Saturday, September 25, 2004

The United States is a non-smoking nation. No smoking, no drugs, no alcohol, no women - unless you're married - no foul language, and no red meat.
posted by Irdial , 11:35 PM Þ 

Inspired by AK's Flamenco post:

Crazy singer-songwriter music with lots of humour and acid instrumentation
and psychedelic folk edge of arranging. A bit like on Tea & Symphony
perhaps at moments. Beside these interesting arrangements & the humour, I
like Jaume Sisa's expressive theatrical high ranged voice very much too.


Sisa in a suit.

One of the historic artists of the catalan progressive scen in the 70's. Jaume Sisa came from Música Dispersa, together with Batiste, at the light of the psychedelic an theatrical music. Under his supervision, the big band Orquesta Platería was created. He made lots of collaborations with other musicians, cineasts and theater groups like Dagoll-Dagom. He was one of the top sellers artists in those 70s' ambiences. (José Manuel Iñesta)

Info in Spanish

And for the rest of your Spanish Progressive Music needs:

See the Flamenco Rock page too, unless yr stupid.
posted by telle goode , 10:57 PM Þ 


It's not rectangular.
posted by telle goode , 10:00 PM Þ 
posted by Claus Eggers , 5:37 PM Þ 


testing Hello and capture card Posted by Hello
posted by captain davros , 2:38 PM Þ 

Filesharing is killing music.


Nuff said!
posted by Irdial , 9:20 AM Þ 
Friday, September 24, 2004

This is very handy:
Local Google

I like that you can click on the map, and the references listing is a great idea. This will save me loads of time.
posted by mary13 , 8:52 PM Þ 


"When he was inspired and he had this, this, that light, that we don´t know what it is, that´s when what he was letting out was a diamond, something extraordinary. When he sang badly, he sang worse than all of the cantaores who have ever sung badly". Manuel Morao, guitarist.

Terremoto de Jerez
Male flamenco singer
Name: Fernando Fernández Monje
Birth: 1934 Jerez de la Frontera (Cádiz)


Terremoto de Jerez was a heterodox cantaor, not because he wanted to innovate, but rather because, as he didn´t know how to read or write, he could only express himself through his singing. Making his art into his only means of expression turned it into the deepest kind of singing, that singing which springs from the heart and expresses the deepest feelings. His ability only responded to inspiration, without technique, without any measure of the meter or the rhythm.

He may be the most important cantaor from Jerez in the second half of the twentieth century. He grew up in the extremely flamenco environment of the Santiago neighbourhood, where he began singing and dancing as a child in exchange for a few coins. But his artistry also came from his blood, considering that related to the most important flamenco families in Jerez. The seguiriyas were the cante (style) that Terremoto de Jerez sang best.
posted by Alun , 7:48 PM Þ 

posted by Alun , 6:49 PM Þ 

Bisociation: The mixture in one human mind of visual physiognomies
from two contexts or categories of objects that are normally considered
separate categories by the literal processes of the mind. The thinking process
that is the functional basis for metaphoric thinking. This is a term coined
by the author Arthur Koestler in his book "The Act of Creation."
Koestler invented this term to distinguish the type of analogical thinking
that leads to the acts of great creativity from the more pedestrian associative
(purely logical) thinking, with which we are so familiar in our everyday
lives.
posted by telle goode , 5:12 PM Þ 

"There is nothing in philosophy which could not be said in everyday language", Bergson told once in an interview. As a stylist he could be compared to Russell or Berkley, but his ideas were often high-flown and difficult to follow. In his first major work, Time and Free Will (1889), Bergson aimed to show how pseudoproblems about the will and its freedom have arisen from a false phenomenology of mental states - essentially, a tendency to conceive and describe them in spatial terms. Human experience does not perceive real life as a succession of demarcated conscious states, progressing along some imaginary line, but rather a continuous flow. Bergson made the distinction between the concept and experience of time. While the physicist observes objects and events in succession, time is presented to consciousness as duration - an endlessly flowing process. Bergson argued that the 'real time' is experienced as duration and apprehended by intuition, not through separate operations of instinct and the intellect.

In An Introduction to Metaphysics (1903) Bergson saw that the intuition, the direct apprehension of process, as the discoverer of truth - intuition, not analysis, reveals the real world. Bergson's treatment of intuition was not coherent - sometimes it referred to getting bright ideas, which presupposes intellectual hard work. Sometimes intuition is the method of philosophy like intellect is of mathematics. His concept of élan vital, "creative impulse" or "living energy", was developed in Creative Evolution, his most famous book. In 1914 all of Bergson's writings, but most especially Creative Evolution, were placed upon the list of books devout Catholics were forbidden to read. After its appearance twenty-five years elapsed before Bergson published another major work, The Two Sources of Morality and Religion (1932). The Creative Mind, published two years later, was a collection of essays and other writings.

Bergson had been interested in Spencerian evolutionism in his youth, but he later abandoned Spencer's view placing intuition as the highest human faculty. In Creative Evolution Bergson argued that the creative urge, not the Darwinian concept of natural selection, is at the heart of evolution. Man's intellect has developed in the course of evolution.
posted by telle goode , 4:29 PM Þ 

Classic Finnish literature!, February 18, 1999 Reviewer: bjornpojke@hotmail.com from Lontoo, Englanti This is a very accurate translation (better than Kirby's in this respect) of the great Finnish epic "Kalevala". The story centres around a group of heroes who weave mighty magics with their singing and includes memorable stories such as the incestuous Kullervo, the son of a male Swanmay and a were-bear, as well as a really funny Finnish heathen retelling of the birth of jesus, in which Mary ("Marjatta" in Kalevala) uses a horse's exhalation as a sauna. This is *the* source for Finnish mythology as well - which is the main reason I wanted to read it
posted by Mess Noone , 2:12 PM Þ 

...The "hourglass" model developed by the food industry analyst Jan-Willem Grievink, in which the top bulge represents the 160 million consumers who make purchasing decisions in Europe, and the bottom bulge represents the 3.2 million farmers and producers who grow food for them. In the middle there is a narrow pinch-point, where just 110 retailers' buying desks (the teams responsible for buying goods in different categories) decide what will be available in the shops for us to buy. In Grievink's diagram, this pinch-point is highlighted with an arrow marked "power".
posted by Alun , 1:03 PM Þ 

1994. As one might expect from a band that includes such slogans as “CDs destroy music” on its CD spines, Bristol’s Flying Saucer Attack suffers from a serious aversion to the high fidelity of digital audio. At the core of FSA’s fluctuating lineup are avowed vinyl devotees Dave Pearce and Rachel Brook, and vinyl has always been the medium of choice for their home-recorded, distortion-drenched musings. With FSA’s begrudging consent, 1993’s eponymous debut was issued Stateside on CD. But the winsome fuzz and hypnagogic haze that envelop FSA’s music beg for the warmth, crackle and amiable flutter of analog anti-fidelity. Distance again concedes to the band’s CD-minded fans, compiling early, much-coveted seven-inch singles and adding 20+ minutes of unreleased material. The disc represents the two sides of FSA’s self-described “rural psychedelia” even more effectively than the (first) album that bore that title. Pearce’s sticky sweet whisper melts over “Standing Stone,” “Crystal Shade,” and “Soaring High”—feedback-swaddled, razorblades-and-honey dream-pop of a bliss-inducing caliber unheard since the heyday of A.R. Kane or Slowdive. Conversely, FSA’s pastorales (“Oceans,” “Instrumental Wish,” “Distance,” “Oceans 2”) draw inspiration from idyllic folk and from the soundscaping vapor trails blazed by Klaus Schulze, evoking the swirling, supernatural character of the English countryside’s mist and morning light.

