“Almost overnight, Barack Obama overhauled his White House and rewrote much of the script. Now all he needs is a happy ending.” On the self-examination and cabinet shuffling over the last two months, and what it could mean for the next two years. If anything it’s incredibly promising that Obama is willing and able to rethink everything and actually take the hard steps to implement a change of operations.

“I set myself a half-day project to write music specifically for shuffle mode — making use of randomness to try and make something more than the sum of its parts. Over an hour or so, I wrote a series of short, interlocking phrases (each formatted as an individual MP3) that can be played in any order and still (sort of) make musical sense.” The reference points here to electronic music (glitch and dubstep, obviously) are interesting, as are his integration of skipping noises as percussive elements and how the skip itself can be used as a musical device. Hat-tips to and reminders to look further into the work of pioneers La Monte Young, Terry Riley, Brian Eno, and John Cage.

“Google Refine is a power tool for working with messy data, cleaning it up, transforming it from one format into another, extending it with web services, and linking it to databases like Freebase.”

“Apparently people in their 20s are a bunch of entitled whiners. I also hear we’re afraid of hard work. I’m rather sick of hearing it. Of course we have a sense of entitlement—we had an understanding with the older generation. We followed through with our half of the deal. What happened? Let’s talk a bit about generational justice.” As a commenter puts it: “I’m a tired of hearing a generation that got everything handed to them (I’m looking at you baby-boomers) bungle everything up so badly and then badmouth the generation that has to clean up their mess (e.g. the national debt, the planet, the educational system, and so on).” See also my notes on that NYTimes article: http://pinboard.in/u:matthewmcvickar/b:a83c50952510

In spite of the potential for people being ignorant or abusive with what he writes, Marco writes because ”I’m freely expressing my ideas in public, which helps me clarify my thoughts, enhance and alter my views, and improve my writing over time. I think I’m getting the better end of the deal.”

An exploration of the author’s gambling addiction and meta-talk about writing and public perception in general thereon.

“plowshare is a command-line application designed for some of the most popular file-sharing websites. Using plowshare you will be able to download files (and for some modules also upload, list and delete) on UNIX-like operating systems:” E.g.: $ plowdown http://rapidshare.com/files/130403982/1989_-_Castellum_honesti.rar

“Draw 3D sketches with animating strokes.”

On why Altered Zones is Pitchfork’s *younger* ‘sister site’, and the fundamental difference between music producers and consumers who don’t remember music before the web, never knew it was something you paid for, and aren’t as concerned with the rating of certain music as ‘bad’. I like this, but I have some big issues with this and want to return to it: 1. Altered Zones has its own set of problems, heavy among them the double-standard to which they hold DIY music. Baby bands at AZ get heaped with over-the-top praise, which at once unfairly removes them from helpful critical influence and subjects them to fame for which they aren’t prepared. As a result many are left in the dust of the Next Small Thing. 2. These music producers and writers don’t remember music before the web? I think this is patently false and that they absolutely do remember it; they generation that doesn’t isn’t reading Altered Zones yet. And what about those music producers sampling and being influenced by music that happened before the web (the 90s, the 80s)? 3. I don’t think Pitchfork is incapable of critically assessing the bands on Altered Zones; they just don’t have the time and energy for it. Which argument means I also don’t believe Altered Zones is not a filter for Pitchfork. How many bands debut on AZ or an AZ-affiliated blog, move on to the Forkcast, get a feature, and then get a bona fide Pitchfork Review? Several. Pitchfork’s own ‘The Week at Altered Zones’ pretty much is a filter by definition.

As Paul Ford says, “The fundamental question of the web.” Discussions about examples thereof, with Paul Ford himself contributing.

Is Forever 21’s Chang family capitalist geniuses or just exploitative and plagiaristic?

Why tipping needs to die.

Why the controversial singer/rapper had such a difficult year in 2010, and — after a new mixtape and remix EP — 2011 looks better.

“It always feels a little silly to get too aggressively bereaved about the loss of a musician you liked — a person whose work you felt connected to, but never in the least knew. Still: Read over interviews with Keenan, and you see a thoughtful, dedicated, curious person, the kind of artist who cared enough about what she was doing that she’d actually set herself writing exercises. (One song a day, a song in a half-hour, that sort of thing.) She’d begun writing poetry and fiction, as well, and given the wealth of ideas and emotions she brought to Broadcast’s songs, I’d always wondered where that might lead — what might happen if she reached the age where music became a hassle and it was more attractive to sit down with a pen. But the work we do have from her is, for some of us, memorable enough, and well worth visiting.”

One of those reviews that serves as a great introduction to entire genre.

A heartbreaking, fascinating profile of a postman with LSD-induced (-abetted?) schizophrenia.

Jesse Bering: “I don’t think any scholar ever captured the suicidal mind better than Florida State University psychologist Roy Baumeister in his 1990 Psychological Review article , ‘Suicide as Escape from the Self.’” An exploration of the six conditions that lead to suicide — academic, informative, and imploring.

“We forget that what we have is more than what we need. Obscenely more. I know it may sound perverse, but here in the future people often feel like they need more than they have.”

I saw this linked as a ‘great article from 2010’ and thought ‘WTF I read about this a long time ago’ and looked in my bookmark history, and there's this little page by David Carkeet (http://www.greenharbor.com/fffolder/carkeet.html), and this Popular Mechanics article makes no mention of that (why would it?) but it is totally great.

Transparent data itself is not empowering.

“1974: Basil Brown, a 48-year-old health food advocate from Croydon, drank himself to death with carrot juice.”

“Sometimes I just NEED things because I LIKE them. And I LIKE the color of these PLATES.”

Dozens of violent, fearful, hateful incidents from just the last three years, leading up to the recent shooting of Representative Giffords. “On June 26, 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court embraced the National Rifle Association’s contention that the Second Amendment provides individuals with the right to take violent action against our government should it become ‘tyrannical.’ The following timeline catalogues incidents of insurrectionist violence (or the promotion of such violence) that have occurred since that decision was issued.”

A good overview, with plenty of arrows in other directions.

“It is facile and mistaken to attribute this particular madman’s act directly to Republicans or Tea Party members. But it is legitimate to hold Republicans and particularly their most virulent supporters in the media responsible for the gale of anger that has produced the vast majority of these threats, setting the nation on edge. Many on the right have exploited the arguments of division, reaping political power by demonizing immigrants, or welfare recipients, or bureaucrats. They seem to have persuaded many Americans that the government is not just misguided, but the enemy of the people.”

“What do you recommend is the best process for getting my music reviewed on Pitchfork? “The easiest way to contact us to email and mail something to me directly, not just to the office. I would also read some reviews, find out which writers might like what you’re doing, and try to contact them directly. Targeting people who seem open to your music is an easy way to help it along. If you do send CDs, I would expect that a one-sheet, while it could be read, is more likely going to be discarded, so if you send a promo CD you should make sure any information that anyone might want– your website, short bio if needed, contact info for booking or PR if you have it, is on the back of the CD case itself.”

No one should ever spend $180 on a clock, but goddamn I want this thing.

‘Get ready for these great upcoming new shows on your favorite cable TV channels in 2011!’ ‘Face Punch Beach House’

I asked a question, and it got answered.