"He was condemned to death for telling the ancient Greeks things they didn't want to hear, but his views on consumerism and trial by media are just as relevant today."

"Commercial concerns are both implicit and invisible in the consumption of content."

"I’m afraid of what the systematic harnessing of communities will result in." Specifically, he's afraid that it will result in a) fans wasting their time and money and b) the artist being relegated to the sidelines while context and 'engagement' take over. Valid fears if you ask me, and exactly the sort of the thing that Matt LeMay outlines in the MBV post 'Living in the Age of Art vs Content' (http://www.mbvmusic.com/2010/10/19/living-in-the-age-of-art-vs-content/26911).

The Roma story.

"'I do not see any socially redeeming purpose being served by these beverages. At the end of the day, they’re aimed at a young, inexperienced market for the purpose of enabling them to become rapidly intoxicated.'"

"A day in the life of the President." "Durable achievement demands a long time horizon—something that the country as a whole seems to have lost. We can’t wait for the carrots to grow—we keep pulling them up to see how they’re doing. Thus, deeply complex problems, from illegal immigration to the BP oil spill—problems that by definition have no quick or easy solution, despite their obvious urgency—become easy emblems of presumptive failure, whatever the president may actually be doing to address them."

"People don't hate hipsters, and hipsters don't hate themselves. What people hate so much is the faux-hipsters: they hate poseurs. And because it's such an irritating thing to be having to tell the real from the fake (exactly as in the matter of overpriced European handbags), the easiest way out is simply to deny any involvement in the whole business. That is why nobody, not even someone who fervently embraces hipster culture, wants to call himself a hipster."

"'It sucks,' he says. 'It's no fault of any of the people in the industry, but music is not the main focus of my life. I never really planned on it being that way. When I meet people on the business end of this music-industry thing, they tend to really gross me out. I'm not trying to make money through this.'"

"'I stuck her with my wang. She hit me in the balls. I grabbed her by her neck. And I bounced her off the walls. She said it was an accident and then apologised. But I still took my elbow and blackened both her eyes.' That's clearly a song about domestic violence. So your Christian message is... don't be like that man?" "Huh?" Violent J repeats, mystified.

Interesting interview. I would disagree, however, that the sequence is funny.

A followup to the article 'Do Fees Rationalize/Incentivize Communal-Culture Ecommerce?' checks in with actual musicians using the site, and finds that they're more or less unfazed by the change, and don't think it's evil by any means.

How native-language subtitled music videos dramatically increased literacy in rural India. And there's a local professor here promoting the same SLS ('Same-language Subtitles') idea. Would be nice to talk to him.

Nitsuh, reasonable as always, dissects the clash of rockists, 'true' fans, and people who write about topics outside their wheelhouse and why it bothers us.

"The Auerglass is a two person pump organ created by Tauba Auerbach and Cameron Mesirow (AKA the musician Glasser). The instrument cannot be played alone. Each player has a keyboard with alternating notes of a four octave scale. Each player must pump to supply the wind to the other player's notes."

Thoughts and collected quotations on Bandcamp's change of plans.

I asked a question and it got answered: "The rally, hopefully, will get a lot of people who have become frustrated with the political process engaged again. To the extent that it succeeds in that, I’m for it. If it does it while being entertaining, I’m doubly for it."

They don't carry disease, they disappeared for forty years, and everyone is freaked out about them. And that's actually all we know.

Prof. Rosalie Loeding, voice teacher, and expert on singing problems discusses techniques for avoiding and curing throat and other medical problems of singers.

From the guy who wrote it.

We can't all be great writers, but we can be better writers. This advice is for everyone. And I put particular importance on number 3.

"These are the folks whose policies helped devastate our middle class. They drove our economy into a ditch. And we got in there and put on our boots and we pushed and we shoved and we were sweating and these guys were standing, watching us, sipping on a Slurpee."

This isn’t a recovery, in any sense that matters. And policy makers should be doing everything they can to change that fact.

A sympathetic overview.

Blest, a Japanese company, has created machine that melts plastic and cools the vapor to create gasoline. Yikes!

Jury's out on how much this really matters in 2010, but still a great set of tips.

"Create Your Own @font-face Kits."

On August 4, 2010, Federal Judge Vaughn R. Walker ruled that California’s Proposition 8, which prohibits California from recognizing same-sex marriage, is unconstitutional. The ruling was stayed pending appeal–which means that nothing will happen until a Federal Appeals court reviews it. As you might imagine, it will be appealed. The ruling itself is 138 pages long. I’ll summarize.

1. PR companies are liars and are out to fuck you. 2. Music blogs are run by human beings and should be treated thusly. 3. Make no concessions.

"To mark the publication of rock critic Rob Sheffield’s second book, an 'I Love the 80s'-style tribute to the music of his youth called Talking to Girls About Duran Duran, eMusic’s Michaelangelo Matos took a unique approach to the author interview: a jukebox jury in which music critics, rather than songs, were the focus of discussion."