1994. Since revealed as a loosely collective effort centered around Bristol’s Dave Pearce, Rachel Brook, and the Third Eye Foundation (Matt Elliott), FSA’s self-titled album marked the dawning of a new age of defiantly lo-fi “post-rock” experimentation. FSA’s sharply crafted songs, though obscured—if not quite obliterated—by avalanches of feedback and torrents of metallic distortion, immediately set the project apart from the swelling ranks of English and American “home-tapers.” Remarkably, time and revelation have done little to diffuse the primal, supremely mysterious aura of Flying Saucer Attack. An all-but-hidden subtitle (“Rural Psychedelia”) is the cipher that unlocks the riddle of Flying Saucer Attack. The sly nods toward Popol Vuh may explain FSA’s Krautrock-derived penchant for beautifully layered guitar-scapes (“Wish,” “The Season is Ours”), but Pearce’s astral-folk leanings expose an equal fondness for the organic idylls of Tim Buckley and Syd Barrett. Elliott’s freakishly intense “Moonset,” a cauldron of percussion and squawking clarinet, is as much no-wave as it is post-rock. FSA’s barbed-wire guitar tone and contradictorily whisper-quiet vocals one-up the dreamy blur of the shoegazer set ten times over, while a hideously corroded cover of “The Drowners” mocks the London Suede’s glam affectations. A baffling, bracing, ultimately brilliant debut.

1995. The second proper album from Bristol’s Flying Saucer Attack collective evidences an extraordinary level of artistic growth. FSA holds fast to its credo (“home taping is reinventing music”) but strips away nearly all the lo-fi fuzz and tape hiss. David Pearce compensates with sparkling pastoral pick work and artful shades of muted feedback. As FSA’s clouds of distortion dissipate, the shy, sweet vocals he once obscured are finally revealed—as painfully intimate and vulnerable as cult-folk icon Nick Drake’s introverted whisper. The cold and foggy drizzle of “Rainstorm Blues” sets a mood of rain-streaked blues and grays. “In the Light of Time” throws down shafts of autumnal light, carving out a painfully intimate space within the album’s comfortable shadows. This idyllic, acoustic aura holds throughout, bathed in occasional cascades of tempered guitar noise (“For Silence”) or illuminated from within by Rachel Brook’s faraway purr (“Still Point”). The turbulence hinted at by Further’s unsettled atmospherics finally manifests itself in “To the Shore,” an onrushing tide of chromatic radiance swept along on a bed of flitting percussion. “She is the Daylight” follows this climactic unburdening, closing the album on a contemplative note suffused with a rosy, optimistic glow.
posted by meau meau , 10:06 AM Þ 

Woe be unto him who tries to isolate one department of knowledge from the rest.
All science is one.
Language, literature and history, physics, math and philosophy--subjects which seem the most remote from one another--are in reality connected,
or rather they all form a single system.
--Jules Michelet
posted by telle goode , 4:08 AM Þ 

File Sharing is Killing Music
posted by alex_tea , 2:44 AM Þ 

Dear Captain, you just gave me the BEST idea!
posted by alex_tea , 1:59 AM Þ 

posted by Ken , 1:24 AM Þ 
Thursday, September 23, 2004

Hell, I'm looking forward to my grandchildren saying "hey Grandad, get this" and dropping a contact lens which they grew from spores their friends gave them into my eye which flips a 4-dimensional holographic love warehouse directly into cerebral cortex, and if it says EMI on it somewhere and I don't know how to dance to it, so be it. 

Dav, you rock my world!!!
posted by mary13 , 11:30 PM Þ 


All of this filesharing worry-worry reminds me of the good old '80s. I've wittered on about this here before, but when I was a lad your vinyl LPs came with the "Home taping is killing music" thing on them, and your stereo came with not one, but TWO cassette decks.

For music lovers like my friends and I, the playground, classroom and journey to and from school, and the living rooms and bedrooms of each others houses were places where we swapped music, recorded on cassettes. If you found/bought/borrowed an album that was cool, whether it was on tape or vinyl, there was no question of you not sharing it with your friends. Phrases like "Do us a tape of that", or "I'll do yer a tape" were bandied around everywhere, and I never saw Madonna or Prince or Motorhead or Duran Duran or The Smiths not making it big because of kids (and adults) making tapes.

I still have a lot of those cassettes, and I still have the vinyl and cassette versions that I often bought after I'd got something on tape anyway. And in some instances I have the CDs I bought again because I loved the music so much.

Some people say "Oh it's different, tapes weren't as good quality as MP3s are, so the effect on the music industry isn't the same", which is total arse. First up there wouldn't have been all that "Home taping is..." stuff everywhere if it hadn't wound up a lot of people. Poor quality or good quality, copying music onto tape was "killing music" in the eyes of the labels. Secondly, yes, there were some awful brands of tape, and terrible stereos for taping and playing vinyl on. But that didn't stop music lovers on tight budgets collecting vast archives of c90s all filled to the brim with hiss and wow and flutter. Some of them were even third or fourth generation, but people were mad for music and wanted to hear it, and tapes made it anytime, any place, anywhere.

MP3 files are just the tip of the same technological iceberg that has always made how we listen to music unrecognisable over one or two generations of time - the same process that made Dansette record players make sheet music look as weird as iPods make Dansettes look old. Musicians and record labels will either fear it/ignore it/try to stop at their peril, or will go with the flow and think "YES!, ALRIGHT!!!". Hell, I'm looking forward to my grandchildren saying "hey Grandad, get this" and dropping a contact lens which they grew from spores their friends gave them into my eye which flips a 4-dimensional holographic love warehouse directly into cerebral cortex, and if it says EMI on it somewhere and I don't know how to dance to it, so be it. Posted by Hello
posted by captain davros , 10:45 PM Þ 

Did you mean: necessary

California drills into dentists' scam
Independent Online, South Africa - 3 hours ago
San Francisco - Authorities in California have charged 20 dentists for subjecting patients to unnecessary - and painful - treatments in order to milk the state ...
Dentists accused of fraud, assault San Francisco Chronicle
5 Dentists in OC Are Charged With Fraud Los Angeles Times (subscription)
Calif. charges 20 dentists with fraud Washington Times
WPBF Channel.com - Modesto Bee - all 166 related »
Draft unnecessary, Air Force general says
Billings Gazette, MT - 13 hours ago
By JIM GRANSBERY. A top US Air Force commander in Billings Wednesday said he does not foresee a need to reinstitute the draft, nor does he want it. ...
Harmful and unnecessary
Ha'aretz, Israel - Sep 20, 2004
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon agreed on Sunday to the Histadrut labor federation's demand that he intervene in the wage-withholding affair at the local ...
Tactical squad unnecessary: inquiry witness
CBC Edmonton, Canada - Sep 21, 2004
Edmonton - Police didn't need to send a tactical squad to a disturbance between neighbours, which led to an officer shooting and killing a man, a fatality ... [...]



Google News doesnt like the unnecessary. Aparently.
posted by Irdial , 9:21 PM Þ 

posted by Irdial , 9:15 PM Þ 

Seeing who the source (the blog not the poster KM!) was, lets see the opposite shall we?

