“I hope that every customer, artist and music company executive takes a moment today to reflect on what we’ve achieved together during the past three years,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “Over one billion songs have now been legally purchased and downloaded around the globe, representing a major force against music piracy and the future of music distribution as we move from CDs to the Internet.”
Written while groovin' to Glazed from the album “Donuts” by J Dilla aka Jay Dee
Has anyone else noticed anything about the Winter Olympics this year? no, I'm not talking about the annoying announcers who act like they could do a better job than the athletes were it not for their being over the hill at 26 years old. And no, I'm also not talking about the fabricated sensationalism that seems to be trying to make a soap opera out of every last nuance of the interpersonal lives of the athletes. I'm talking, instead, about the fact that every snowboarder seems to be riding while listening to their iPod. Apple is not an official sponsor of the Olympics but the dollar value of the exposure we're receiving has got to be well into the tens of millions.
Written while groovin' to Don't Cry from the album “Donuts” by J Dilla aka Jay Dee
If you're like me and you were trying to load your own, legally owned audio files to your Motorola RAZR V3 to use as a funky ring-tone (or ring tone, or ringtone for the google index) then this post is for you. Using iTunes, get your settings to look exactly like in the images below then upload using bluetooth, usb, smoke signal..whatever. You'll avoid the dreaded (and grossly non-descriptive) “File Type Not Recognized” error that the Motorola OS folks decided was enough information (they make nice phones, their OS skills are worse).
Click the above images for bigger versions.
Yahoo! is proving that they get it. I will write another post when I discover the secret to their getting it but the fact that they have bought companies (Flickr, del.icio.us) for a song ($15-20MM typically) that are living examples of the spirit of the age (community, the long tail, wisdom of crowds) is an indicator. The fact that these companies didn't have viable business models at the time was secondary. Sorta like open source then isn't it? It seems that an over-arching sense of community/altruism fueled by innovation and working within a construct of a capitalistic structure might be feasible after all? As evidence of this, Yahoo! has released a bunch of useful code and some great learnings under the BSD license. Enjoy. Further evidence is the people I've met from there recently. I look forward to being considered as “getting it” at some point in the near future; not so much for egotistical reasons (though, have you seen the size of my ego?!) but rather because it will be a validation that the stuff I'm working on right now (which I, of course, can't talk about--I'm like so cool and what not) wasn't a [complete] waste of time.
Written while groovin' to Yeah Yeah Yeah Song from the album “At War With the Mystics” by The Flaming Lips
Wait, Warner Brothers, I wanna get this right. You're telling me that this digital downloads stuff, the stuff you're griping about seemingly non-stop is actually helping your sales? It what?... Doubled your profits last quarter?! Your thank you note must have gotten lost in the mail. In any case, you're welcome.
A couple of folks have asked me for a session tape from a loft night and while I don't have audio of last Friday night I do have a live recording of the same line-up from a couple of years ago. Hey, no complaints...you asked for it.
Written while groovin' to DJ Shadow box set mix from the album “Funky skunk” by DJ Shadow box set mix