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Note: In general, I use my blog as an archive of the
tidbits that appear on my front page. Occasionally, I'll write
directly to the blog about non-music topics.
Blog Archive
2008
February/March
June to Sept.
2007
January
February/March
April/May/June
July/August
Sept. to Dec.
2006
December
November
October
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by George Ziemann
June, 2008 -- Gene Simmons sez: "The record
industry is dead. It's six feet underground and unfortunately
the fans have done this. They've decided to download and file
share. There is no record industry around so we're going to wait
until everybody settles down and becomes civilised. As soon as
the record industry pops its head up we'll record new material."
With this to consider, a solid
argument emerges against hastening the industry's slow, lingering
death.
Judge Orders YouTube to Give All User Histories
to Viacom
August 30, 2008 -- Every year at this time, I get
the urge to redesign this site. Organizationally, it's getting
of out of control. I've got more things going than I can keep
up with already.
But a significant event has
taken place, even though I'm still
being kind of low-key about it. The RIAA is no longer in
the way. Very soon I will be able to go back to what I was going
to do 6 years ago, when they got in the way in the first place.
September 4, 2008
-- Dazed and Confused --
Today's drug-addled rant brought to you courtesy of Percoset
and the letter H. (Read
More)
Sept. 11, 2008 -- Article
at the New York Times. Headline says, "Border Fence
Is Not Likely to Be Done By Year's End." The Dept. of Homeland
Security had hoped to have the fence completed by the end of
Bush's term because it's "vital" to securing the border
with Mexico.
The fence that they won't have
finished is 670 miles long. How this is supposed to "secure"
a 2,000-mile border is not exactly clear, but neither is the
list of things you can't take on a plane, so I guess it's one
of those DHS "need to know" things.
September 12, 2008 -- Australia -- The are two
or three guys in Australia repeatedly downloading the same song
from the music page. Other than making me falsely think our fan
base had suddenly increased, I can't figure out what the point
is. So if you're one of those guys, please clue me in because
I think you're a bit daft.
Washington, D.C. -- The Senate
Judiciary Committee decided that having the US Dept O' Justice
hunt down online copyright infringement was a wonderful idea,
ignoring the same obvious questions that the RIAA has been ignoring
for 5 years, like the exact legal basis for the charges they've
filed more than 30,000 times. Will the DOJ be able to actually
prove a case? Or establish that not-for-profit filesharing is
actually a violation of a law, when the law fails to acknowledge
its existence, much less the unique issues that this delivery
method has presented.
Texas -- Walked past the TV and it's tuned to CNN,
which is covering the hurricane. At the bottom of the screen
it says something like, "FAILURE TO EVACUATE WILL RESULT
IN CERTAIN DEATH." Despite this, there's a guy standing
on the beach wearing a bright red CNN jacket, risking CERTAIN
DEATH to offer irrefutable proof that high winds and heavy rain
take place during a hurricane. Again.
Later that same evening -- Now it's Geraldo on the beach,
reminding us of the third danger of a hurricane -- flooding.
Geraldo is wearing all black. It's nighttime. Flood waters are
rising. If he gets blown into the Gulf, they'll never find him.
September 22, 2008
To Our Valued Customers:
As WaMu's new chief executive
officer, I am writing to discuss the extraordinary economic environment
for all banks in the United States and why you can count on us
to continue to serve you safely and soundly.
When I was recently approached
about the opportunity to lead this great company, I did my homework
to satisfy myself that WaMu has the capital, the liquidity, and
the business plan to serve your needs and protect your money
through these challenging times.
Sincerely,
Alan Fishman
Chief Executive Officer
Two days later, the federal
government seizes WaMu and sells it to Chase Morgan. According to the Washington Post, it is "the largest bank failure
in U.S. history."
Sept. 24, 2008 -- The
Decider appeared on television this evening to warn us that the
country is in danger, which has pretty much been the subject
of every speech he has ever made -- except for the times he's
not quite apologizing for ignoring a real danger until
it was too late.
Last month, the offical Republican
party line was that bailing out failed corporations was a bad
idea. We didn't want more government, more regulations, more
red tape. Stay out of the way and let the free market regulate
itself.
As a result of following that
path, we now have an "emergency" that's going to cost
at least $700 billion to fix. Invading Iraq was an emergency,
too, as I recall. No time to debate the wisdom of such action
or waste time discussing the consequences. Dubya said that the
tearists had nucular weapons of mass destruction. And biological
weaponization. It was an emergency. The future of the country
was at sake. If we didn't attack Iraq, they were going to swim
across the Atlantic and destroy us.
The border fence was an emergency,
too. And pointless airport regulations. Wiretapping citizens.
Torture. It seems like every time we turn around, there's a new
emergency. Except New Orleans, which had to wait until Bush's
vacation was over or something.
Today's emergency once again
threatens the very fabric of American life, so we're going to
go ANOTHER trillion $$ in debt and pass it out to the same people
who created this mess in the first place, with absolutely no
oversight to make sure they don't turn around and do exactly
the same thing again.
Hey, I'm a shitty businessman,
too. I'm in debt up to my ass. Had to take out a second mortgage
to pay for the consequences of my bad decisions. No one's offering
to bail me out and give me a multi-million dollar payoff for
being a fucking idiot, except for some guys in Nigeria.
September 27, 2008
-- Once again, RIAA customers'
purchases scheduled to vaporize.
Update -- October 10 -- WalMart
changes mind, will leave DRM servers on "forever."
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Quotes
"Never attribute to malice
that which can be adequately explained by stupidity"
-- Robert Heinlein (in Logic of Empire)
"I don't want to go out
and see Bob Dylan. I don't want to go out and see the Stones.
I wouldn't pay money to go see the Who, not even with new songs."
-- Pete
Townshend, 2006
"Two things are infinite:
the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the
the universe."
-- Albert Einstein
"A watched pot never boils
over. " -- GZ
"News is what someone
wants to suppress. Everything else is advertising."
-- Reuven
Frank, NBC News President, 1968-72
"I live in my own little
world. It's nice there."
-- Deborah Harry
"Music is everybody's
possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it."
-- John Lennon
I don't gamble, because winning
a hundred dollars doesn't give me great pleasure. But losing
a hundred dollars pisses me off. -- Alex Trebeck
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