Web Results 1 - 10 of about 4,550,000 for unnecessary [definition]. (0.30 seconds)

Foreign Policy: Error
FP Logo, ...
www.foreignpolicy.com/resources/blank.html - 35k - 21 Sep 2004 - Cached - Similar pages

'Madden NFL' called for unnecessary roughness | CNET News.com
'Madden NFL' called for unnecessary roughness | Fans of EA's hit football game protest
a scrimmage-line glitch. ... 'Madden NFL' called for unnecessary roughness. ...
news.com.com/.../2100-1043_3-5347305. html?type=pt&part=inv&tag=feed&subj=news - 50k - Cached - Similar pages

infoSync World : Unnecessary virus removal?
... E-mail: Choose format. Unnecessary virus removal? By Larry Garfield, Thursday
26 August 2004. Some phone stores in the Philippines ...
www.infosyncworld.com/news/n/5264.html - 42k - Cached - Similar pages

Unnecessary Necessities - Joke Items, Gag Gifts, Pranks, Novelties ...
At Unnecessary Necessities TN we've been selling you things you don't need
for over 21 years! Our giant online storefront offers ...
www.jokeitem.com/ - 12k - Cached - Similar pages

very unnecessary
very unnecessary. September 21, 2004. I feel I have not achieved full fanglement.
In Ren Lit tonight, the professor wondered aloud ...
www.veryunnecessary.com/ - 49k - 21 Sep 2004 - Cached - Similar pages

GRAVITY MODELED AS DYNAMIC GEOMETRY
A) GRAVITY MODELED AS DYNAMIC GEOMETRY. ELIMINATES NEED FOR DARK MATTER.
copyright©2001, 2003 DS.Barclay Engineering. comments/feedback. Abstract. ...
www.gravitational-engineering.com/ gravity_modeled_as_dynamic_geome.htm - 101k - Cached - Similar pages

unnecessary friction
about news shows bands order places.
www.ufrecords.com/ - 2k - Cached - Similar pages

WorldNetDaily: An unnecessary war
... An unnecessary war Posted: June 4, 2003 1:00 am Eastern ... We fought an unnecessary
war, and now we must rebuild a nation at a rising cost in blood and treasure. ...
www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=32894 - 25k - Cached - Similar pages

[Larry's] Negativland [page]
Please read this bulletin if you want to continue linking to this page after December
29. The Unofficial, Unnecessary Negativland Page. (Hi Mark!). ...
www.l2g.to/negativland/ - 6k - Cached - Similar pages
posted by Irdial , 8:48 PM Þ 
posted by Ken , 7:47 PM Þ 

So in conclusion, I think that ski jacket is really dumb because I could totally envision someone "just totally jammin" to their iPod while skiing downhill then slamming into a huge Conifer, cracking their skull. Jam away!

Really? I thought the jacket was innovative. The last thing I want to do when I'm freezing on the lift is to unzip my jacket to change a tune. Lose all that body heat? Not likely. And considering I am in the market for both a new ski jacket and a portable music device, this is an interesting option. My diskman skips when I walk across the room, and it's about 10 years old, so I can't make a complilation and take it with me. The batteries wear down quickly, and who wants to carry a stack of CDs when the main goal is to be as light as possible?

And of course I want to listen to music when I ski. Music and movement! How glorious. How liberating. The body responds to music in a positive way. It will only amplify the experience, and I could be a better skiier for it.

However, I can't speak to the sound quality. That's what I come here to learn about.
posted by mary13 , 6:04 PM Þ 

Hey Dav, I remember you asking about Burning Man, you will find a nice photo essay here:

Give It Away Now
posted by mary13 , 5:52 PM Þ 

posted by meau meau , 1:48 PM Þ 

The Western leaders, Bush and Blair, are to embark on one of the most ambitious efforts ever to remake a destroyed country by creating a new version of western culture, Iraq, destroyed by the war near the Oil fields in Persia, last spring.

Iraq, a country which took the Leaders less than two years to destroy, using thousands of soldiers, was bought by Dick Cheney for $5,000,000,000. Mounted in oil drums arranged in the shape of an eagle, it showed scenes of torture and mass killing. It was said to be one of Mr Cheneys favourites and was widely regarded as the most secular state to be lost in the blitz.

The new work will not be called Iraq, Colin Powell told the Guardian. "It's a bigger, better version of Iraq," he said. "It would be a stupid waste of time to remake that [original] but we are going to make a culture that will be a bigger, better version."

Iraq was one of scores of countries to be destroyed in the Oil Wars, thought to have been caused by terrorism following a break-in in a neighbouring oil producing unit in the early hours of September 11th.

[...]
posted by meau meau , 1:48 PM Þ 

The image “http://www.bartcop.com/message-from-God.gif” cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.
posted by Irdial , 1:47 PM Þ 

posted by meau meau , 1:47 PM Þ 

posted by meau meau , 1:45 PM Þ 

Smacking students

Kennedy said that the practice of sueing file sharers had government support and had begun to make a difference, especially in US colleges. Students knew that if they were caught drink-driving they'd face jail, or downloading an exam cheat from the Internet, they'd face expulsion; but students could download music with impunity. The music industry is keen to impose a per-college tax on students for sharing files, although the students lose the music when they graduate.

Kennedy was bullish about the new music download stores, which is not surprising since it's early days, the press has been favorable, and very few have gone bust yet. In the past labels had "got greedy and decided to be retailers as well as wholesalers," he said, and had forgotten that the record company isn't a brand that means anything to the mass market.

Asked by The Observer's Faisal Ahmed why it took a technology company, Apple Computer, to create the online goldr ush, Kennedy said it was down to the iPod.

"A hardware company came up with a sexy piece of hardware. A record company couldn't do that," he said.

Nevertheless, he enthused about the quality and value of the downloadable song.

"For 79p you've got a work of art that's like a Picasso, only one that's as close to the original as you can get," he said. [**]

But record companies were still needed, he said, because "no unsigned band has been broken by the internet," he said. "Bands are screaming in space on the internet."

Every pigopolist has a hard luck story, it seems, and Kennedy's was that he'd turned down the chance to manage George Michael in the Wham! days. That decision cost him £20m, he said, and he now goes home on the bus. Later, Kennedy had extracted The Stone Roses from their first indie contract but then went into bat against George Michael when the pop star wanted to extract himself from his own contract with EMI.

After the session, a member of the audience who buys his own music and doesn't work for a record company asked your reporter what the average person in the street would think, if he'd heard Kennedy's performance. Although the UMG chief could undoubtedly give as good as he got, I suggested that the instinctive reaction wouldn't be verbal. ® [...]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/09/23/ifpi_boss_keynote/

So, filesharing is the same as drink driving.

Can you hear the desperation?
posted by Irdial , 1:26 PM Þ 

17 September 2004

This is a copy of the engish_rewards.htm that was on the CIA website at

http://www.cia.gov/cia/english_rewards.htm

The CIA has removed the page after it became a source of amusement world over. Now, only the Arabic version of the page remains.

______________________

If you have information relating to Iraq which you believe might be of interest to the U.S. Government, please contact us through our secure online form. We will carefully protect all information you provide, including your identity.

To help us confirm and act quickly on your information, you must provide your full name, nationality, occupation and contact information including phone number. This allows the U. S. Government to grant rewards for valuable information. We will maintain strict confidentiality.

Imminent attacks: If you have information regarding an imminent attack by insurgents or terrorists we ask that you also contact a Coalition Force member or Iraqi police immediately.

Weapons of mass destruction: The presence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq puts at risk the health and safety of all Iraqis. The U.S. Government offers rewards to Iraqis who give specific and verifiable information that helps Iraqis rid their country of these dangerous materials and devices. Rewards will be available for specific and verifiable information on:

  • The location of stocks of recently made chemical or biological weapons munitions, missiles, unmanned aerial vehicles, or their component parts;
  • The location of chemical or biological laboratories and factories, development and production sites, and test sites associated with WMD, or sites where these materials were secretly disposed of;
  • Weapons system plans, military orders, or other relevant documents about biological and chemical weapons, missiles, or unmanned aerial vehicles;
  • Iraqis who are able and willing to provide detailed information on Iraq's WMD programs and efforts to hide them.

