) taken his name off the listing.
Here is the google cache so that you can be sure I am not lying to you.
Input by Mike at
10:04 AM
Friday, March 19, 2004
The Real Humor is in the Layers
During the State of the Union address, W was caught in an unforseen rhetorical problem when anti-Patriot Act politicians applauded after the statement, "Key provisions of the Patriot Act are set to expire next year." Bush continued to say that it should be renewed, but his point was lost in the shuffle. Easterblogg notes today that there was another layer of humorous applause in the segment.
Input by Mike at
10:11 AM
Proof That You Don't Have to Be Young and Black...
...all you need is no sense of ethical responsibility. Here's the cut-and-dry "we're gonna sink this bastard" version of Jack Kelley's ouster for plagiarism and fabrication from USA Today.
Here's my you-heard-it-here-first moment of the century, discovered by my tireless research (Google)... Jack Kelley is (was?) faculty at the World Journalism Institute.
The reason I'm familiar with WJI is because flyers for it are frequently passed on to me by my pastor. That's right, WJI is a journalism school focused on Christian ethics. From their mission statement (linked above):
There is one primary reason why the World Journalism Institute should be committed to the education of young journalists: it comes directly from the need to be faithful to the Christian example of accurately reporting (e.g., being reliable eyewitnesses) the work of God in today's world.
We at WJI believe it is now time to implement a new phase of this statement in order to help turn out journalists capable of presuppositional reporting.
O I love the smell of irony in the morning.
Input by Mike at
9:41 AM
Thursday, March 18, 2004
I'm Just Like All These Other Collector Losers, I
Thought I'd diversify the listing of things a little bit by adding some of the better comics I've been reading.
Hell - (preview available) Gorgeously drawn and colored. Hell of the title is actually an island of genetic experimentation (Eden) gone horribly awry. The coloring is lush; there is probably no better word for how well its details and pallettes work. And the drawing... Done in a graffiti-ish style, with sharp, jagged emphasis along curving and twisting forms, captures action and motion as well as (if not better than) anything I've seen. I'm only through issue 1 (there are four on stands), but if the story holds up, Hell could assert itself as one of the best action comics in production.
B.P.R.D. - (preview) With the Hellboy movie coming out, it seems providential that I discover B.P.R.D., a Hellboy spin-off as sure as they come. This comic makes me very curious about the film. Yeah, the first issue ends with a lot of screaming and shooting and punching and monster noises. But you gotta have some of that when you've compiled a task force of tortured superfreaks. There's an air of "League of Extraordinairy Gentlemen", but I get the feeling that much more has been invested into the story than with that book. We will see when the second issue comes out in April.
The Pogostick - Our hero is a mixture of Milton from Office Space and Jimmy Corrigan of Smartest Kid on Earth fame. As such, Pogostick is a dark comedy of office interrelation hijinx and tragedy. Al Columbia is an amazing comics artist, yet (like many underground comix) his work is difficult to come by when it's out of its run. It's good to be reading it during the cycle.
Some quick notes as well... Dead@17 is essentially Buffy the Zombie Slayer and a little disappointing because of it... The Clockmaker folds out to tabloid size and wins some art points because of it, but the story itself is plodding (I'm on issue 3) especially for a short-run comic... the new Optic Nerve is on par for Adrian Tomine; I'd reccommend the previous issue (#8) if you'd like to read an exemplary story of his.
Input by Mike at
10:42 AM
Wednesday, March 17, 2004
Ripped from the headlines...
Kudos to Eric Zorn's amazing blog for this one. If you've ever seen even one episode of "Law and Order" or "Law and Order: SVU" or "Law and Order: Criminal Intent" or "Law and Order: CSI", you must check out the Random Law and Order Plot Generator. My favorite so far:
A headless corpse is discovered in a park by out-of-towners. Lenny and Curtis initially pin the crime on the victim's lover, but after insurance fraud is revealed, they arrest a down-on-his-luck executive. McCoy and Kincaid prosecute, but McCoy must skirt the law to win. The old DA takes a drink and says "Advice is like castor oil, easy to give but dreadful to take." Tony Danza guest stars.
These are the actual TV Guide recaps of tonight's episodes on NBC:
After a sweatshop owner is beaten to death, suspicion falls on the husband of a worker he impregnated.
The discovery of a woman's body in the Hudson River leads to an investigation that uncovers a scandal involving attorneys and a judge.
I wonder if McCoy will get his man.
Input by Scot at
12:22 PM
Tuesday, March 16, 2004
My Michael the Car
"Michael Jackson wanted to star in a movie about a man who turns into a car that’s driven around by a little boy."
Input by Mike at
10:28 AM
Get an Axe...
...it's a trap.
Input by Mike at
10:16 AM
Spanish Bombs
It's impossible to tell just what the swing in the Spanish vote was caused by. Any of the reasons I've heard (from the polls being wrong, to the Iraq war, to the heavy-handed accusations at ETA) have validity on a micro level with individual voters. It's silly to think that the entire swing was motivated by one particular response. Democracy is wild and diverse...
The issue here, in my mind, is that what happened went exactly as predicted.
From a piece on Iraqi jihad that the Guardian cites being published in December:
"If [Spain's] troops remain in Iraq after the attacks, a Socialist victory is practically guaranteed and withdrawal of the troops will feature in its election manifesto."
This is what makes the election results frightening however fair and justified they may be. There is a plan in action that we (again) did not foresee.
Input by Mike at
10:15 AM
Monday, March 15, 2004
The [Start] and Fall of Matte
Noticed today that alt.culture magazine Matte has given up its domain and is no longer even in Google. A sad sight (site) because the folks at Matte were putting out one of the best magazines on the shelves. What did Matte do well? Well, for one, its design balanced text with art in interesting ways (like a black and white Print almost). Here's a sample. Tied to that, it was terrificly readable. The writing was handled maturely without being too heavy-headed, and the design was enough to draw you into an article you might otherwise skip over. Plus, there were just a lot of in depth articles. Reading 30% of the magazine was like reading everything in two issues of Rolling Stone. Even aside from these basic foundation points, Matte had a lot going for it. A large advertising base with pricey rates (for a small press publication) was in place from the very first issue. They had a publisher belaying, at least, part of the up-front cost. And distributors. A large staff and what seemed to be a good support structure...
So what went wrong? Well, I have guesses... The change in printing between issue 2 and 3, moving from a thick, unfinished heavy stock like The Believer to a more traditional paper quality, seems to hint at the economic plan of the magazine falling apart. I'd gander that the magazine wasn't able to pull in subcribers with its $20 for 4 issues plan. I also imagine its abstract covers weren't able to attract the eye of buyers on a newstand end. The third side of effective distribution for a print pub these days is the web, but Matte's website was static and fairly minimalist. The readership for Matte should have been much larger, but its most basic draws for building that readership were fairly impotent.
In my dreams, I imagine co-editor Anne Elizabeth Moore's seeping-through-the-pages pretension (which may or may not be fair to her outside Matte) to have turned enough people off to lead to the withering of Matte. But, I'll place my bet in reality on the business model collapsing because of the mag consistently turning its back on effective marketing techniques. I don't know who is at fault for that. Still, Matte's collapse has an important lesson in it for the small press... Even if everything goes right, it can still be blown.
Input by Mike at
10:39 AM
Sunday, March 14, 2004
Delegates in the Dark
The two man against 193 men parliamentary Double Dragon style fisticuffs reported in a prior post apparently looked more like a musical than River City Ransom.
I don't know if this is good, bad, or in between. But, yes, that's a flying toupee.
Input by Mike at
7:14 PM
