FolkWolf.Net: Category politics

Yet another tale of the music industry

Matt Rose — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 18:21:00 -0400

Here we go again. This one's good.

When Pigs Fly: The Death of Oink, the Birth of Dissent, and a Brief History of Record Industry Suicide.

I tagged along on $1500 artist dinners paid for by the labels. Massive bar tabs were regularly signed away by record label employees with company cards. You got used to people billing as many expenses back to the record company as they could. I met the type of jive, middle-aged, blazer-wearing, coke-snorting, cartoon character label bigwigs who you'd think were too cliche to exist outside the confines of Spinal Tap. It was all strange and exciting, but one thing that always resonated with me was the sheer volume of money that seemed to be spent without any great deal of concern. Whether it was excessive production budgets or "business lunches" that had nothing to do with business, one of my first reactions to it all was, "so this is why CDs cost $18..." An industry of excess. But that's kind of what you expected from the music business, right? It's where rock stars are made. It's where you get stretch limos with hot tubs in the back, where you get private jets and cocaine parties. Growing up in the '80's, with pop royalty and hair metal bands, you were kind of led to think, of course record labels blow money left and right - there's just so much of it to go around! Well, you know what they say: The bigger they are...

Kenya

Matt Rose — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 13:59:52 -0500

Bradburn and I have been dominating the conversation in the africa topics on the well these days, as his parents live in Kenya, and my parents lived in kenya, and are hoping to move back soon. Naturally, we've been feeding each other stuff, and he just posted this, which is from a blog comment thread. It's amazing.

Anonymous said... My fellow Kenyans, I am a kenyan, one who has had the privilege of living with the Luo, the Kalenjin, the Kisii, and others. I am Kikuyu. I have read all the above dialogue with much sadness. It is clear from it what is eating our nation: Ignorance. As a Kikuyu, I know, as any half brained Kenyan does, that the election had some serious problems. But really, Odinga or Kibaki, the end result would have been the same: The pooir people of Kenya would have remained what they have always been: Hard working, honest, hopeful, suffering, and poor. On that note, we all need to wake up and realize one thing. In Kenya there are ACTUALLY ONLY TWO TRIBES: The politicians, and the rest of us. ON that note, Kibaki, Raila, Ruto, and the other parliamentarians are one tribe. Real brothers. They live in palatial homes, with guards at the gate. They go to Europe for medical treatment, and they would not even take their cow to Kenyatta hospital, Kisumu Provincial, or any hospital in Kenya. They travel in government maintained cars, and they enjoy fat salaries. ALL OF THEM. Presently, the population in KIbera has destroyed two kms of railway line. I have travelled that line to the rift valley, and I have been out all the way to Kitale, Kisumu, etc. It is an important line for the common KEnyan (the second tribe, the rest of us). Now that it is destroyed, the poor Luo who was hoping for pricews to stay down and the price of malariaquin to stabilize will suffer this coming rainy season. So will the Kikuyu who lives in Kisumu, and the Luhya who lives in BUtere. But Kibaki, Ruto and Raila will never mourn the railway line. They never use it. Raila flies to Kisumu. Kibaki has a government jet. Ruto can fly to Eldoret. When I lived IN kericho, I (kikuyu) visited many Kalenjin homes. I am of the opinion that the most generous, givng people in Kenya are Kalenjins and Muslims. When I went to High school, I shared cofee and toothpaste with some Luos. We drank tea from the same cups, and we huddled togetherer for the same cup of coffee which we passed on from person to person. We had little, very little. As far as life in Kenya goes, these luos, Kalenjins and some Luhyas we shared the dormitory with were my brothers. The problem now is that Ruto and Kibaki and Moi and Odinga would have us believe if one of them is in power, that tribe eats. I can go to a court of law to defend many kikuyus because when Kenyatta was president, many of us did not eat. The eaters were Kenyatta, Moi, Odinga Snr (I personally have a lot of respect for Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, and I believe he should be more prominet in Kenya's history books than he is now), Kibaki, etc. But all ppoliticians who were anti Kenyatta told their tribes the Kikuyu were eating. All I remember during KEnyatta's time were the many days I was home without school fees. During MOi's reign, I lived in Kericho. Although I live out of the country now, I still visit Kericho when I go home. It is my second home in Kenya, although I have no land there. I love the town, and the community around it. Anyone who thinks the Kalenjins were eating during Moi's time should go see how hard working the Kalenjin community is, and how many of them I saw could not buy sugar. I met many a Kalenjin during the Moi era who were without. I saw many die at the little equipped Kericho hospital, which Moi never visited (or any other politician except maybe the local politicians). But when Moi and Kibakin travelled in the Kericho and Nyanza area, they stayed at the Highland hotel. You have to be one of this tribe to afford it. The Luos and the Kikuyus now living and dying in Kibera are rothers. and their relatives are in Mathari. Here, they live on 100 shillings a day--when they get it. When Omolo's son gets sick, they ask Kamau's wife to lend them 50 shillings. KIbaki and Odinga are usually at the Intercontinental, paying sh300 for a soda. Now that tribe wants Kenyans to get up and fight, and on this blog, that is what you are doing, my brothers. If you are LUo, you are as much my brother as the Kalenjin or Nandi in the Rift valley. If you don't believe it, go to Kenyatta hospital. Your mother and my mother will be lying in neighboring beds, dying without medicine. You and I will have left our children at home, to come to the hospital to care for our parents. ON the bed across the isle will be Mama Choge, dying also, without medicine. the pain, frustration, fear, hand hopelessness on thier faces will know no tribe. It will be our mothers, one dying as surely as if she was the other, dying under the same system of operation. If you get to the hospital before I do, please prop our mothers up for comfort. I will do the same when I get there. Kibaki, Odinga, and Ruto will not be there. Their tribe will be in another hospital, or at the intercontinental, waiting for us to get home and fight to secure their comfort. So, what tribe are you now? January 27, 2008 2:25 AM