Ba'thist leaders: U.S. Government Rewards are available for the following information on former Ba'thist regime leaders, including 10 million U.S. dollars for information leading to the capture of former Revolutionary Command Council Chairman `Izzat Ibrahim Al-Duri:

  • The current location and activities of these individuals;
  • Who these individuals are meeting with and their future plans.

Insurgency and terrorism: Insurgents loyal to the former regime, and terrorists are trying to undermine Iraq's future. Rewards are available for specific and verifiable information that helps in their capture or otherwise to deprive them of sanctuary and support, such as information on:

  • Al-Qa'ida, Ansar Al-Islam, Abu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi and affiliates in Iraq;
  • Individuals or groups obtaining explosives and other weapons to use against Coalition forces, Iraqi police, Iraqi Civil Defense Corps members, schools, businesses, or civilians;
  • Individuals or groups providing insurgents and terrorists with safe houses, training, logistics support;
  • Individuals or groups involved in, or knowledgeable about, terrorist smuggling routes into Iraq;
  • Individuals or groups recruiting, facilitating, fundraising, and otherwise supporting terrorism in Iraq;
  • Facilitators providing documents that assist terrorists' travel to Iraq;
  • Travel agencies, NGOs, and front companies involved in facilitating terrorists' travel to Iraq.
Missing Coalition personnel: Rewards are available for information on missing Coalition service personnel, as well as Gulf War officer, U.S. naval aviator Michael Speicher.

From Cryptome
posted by Irdial , 11:57 AM Þ 

In one extraordinary comparison, he likens his inability to answer criticism over the terms of terror suspects' detention to the silence enforced on the Labour prime minister Clement Attlee after he and his inner cabinet secretly sanctioned the building of a British hydrogen bomb in the late 40s.

HMS Blunkett running aground, all guns blazing, firing blindly at unseen enemies.



From the ridiculous to the sublime....
Mugabe slams 'political God Bush'
President Robert Mugabe
Mugabe is accused of use violence and fraud to stay in power
Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe has accused US leader George W Bush of behaving as though he is God, with UK Prime Minister Tony Blair his prophet.

He was speaking during a stinging attack on the US-led invasion of Iraq at the UN General Assembly in New York.

He said the US and the UK were "raining bombs and hell-fire on innocent Iraqis, purportedly in the name of democracy."

Mr Mugabe has long been at loggerheads with the UK, saying the former colonial power is trying to oust him.

Applause

"We are now being coerced to accept and believe that a new political-cum-religious doctrine has arisen, namely that there is but one political God, George W Bush, and Tony Blair is his prophet," Mr Mugabe said to scattered applause at the UN headquarters.


posted by Alun , 11:37 AM Þ 

...With digital rights management likely to remain insecure, and sharing of music certain to continue

Its amazing how the Guardian cannot hire a single person who actually understands what all of this is about.

Digital rights management likely to remain insecure? This is a computer illiterate pure and simple. DRM is against the human spirit, which by its nature is built to share.

DRM also represents a reduction in utility for the music consumer; you cannot do with a DRM file what you could do with a cassette or a CD or an LP. That is the true problem with DRM, and the fact that he doesnt know this, in spite of everything that has been written about DRM, shows that he isnt reading properly, and doesnt consume music online. He should be doing both of these things BEFORE he starts to write about this subject.

the only way labels can kill piracy is to persuade people that it's naff and wrong.

This is a joke right? Persuade people that something that is free is "naff and wrong", something that everyone who takes ten seconds to think about it knows is not stealing? Would this be akin to the campaigns that sought to persuade people that heroin was "naff and wrong".

Just who is on drugs here?

They can do that by creating amazing online services and through clever marketing.

This is hjilarious (mmmm yes, "hjilarious") coming from The Guardian. Just look at their blogs. They are pathetic. And lets not even discuss how many people are not buying their online digital edition of the full paper.

This a perfect example of computer illiterate marketing twaffle (twaddle and waffle combined); no specifics, plenty of adjectives and absolutely no substance. They cant even conjure a picture of what the service should look like using examples of previous and existing services. Its just worthless jabbering; and thats a good thing, because when these drones get a clue, all will be lost. NOT!

The big labels then also guarantee their relevance in the industry's future.

And....THEY WANT THIS!!

Right now, their place at that table is not secure by any means.


Spoon boy: Do not try and bend the spoon. That's impossible. Instead... only try to realize the truth.
Neo: What truth?
Spoon boy: There is no spoon.
Neo: There is no spoon?
Spoon boy: Then you'll see, that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.

There is no table. Nuff said.
posted by Irdial , 11:36 AM Þ 

he-no-he-no-mo-he-ji-

へのへのもへじ


Traditionally, a day before an important occasion such as a school trip, Japanese children tie a piece of cloth in the middle leaving a small "head". They they draw a face, usually a series of kanas "he-no-he-no-mo-he-ji-" (last one with " accent drawn above the left eye as "head hear"). Japanese children hang such tied facial cloth down the window pane, beliving that it, "teruterubozu" (sunny sunny boy) wards off bad weather.

You probably know "ji" is spelled as "shi" with an " accent. The drawn face is therefore, if spelled in romaji:
 
He  He  i "
No  No
Mo
He
S   h
The "shi" is written extremely vertically and horizontally magnified.
Parodius Stage 3 boss is a direct depictation of teruterubozu, who is practically a god of good weather.

Visual proofs: Henohenomoheji and Teruterubozu.
I did not explain the above fact because I thought no people other than Japanese draws a face using fonts, and hence henohenomoheji was impossible to "translate".
posted by alex_tea , 11:21 AM Þ 

Tim Duffy, M&C Saatchi
"Any campaign against illegal downloading must rely on brutal simplicity. Simple ideas enter people's brains and stay there longer. We need focused targeting, aiming not at morally delinquent downloaders but those who are wavering. I don't think legal action is necessary to have an effective campaign."


"By the way, if anyone here is in advertising or marketing, kill yourself."

Mark Borkowski, Borkowski PR
"I think what we are seeing is a disconnect between the record companies and the public. Pop Idol shows the danger of paying to get into people's hearts ... we now have very savvy audiences who actually want to take on the music business."

"By the way, if anyone here is in advertising or marketing, kill yourself."

Steve Redmond, BPI
"There is some very good news regarding legal downloading, which has grown massively in the past year. Legal downloads are now equivalent to a quarter of the singles market. However, we are close to the point of litigation; it is the only thing that has been proved to be effective."

Dream world
You've been living in a dream world
Trust me
You just can't escape from reality

Neil McIntosh, the Guardian
"The industry faces disaster if it thinks suing teenage girls will win it a PR coup. With digital rights management likely to remain insecure, and sharing of music certain to continue, the only way labels can kill piracy is to persuade people that it's naff and wrong. They can do that by creating amazing online services and through clever marketing. The big labels then also guarantee their relevance in the industry's future. Right now, their place at that table is not secure by any means."

Almost sees the point, then walks straight past it, into the arms of Beelzebub.

From this article. How do these people think they can combat what they see as a threat when, after years already, they still do not understand the nature of what is going on?

"When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own house, his possessions are safe. But when someone stronger attacks and overpowers him, he takes away the armor in which the man trusted and divides up the spoils."
posted by Alun , 10:21 AM Þ  

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posted by Irdial , 9:54 AM Þ 

I enquoth the word problem because the "whatever", "I guess" generation doesnt give a fuck about what music sounds like - to them, there is no problem at all. The only thing that they care about is....what exactly?!

Thanks for posting that Akin, your discussion really helped me crystallize something in my mind that I have been toying with for the past few weeks/months. This has some relation to the ski-jacket with iPod controls too.
I have been wondering about the iPod cravings, how everyone has one (and can somehow afford one!!), how everyone seems to have portable music. Portable music is fine, but it seems that the majority of the people are not listening to anything at all (you know what I mean!). I suppose since it is a hot marketing item and an easy way to make cash people are strapping the iPod into everything and involving mp3 music into everything. I have had a hard time understanding this because to me listening to music is a very special thing, and for me to really enjoy it I must be in a special place, a place where I can think about the music, and the quality is so so important. This is the reason I've spent the last four years amassing a hi-fi system composed of used parts (what I can afford). I find portable music to be as bizarre as walking around staring at a de Kooning or something, walking into walls and such. But that's probably just me (actually, I'm sure it is).
So back to the iPod - the place for music becomes everywhere (as that is how it's marketed), and since it IS everywhere, how can one possibly concentrate on the MUSIC? This leads me to think that all these people want to do (even if maybe they don't realize it) is to be seen listening to something on a portable music player (namely an iPod), just like any other fashion accessory. To be seen with something that was purchased. It's NOT about the music, then (if you follow this very tenuous argument). These people do not actually care about music, much in the same way they do not care about art. They care about the commodity (perhaps this is the only thing they know to care about, and perhaps they need an education?). Even though most of the mp3 files on the iPod are probably "stolen" (their words, not mine), I still see it as commodity because so much major label-based pop music is about image (the kind of stuff I hear all the time on people's tinny tinny shit annoying earbud 'phones).
I have noticed that the best mastering that one can buy today consistently comes from small(er) labels, sources that seem to care about the music not as commodity but as art (which therefore requires Real Quality). The simple fact of the matter is that the major labels (and subsequently, their patsies - commercial radio) do not care about dynamic range because it has proven to be an expense that is not needed. Range is not necessary to sell to the people they want to sell to. You All Know This.
So in conclusion, I think that ski jacket is really dumb because I could totally envision someone "just totally jammin" to their iPod while skiing downhill then slamming into a huge Conifer, cracking their skull. Jam away!

Van Morrison - TB Sheets. OMG.
posted by Barrie , 4:33 AM Þ 
Wednesday, September 22, 2004

http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html

run this on your windoze box NOW.
posted by Irdial , 9:13 PM Þ 

Twinkies Maker Seeking Ch. 11 Protection

1 hour, 9 minutes ago
Add Business - AP to My Yahoo!

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Interstate Bakeries Corp., the nation's largest wholesaler baker whose products include Twinkies and Wonder Bread, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection early Wednesday. The company also named a new chief executive.

Photo
Reuters Photo

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The electronic filing, made shortly after midnight with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of Missouri in Kansas City, listed assets of $1.626 billion and liabilities of $1.321 billion.

The company said it had a commitment, subject to bankruptcy court approval, from JP Morgan Chase Bank to provide $200 million to pay suppliers, employees and other operating costs during the reorganization. It said it would continue operating its bakeries, outlet stores and distribution centers.

James R. Elsesser, who had been chairman and chief executive officer, resigned both positions effective Wednesday, and the board named Tony Alvarez as CEO, with John Suckow to be chief restructuring officer. Both are with Alvarez & Marsal, a turnaround management firm founded and headed by Alvarez.

Leo Benatar, a member of the board, was elected to be the non-executive chairman.

"IBC has some of the most recognizable and popular baked breads and sweet goods brands in the nation," Alvarez said in a statement. "By filing for protection under Chapter 11 and obtaining...financing, the company should have the liquidity, time and resources necessary to thoroughly identify, assess and address the issues that will enable this company to be successful in the future."

Last month the company missed a second deadline for filing its annual report, after request an extension in May because of a series of investigations into its reserve fund for workers' compensation claims.

The report was due Aug. 27, but the company said it was still not finished because of problems with a financial system it started using in June, uncertainty over results for the current quarter, and questions about its ability to pay its loans this year.

It also said there was a possibility that auditors would include a paragraph in the report saying "there may be substantial doubt about the company's ability to continue as a going concern."

Interstate, with annual sales of $3.5 billion, operates more than 50 bakeries and employs about 34,000, including 600 of them in the Kansas City area.

The company's shares closed at $3.27 on the New York Stock Exchange (news - web sites) Tuesday, down 13 cents.

A call Wednesday morning to Mark Dirkes, vice president for corporate marketing and the company spokesman, was not immediately returned.

posted by Irdial , 8:56 PM Þ 



Ski jacket plus iPod controls all rolled into one. I imagine the jacket will be twice the price as the iPod. But what fun!
posted by mary13 , 8:51 PM Þ 
posted by Irdial , 7:56 PM Þ 

Couldn't get those wavs waving, but found these...

http://ody2000.free.fr/Sons/StarWars/

Now, who's going to mix up the Black Star Album....?

Use the force, hova.
posted by Alun , 6:59 PM Þ 

Sound designer Ben Burtt's responsibility on Star Wars was to create specifically unusual sounds - weapons, vehicles, character and key backgrounds.

Burtt blended the sounds of his TV set and an old 35 mm projector to create the hum of a light saber.
SABER SOUND

Laser blasts are the sound of a hammer on an antenna tower wire
LAZER SOUND



The screech of a TIE Fighter is a drastically altered elephant bellow.
TIE FIGHTER SOUND

Luke Skywalker's landspeeder
The whoosh of Luke Skywalker's landspeeder was achieved by recording the roar the Los Angeles Harbor Freeway through a vacuum-cleaner pipe.

Ewokese language
A language created by altering and layering Tibetan, Mongolian, and Nepali languages
EWOKESE SOUND

Ben Burtt talks more about the origins of his Star Wars Sound creations in this article/interview.
posted by telle goode , 4:22 PM Þ 

I've bee reading Heresies by John Gray. Guaranteed to ruckle with liberals, humanists, marxists, anyone with a westernised post-enlightenment viewpoint actually.
Culled from New Statesman columns apparently.
I notice that Darcus Howe writes a NS column as well, I remember about 10-15 years ago finding his monologues on Channel 4. One man espousing in a bare studio (maybe a lectern), very few and slow camera changes. Wouldn't happen now, even at 23:30 or whatever stupid time it was on.
posted by meau meau , 1:54 PM Þ 

The Israeli arms deal covered by Alun's link is only part of the problem. (BBQ said 5000 as well so it _must_ be true).

This sort of deliberate provocation does the US no favours whatsoever, in fact the best thing the US could have done to temper the middle eastern militants at this stage was to not let the order go through, etc...
posted by meau meau , 10:46 AM Þ 

Iraq - It's all Kerry's fault!"

New York Post
Editorial, September 21

"Surely, terrorists everywhere can only be heartened by Mr Kerry's gloomy description ... At some point, this 'last helicopter out of Baghdad' rhetoric could become a self-fulfilling prophecy: terrorists, encouraged by Mr Kerry's words, step up their attacks - while Americans, equally discouraged, move toward retreat.

"Mr Kerry will have achieved the disaster in Iraq he now describes. Just as defeatism and anti-war protesting (complete with over-the-top lies by, yes, a much younger Mr Kerry) sapped America's will to fight in Vietnam and led to a humiliating loss for America."



Coming soon: Lee Harvey Oswald's ghost blamed for Israel's pre-emptive 'defensive' strike on Iraq's nuclear facilities using newly acquired bunker-busters provided by Mother Theresa.
posted by Alun , 10:44 AM Þ 

most impossible

Que? How so?

Its simply a highly intense self contained beam of static coherent light.

Teleportation was only recently thought to be impossible; "the amount of calculations you would have to perform to do it would only be possible in a computer the size of the universe" or some other such twaddle like he said on the TV one time.

and take a gander at this:



"Impossible" is the greatest swear word of them all. Except when its true.
posted by Irdial , 9:54 AM Þ 

"I ain't got no people. I seen the guys that go around on the ranches alone. That ain't no good. They don't have no fun. After a long time they get mean. They get wantin' to fight all the time. . ."