Matt's obsession with US politics, part IV, subsection 3

Matt Rose — Sat, 16 Sep 2006 12:49:00 -0400

I was up late (or early, actually I had slept earlier that night) at Burning Man, guarding the temple of Hope and Fear. The guys from Disorient had brought out their bus with the Massive PA system, and there was a rave going on all night behind us. In the middle of it, I heard this tune, which was remixed from this poem.

What brought it all back, in a weird way, was this "remix" of the tired "Neville Chamberlain" appeasement argument, where American columnist Keith Olbermann, turns the argument on its head in a quite brilliant manner.
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2006/08/30/keith-olbermann-delivers-one-hell-of-a-commentary-on-rumsfeld/

Jane Siberry is cool

Matt Rose — Fri, 05 May 2006 16:44:00 -0400

Jane Sibbery is one of the nicest musicians I've ever had the privilege to meet. She asked me to be her roadie at one point. In 1996, she'd decided to get the rights back to all the songs that she could, and release them on her own record label. Just recently, she decided to change her pricing policy on her online record store. She calls it "self-determined pricing"

the "Freakonomics" author likes it As well as the EFF

A sign of (faint) hope

matt — Thu, 26 Jan 2006 12:03:15 -0500

WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: Compostmodern

Roian Atwood from American Apparel had a lot to say about the garment industry and their successful bucking of the trends. America's textile industry is dead--98% of clothes sold in America are foreign-made, and of course tales of sweatshops are infamous. But American Apparel makes all of their clothes in the US, from materials almost entirely grown/made in the US, and pays their factory workers $13 - $20 an hour plus benefits. Far from struggling along for the sake of a mission, they're growing wildly. They're a vertically integrated company, from farm to store, and at present their main obstacle to offering more organics is the lack of spinning mills left in the country, which makes it difficult to specialize. And for those that haven't already heard, they don't use models for their ads--they're workers from the company or anyone off the street, with no airbrushing and minimal makeup. Their much-lauded practice of having no logos on anything was actually an outgrowth of the fact that they started as wholesale suppliers of "blanks" which brand-name companies printed their logos on--when American Apparel started retailing for themselves, they didn't want to compete with their existing customers.

Support Musicians by opposing the Music Industry.

matt — Wed, 11 Jan 2006 17:44:52 -0500

It doesn't make sense, but it does. If you want to stop DMCA style legislation in Canada, go sign the online petition at Online Rights Canada. A joint venture by the EFF and CIPPIC.

This is the email they wanted me to send out to up to 5 friends, but instead of spamming you, I'll just put it here

. Check out Online Rights Canada's petition asking politicians to swear off money from big copyright holders:http://www.OnlineRights.ca/getactive/copyrightpledge_petition/email.php

They have 103 signatures, and they're trying to get as many as possible before the election.

Self referential post.

matt — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 14:43:13 -0500

I've mentioned Jon Carroll, from the SF Chron numerous times before, and I've also mentioned Fafblog numerous times. In this column, JRC imitates Fafblog.

Open source and Developing markets

matt — Fri, 25 Nov 2005 12:56:28 -0500

In Timbuktu Chronicles: Open source and Developing markets. Emeka Okafur, points to a CNET article on Open Source in the developing world. It brought to mind this quote from Bruce Perens speech at the WSIS conference in Tunis.