Jonathan Freedland's column
A survey by pollsters HI Europe earlier this month found that, if Europeans had a vote, they would back Kerry over Bush by a 6 to 1 margin. Bush would win just 6% in Germany, 5% in Spain and a measly 4% in France. No Republican is going to cede turf like that to the enemy.

You would think those numbers would hurt Bush, making clear how unpopular he is in the world. But they don't. If anything they hurt Kerry, suggesting he is the candidate of limp-wristed foreigners and therefore somehow less American.





After the speech, Bush brushed aside a bleak National Intelligence Estimate of Iraq's future that spoke of possibilities ranging from tenuous stability to civil war. Bush characterized the scenarios developed by senior U.S. intelligence officials as "life could be lousy, life could be OK, life could be better. And they were just guessing as to what the conditions might be like."

At a late-night rally Tuesday in Orlando, Fla., Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass. Bush's rival for the presidency, read that comment to his audience and said: "Does that make you feel safer. Does that give you confidence that this president know what he's talking about." Of the guessing by U.S. intelligence officials, Kerry said: "This president ought to be turning that CIA over, upside down if that's all they were doing."

"Whatever we ain't got, that's what you want. God a'mighty, if I was alone I could live so easy. I could go get a job an' work, an no trouble. No mess at all, and when the end of the month come I could take my fifty bucks and go into town and get whatever I want"
posted by Alun , 9:53 AM Þ 

Current reading matter.... "What Is History?" by EH Carr.
posted by Alun , 9:41 AM Þ 

Star Wars. On DVD.

Is the light sabre sound the best (most impossible yet real) sound effect in film history?
posted by Alun , 9:13 AM Þ 

User Stats

On Blogger Since January 2001
Recent Posts 146
Avg Posts Per Week 23
Posts Written 4,567
Words Written 592,338
Outbound Links 3,800
Profile Views 0

Wouldnt it be great to have an online tool that could do a concordance of your blog from your published archives Anthony?

Then it would be magic to list every word in the concordance in a page, each link initiating a search with your search tool so you could serach (yes, serach) through your archive with that list.

Not rocket science, but very very interesting. Then, you could use these concordances to generate uniqueish fingerprints for each blogger, and then, in an audioscrobller style, match bloggers to each other with these fingerprints.

I would run this tool against this blog.

ANTHONY!!!!!!!
posted by Irdial , 9:06 AM Þ 

http://sweetgalz.blogspot.com/

chinyee!!u got blog,neva tell me!!haZ..i link ya kkZ=) cMe rOx
posted by Irdial , 8:37 AM Þ 

Cat Stevens sparks US plane alert
Yusuf Islam (Cat Stevens)
The singer converted to Islam in 1977
A security alert involving the singer who used to be known as Cat Stevens has forced a London-to-Washington flight to be diverted to another US airport.

The plane was already in the air when US officials identified that the singer, whose name is now Yusuf Islam, was on one of their "watch lists".

United Airlines Flight 919 was diverted 600 miles (1000km), landing in Maine.

After an interview, the singer - who converted to Islam in 1977 - was denied entry into the US.

Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officials said the access was denied "on national security grounds", without giving any further details.

Yusuf Islam is now expected to be put on a flight out of America later on Wednesday.

Four years ago, Mr Islam was deported from Israel over allegations that he backed militant Muslims.

Yusuf Islam was born Stephen Demetre Georgiou in London to a Greek Cypriot father and Swedish mother.

Since abandoning a successful music career in the late 1970s, he has devoted himself to advocating and teaching Islam.

One high-profile activity was the founding of a Muslim school in London. [...]


More hypocracy from the number one hyporatic police state.

Get on the peace train you losers.

From catstevens.com :

A recent news story regarding Yusuf Islam (Cat Stevens) being deported and a plane diverted due to his being on a terrorist "watch list" has recently hit the press. CatStevens.Com has not yet spoken to Yusuf or a spokesperson, but we want to assure all readers that Yusuf has in no way supported any terrorist groups or activities. In fact he has a long record of doing just the opposite.

Investigations into Yusuf's own charities and his contributions to others have never shown any terrorist connections. Such accusations are completely ridiculous and unfounded. Yusuf Islam has devoted his life to peace. He lives it and he believes it. His being on any sort of "watch list" is certainly an error. It's also a very sad state of affairs when a man best known as a peace loving pop star can be grouped into the same category Osama Bin Laden just because of his chosen faith.

From "The CNN":

One administration official said the singer had been in the United States as recently as May, and was a recent addition to the list.

The rest of the passengers were screened and continued on to Washington's Dulles International Airport after Islam was taken off the flight.

"They said, Get ready to land,' and then they said 'Welcome to Bangor.' And we though they were joking," one woman passenger said.

"We had no idea we'd been diverted."

The Boeing 747 had about 280 passengers and crew on board when it took off from London's Heathrow Airport, United Air Lines spokesman Jeff Green said.

The plane was met by federal agents on arrival in Bangor, where it was on the ground for about four hours before being allowed to depart, Green said.

It landed at Dulles nearly six hours behind schedule.

According to a TSA spokesman, Islam made it through pre-screening by United Air Lines and was given a boarding pass. [...]

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/09/22/plane.diverted.stevens/index.html

There is so much wrong with this story. First of all, what the HELL are you doing going to the USA Islam? Second, that aircraft didnt tell its passengers that it was being diverted. They simply landed in another place and then were "screened" even though they had done nothing at all save board an air plane, and only one man was on the hypocrites shit list. Imagine if you were flying somewhere and were suddenly kidnapped and diverted to another airport with no warning, by your leave, we have an emergency... any reasonable excuse at all. Imagine how you would feel.

Where on earth is the common sense of the pilots? If Mick Jagger converts to Islam and is on your plane, would you take instructions and divert because he is on some absurd list, or would you leave the cockpit and get an autograph?

Honestly, the STUPIDITY of these people beggars belief.
posted by Irdial , 8:06 AM Þ 

Oh, Oh, Meau Meau
Please design me a bungalow
For a far off land
Where there is no broadband
posted by captain davros , 1:25 AM Þ 
Tuesday, September 21, 2004

Mr sbindon has now fixed the links on his site so these:

Some mp3z (not all are the final version):

wikki

wasted dawn

drops

one of a kind

spacetime

phew


now work.

Who amongst you can ID that stunning, mind blowing track from his DJ set?!!
posted by Irdial , 7:38 PM Þ 

The fund would help countries lay the foundations of democracy by instituting a rule of law and independent courts, a free press

Independent courts?

and a free press?

Has Bush flipped into crypto-Stalinism?

The alien brain-meld is failing, the human host specially selected for its combination of 'status' and disposability hasn't the power to stabilise such complex thought patterns generated by the virus...
posted by meau meau , 6:52 PM Þ 

Musicians on Call
If you have a neighbour, friend or relative who is unable to get to concerts themselves or looking after someone unable to leave their home, now is your chance to nominate them for a 'home-visit'.

Lines will be open from 9.00am on Tuesday 21 st September and will remain open for one week or, the first 1000 calls, whichever is reached first. The criteria are simple: any one, any age, any venue. Just ring free-phone 0800 033 033 to discuss your nomination and, based on your successful application, an orchestral coordinator will be ring you back as soon as possible.
Musicians on Call has the support of 30 orchestras giving it access to over 1500 musicians. But don't worry about the size of your room or the length of the symphony, each visit involves two musicians and will last no longer than one hour!
posted by Alun , 6:38 PM Þ 

Today I propose establishing a democracy fund within the United Nations.

This is a great calling for this great organisation.

The fund would help countries lay the foundations of democracy by instituting a rule of law and independent courts, a free press, political parties and trade unions.

Money from the fund would also help set up voter precincts and polling places, and support the work of election monitors.

To show our commitment to the new democracy fund, the United States will make an initial contribution.

I urge all other nations to contribute as well...

I have faith in the transforming power of freedom. [...]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3677418.stm

Which of you can tell us wether or not the USA has paid its bilion-dollar debt to the UN?
posted by Irdial , 6:32 PM Þ 

knights-errant

Dedfinition: They that comit error and love a building other than TStMA
posted by Irdial , 6:22 PM Þ 


Who is Karen Elliot...?
posted by telle goode , 5:19 PM Þ 

View do most of the good photographs you'll find in UK architecture magazines. Beware of the resizing windows. Plenty for knights-errant to look at.
posted by meau meau , 3:03 PM Þ 
posted by meau meau , 2:46 PM Þ 
posted by meau meau , 2:06 PM Þ 

posted by meau meau , 1:37 PM Þ 

AK proves that he has ESP going on.

News at Ten!!!

PS:

I felt that his initials should be in green, because that is the colour of the energy that I am feeling from his keyboard.
posted by Irdial , 1:06 PM Þ 

Call to legalise file-sharing with taxes
By Mark Ward
BBC News Online technology correspondent

Pop piracy should be decriminalised and the music industry should realise that efforts to stop illegal downloading are doomed, a conference has been told.

iPod and ear buds, Apple
iTunes and other services may have a limited life
Instead the music industry should embrace file-sharers, said technology journalist and author Andrew Orlowski in a keynote speech at the Interactive In The City conference being held in Manchester.

Mr Orlowski said the record labels should look to novel ways to generate cash to support new artists.

One way could be the addition of a small surcharge to net subscription fees which could be shared among artists whose music is being downloaded.


...

"Copyright law is fine. We just need to enforce it in a more enlightened way."

The inclusion of a small surcharge on monthly internet subscription fees that was given to record labels to pay artists could solve the problem, he said. [...]
posted by Alun , 11:54 AM Þ 

The music industry needed to realise that a generation was growing up that was happy to get its pop for free.

Instead of using the law to stop this piracy, said Mr Orlowski, record labels needed to change their tactics.

"Copyright law is fine. We just need to enforce it in a more enlightened way."

The inclusion of a small surcharge on monthly internet subscription fees that was given to record labels to pay artists could solve the problem, he said.

"I do not have kids and I do not have a car but I do not have any objection to paying for roads and schools because it is better that they are there rather than not."

He added that the idea of a surcharge was winning the broad backing of many in the music industry including legendary figure Tony Wilson formerly of Factory Records. [...]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3674270.stm

Who decides who gets what part of this pot? Just because the British are inured to paying absurd taxes like the BBC licence fee doesnt mean that everyone world-wide is going to accept this "solution".

Will anyone who sets up a record label be entitled to a cut of this theoretical pot? And why should record companies get anything at all, why not just distribute this money to every jackass with a guitar?

I for one will not pay extra money on my ISP bill so that The Libertines, The Strokes, $twaddlepeddlingrubbishmerchant can exist. I'm sure there are millions who would not pay for US to exist either. It is better that roads and schools exist, but can anyone with a single braincell claim that the world is a better place with the monopoly intact acting as it currently does? I think not.

This idea is an old one, it was trotted around in the days of DAT, and only the monopoly benefits from media taxes. The internet is not a piece of blank media. You cannot tax as a "solution" to the "problem" of file sharing. I enquoth problem because as you already know, fileshareing has no effect on sales of CDs.

Finally, changing tactics from suing to buying legislation is not a change in tactics at all; both attacks use the law to get money from filesharers.
posted by Irdial , 11:49 AM Þ 

How much longer can this sort of behaviour go on for?

How long have you got?

It will go on forever OR until the sham democracy is permanently dismantled.

But you know this. A rhetorical question I suspect. I like those. Do you?
posted by Irdial , 11:42 AM Þ 

What happened to dynamic range? That's a question that should be asked of record labels, producers, and last but not least, mastering engineers. The question needs to be asked because they're the ones responsible for what's happened to our music. The music we listen to today is nothing more than noise with a beat. It's not because it isn't good music. It's because it lacks dynamic range. When music lacks dynamic range, it lacks punch, emotion, and clarity. The record industry insists on blaming Napster, MP3s, CD burners, and a host of others for the lack of music sales. While there is some truth to their constant whining, they only have themselves to blame for the thievery that's going on among consumers. I'm not an advocate of that thievery. No one has the right to steal someone else's property. However, the music industry needs to reevaluate what it considers to be good music. The music available to the consumer today isn't musical at all. It's best described as anti-music. It's anti-music because the life is being squashed out of it through over compression during the mixing and mastering stages. It's no wonder that consumers don't want to pay for the music that's being produced today. It's over priced and sounds bad. [...]


The Myth Of Radio-Ready CDs. (mastering specifically for radio)
Radio ready is an ambiguous term created by marketing professionals whose only goal is to sell products. It's in your best interest to be an informed artist or producer. Radio is the great leveler. It takes songs that are soft and lacking punch, and brings them up in level to compete with the so called loud songs. In doing so, the natural dynamics of the songs are totally destroyed. But that's not all. It will also take songs that are extremely loud and compressed, and squash them even more. Mastering for radio creates a situation that can actually make songs sound worse than the properly mastered recordings of the competition. Still, many will argue they want a CD mastered so it sounds good on the radio. What they're really saying is they want it to sound as compressed as it does on radio when listening on a home or car stereo system. [...]

http://www.proaudiorx.com/dynamicrange.htm

Oo, E, Oh, Ahhhhh
Oo E Oh Ahhhhh
Oo, E, Oh, Ahhhhh
Oo E Oh Ahhhhh

You know the one!

Thanks to meau2 for that link, which I just HAD to extrapostlate into a fully blown entry. After you RTFM, then read this one:

http://www.proaudiorx.com/dynamiccomments.htm

Which is a list of comments on this "problem". I enquoth the word problem because the "whatever", "I guess" generation doesnt give a fuck about what music sounds like - to them, there is no problem at all. The only thing that they care about is....what exactly?!

As I predicted in 1992, the "people" who are around now dont know what music sounds like. They dont care about the words that experienced people let fly about the sound of music, and so, we are stuck in a world (those of us who have not comitted suicide) where every released recording is deliberately and with malice put through a sonic grinder that destroys its sound from the multitrack to the master. Then, when you get to listen to it on the radio, it has been put through another 20 stages of destruction before it gets to your reciever, and of course, as the article says, it may have been played from a DJ only disc prepared "for radio" which means it is deliberately mashed to pieces so that it "sounds good on KissFM".

Now, where is my button??!??
posted by Irdial , 11:01 AM Þ 

One of the 13 detainees interned for nearly three years as suspected international terrorists was released yesterday from a high security prison by the home secretary, David Blunkett, without any detailed explanation being offered.

The release of the Algerian national, identified only as D, comes just three months after he was said by a special judicial commission to have a "long history of involvement in terrorist support activity" and the ability and commitment to resume that work were he at liberty in Britain.

His solicitor, Natalie Garcia, said last night she had broken the news to him: "He was absolutely choked. All he could say was 'I don't understand'. He feels he's been locked up for three years just on a whim."

Mr Blunkett in a statement to MPs said yesterday he had made the decision because "the weight of evidence" no longer justified D's continued detention [...] Guardian

Looks like Blunkett's'terrorists' under random detention policy is as well thought out as the rest of his strategies. How much longer can this sort of behaviour go on for?