I bring you greetings from the hundreds of thousands of Open Source Software developers around the world. We embody many of the goals of the United Nations: we are a community without borders, a global network that shares knowledge, a social movement that produces real products available equally to the rich or poor, an economic reality that has engaged the world's largest companies and talented individuals in a collaboration of equals. Our work facilitates global e-inclusion and a sustainable infrastructure for technology and innovation in developing nations. Millions of people use our software to create global markets for local business through the Internet.

We create wealth for all. Our work, by metrics for conventional software creation, is valued in the billions of dollars. For our reward we ask only that you use our software. If you find it effective, perhaps you will join us in augmenting it.

Others offer developing nations charity and a relationship as vassals, captive markets and providers of labor at a salary the developed world would not accept. Open Source offers developing nations technological empowerment, control of their own infrastructure, and an equal technological partnership with developed nations.

This brings up the question: Why the hell aren't more people talking about this? All the pieces are in place, and have been for some time now. Extremely low cost computers are there. Open Source IS easy to use, if you're not used to windows. This is not only a great opportunity for Africa and the rest of the Developing world to get into ICT on a level playing field with the Developed world, but it is also a HUGE opportunity for Linux and other Open Source projects to gain true "World Domination," not just the domination of the small percentage of the world's population that already uses computers

Jambo OpenOffice is a start, I guess.

Intelligence Failures?

matt — Wed, 23 Nov 2005 14:39:36 -0500

In this article: The Right Way in Iraq John Edwards says

The argument for going to war with Iraq was based on intelligence that we now know was inaccurate. The information the American people were hearing from the president -- and that I was being given by our intelligence community -- wasn't the whole story. Had I known this at the time, I never would have voted for this war.

And in this article Sen. Bob Graham tellingly states:

The American people needed to know these reservations, and I requested that an unclassified, public version of the NIE be prepared. On Oct. 4, Tenet presented a 25-page document titled "Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction Programs." It represented an unqualified case that Hussein possessed them, avoided a discussion of whether he had the will to use them and omitted the dissenting opinions contained in the classified version. Its conclusions, such as "If Baghdad acquired sufficient weapons-grade fissile material from abroad, it could make a nuclear weapon within a year," underscored the White House's claim that exactly such material was being provided from Africa to Iraq.

From my advantaged position, I had earlier concluded that a war with Iraq would be a distraction from the successful and expeditious completion of our aims in Afghanistan. Now I had come to question whether the White House was telling the truth -- or even had an interest in knowing the truth.

On Oct. 11, I voted no on the resolution to give the president authority to go to war against Iraq. I was able to apply caveat emptor. Most of my colleagues could not.

What happened wasn't an intelligence failure, it was a deliberate distortion of intelligence that Senators "fell for". This has to come out at some point.

Yet another uninformed opinion

matt — Sun, 20 Nov 2005 23:06:30 -0500

Posts like this one make me angry. Oh, let's go against ALL collective wisdom on Africa, and pull out one statistic, two anecdotes out and no first-hand experience, and say "No, people in Africa are happy!" btw phil, The celphone statistic is because: 1. most africans have never had a landline, 2. celphones are actually far cheaper in africa, and 3. Celphones are actually far more advanced in africa than they are in North America. The may not have cameras in them, but you can take your sim card with the same phone number to a different phone on a different provider.

[The folks who've actually spent time in Africa feel a lot less sorry for Africans. One fellow at the Hacker's Conference spent nearly a year on a road trip through Africa with www.dragoman.com. He said "In a lot of the villages where we stayed, folks only have to work about two months per year to pay for all of their food and shelter. They're so much happier than Americans." My friend who work in public health and have spent years in Tanzania don't shed tears for the locals, either. And there is some evidence that Africans may not be as bad off economically as the dry statistics suggest. http://www.usatoday.com/tech/products/gear/2005-10-16-africa-cellular_x.htm notes that "an estimated 100 million of [Africa's] 906 million people" have mobile phones.]

Another quote from Githush. This post should provide a little more context into the problem

Nothing weird you say, well on another channel - Bravo - they have a marathon of the reality show, The Restaurant. Now imagine this, on one channel you are watching a chef slathering a whole pig with butter, frying up some chicken, and grilling a ribeye steak. On the other channel you see folks (Ethiopian) forced to eat grass - which the refer to as cababage - a Sudanese family forced to go 3 weeks without food, and North Koreans forced to eat human flesh in order to survive. Curious are we, there is more.

The patrons in the restaurant can not stop complaining, ohh the food is not hot enough, it's taking too long, it's not in the right plate etc.. But the Ethiopian, Sudanese and North Korean just accept what little they have (though they try hard to get better) and do not keep complaining. Those with plenty bitch about not having enough or not the right knd, but those with little accept what they have, thank the lord for what they have and continue on with life. Kweli hardship hardens the skin.