HE FAILS IT
posted by meau meau , 10:49 AM Þ 

The US elections; Isn't this what counts?.

I heard J*K speaking on the radio last night, it's not just his circumloqacious phraseology, that man has no dynamic range whatsoever, he modulates his voice for emphasis but like all good chart toppers it feels compressed to gnat's brain size. There is nothing to attract the wandering attention because his reedy voice NEEDS dynamics he can't get enough density into his modulations and it still sounds as though he's talking from within a cardboard box.
posted by meau meau , 10:20 AM Þ 

NO2ID has officially launched, and it appears that they are gaining momentum. The real question however, is this: Are they going to make the same mistakes that the StopWar people did?

StopWar had unprecedented momentum, nationwide grassroots support, they pulled off the biggest demonstration ever, that went off without a hitch and...

They failed.

NO2ID has a similar task in front of it. Even if they gather together an identical amount of support across the nation, how are they going to guarantee that the ID card fiasco is not going to be forced upon the people of Britiain?

What plans do they have to ensure that there is no failure? Failure is not an option, and it should never be a fallback position. So, what are they going to do?

The NO2ID problem is different to the StopWar problem. The UK sent a small number of troops to another country to invade it. There is nothing that the population of the UK could do to physically stop this from happening.

ID cards are however, another matter.

In the case of ID cards, the army that is "going to war" is the population of the UK itself. This means that if NO2ID can gather enough support, they become the generals of that army. They can then command every soldier to break the law and refuse to be processed (fingerprinted and photographed). N02ID can win this if they have the will to turn the country into a nation of refusnik shock troops who are ready to break the law rather than submit to being processed into the ID card system.

If they are not willing to do this or something very similar to this, if they are soley going down the lobbying route, if they plan demonstrations, then they will FAIL, just like StopWar failed.

Their sole purpose now should be recruitment, both ideological and membership. They need to use every networking tool available to spread the message about why ID cards are terrible, to make sure that every Sharon, Tracy, Pat and John in the UK understands it and takes it as their creed.

They need to set up a decentralized communication network, so that commands can be sent out to all of these people, wether they are on the net or not. This means assigning sargeants with email to communicate with 20 privates each who do not, so that when a command to act is made, or a corrective message is drafted, everyone gets it within one day of the signal being sent.

Relying on the media is suicide, because they always put across the governments side as if it were equal in weight. There must be a total dissconect between the NO2ID army and media sourced communication, in fact, one of the main purposes of the sargeant/private 20 to 1 system is to be sure that poison ideas cannot inflitrate the minds of our troops and distract them.

If they are not building this army, if they dont see this in terms of a war, then all is lost. ID cards will be introduced just as Iraq was invaded against the will of the British public. NO2ID must see the coming defeat and plan around it so that it cannot possibly happen.

http://www.spy.org.uk/spyblog/archives/000458.html

PS:

We all know that the Austrailians were sucessful in quashing their own governments ID card proposal; has anyone from NO2ID contacted the members of the group that organized that sucessful campaign? Sharing notes on the sort of messages that work and the ones that do not would be invaluable.
posted by Irdial , 9:30 AM Þ 
Monday, September 20, 2004

Put Away Your Hankies...a message from Michael Moore
9/20/04

Dear Friends,

Enough of the handwringing! Enough of the doomsaying! Do I have to come there and personally calm you down? Stop with all the defeatism, OK? Bush IS a goner -- IF we all just quit our whining and bellyaching and stop shaking like a bunch of nervous ninnies. Geez, this is embarrassing! The Republicans are laughing at us. Do you ever see them cry, "Oh, it's all over! We are finished! Bush can't win! Waaaaaa!"

Hell no. It's never over for them until the last ballot is shredded. They are never finished -- they just keeping moving forward like sharks that never sleep, always pushing, pulling, kicking, blocking, lying.

They are relentless and that is why we secretly admire them -- they just simply never, ever give up. Only 30% of the country calls itself "Republican," yet the Republicans own it all -- the White House, both houses of Congress, the Supreme Court and the majority of the governorships. How do you think they've been able to pull that off considering they are a minority? It's because they eat you and me and every other liberal for breakfast and then spend the rest of the day wreaking havoc on the planet.

Look at us -- what a bunch of crybabies. Bush gets a bounce after his convention and you would have thought the Germans had run through Poland again. The Bushies are coming, the Bushies are coming! Yes, they caught Kerry asleep on the Swift Boat thing. Yes, they found the frequency in Dan Rather and ran with it. Suddenly it's like, "THE END IS NEAR! THE SKY IS FALLING!"

No, it is not. If I hear one more person tell me how lousy a candidate Kerry is and how he can't win... Dammit, of COURSE he's a lousy candidate -- he's a Democrat, for heavens sake! That party is so pathetic, they even lose the elections they win! What were you expecting, Bruce Springsteen heading up the ticket? Bruce would make a helluva president, but guys like him don't run -- and neither do you or I. People like Kerry run.

Yes, OF COURSE any of us would have run a better, smarter, kick-ass campaign. Of course we would have smacked each and every one of those phony swifty boaty bastards down. But WE are not running for president -- Kerry is. So quit complaining and work with what we have. Oprah just gave 300 women a... Pontiac! Did you see any of them frowning and moaning and screaming, "Oh God, NOT a friggin' Pontiac!" Of course not, they were happy. The Pontiacs all had four wheels, an engine and a gas pedal. You want more than that, well, I can't help you. I had a Pontiac once and it lasted a good year. And it was a VERY good year.

My friends, it is time for a reality check.

1. The polls are wrong. They are all over the map like diarrhea. On Friday, one poll had Bush 13 points ahead -- and another poll had them both tied. There are three reasons why the polls are b.s.: One, they are polling "likely voters." "Likely" means those who have consistently voted in the past few elections. So that cuts out young people who are voting for the first time and a ton of non-voters who are definitely going to vote in THIS election. Second, they are not polling people who use their cell phone as their primary phone. Again, that means they are not talking to young people. Finally, most of the polls are weighted with too many Republicans, as pollster John Zogby revealed last week. You are being snookered if you believe any of these polls.

2. Kerry has brought in the Clinton A-team. Instead of shunning Clinton (as Gore did), Kerry has decided to not make that mistake.

3. Traveling around the country, as I've been doing, I gotta tell ya, there is a hell of a lot of unrest out there. Much of it is not being captured by the mainstream press. But it is simmering and it is real. Do not let those well-produced Bush rallies of angry white people scare you. Turn off the TV! (Except Jon Stewart and Bill Moyers -- everything else is just a sugar-coated lie).

4. Conventional wisdom says if the election is decided on "9/11" (the fear of terrorism), Bush wins. But if it is decided on the job we are doing in Iraq, then Bush loses. And folks, that "job," you might have noticed, has descended into the third level of a hell we used to call Vietnam. There is no way out. It is a full-blown mess of a quagmire and the body bags will sadly only mount higher. Regardless of what Kerry meant by his original war vote, he ain't the one who sent those kids to their deaths -- and Mr. and Mrs. Middle America knows it. Had Bush bothered to show up when he was in the "service" he might have somewhat of a clue as to how to recognize an immoral war that cannot be "won." All he has delivered to Iraq was that plasticized turkey last Thanksgiving. It is this failure of monumental proportions that is going to cook his goose come this November.

So, do not despair. All is not over. Far from it. The Bush people need you to believe that it is over. They need you to slump back into your easy chair and feel that sick pain in your gut as you contemplate another four years of George W. Bush. They need you to wish we had a candidate who didn't windsurf and who was just as smart as we were when WE knew Bush was lying about WMD and Saddam planning 9/11. It's like Karl Rove is hypnotizing you -- "Kerry voted for the war...Kerry voted for the war...Kerrrrrryyy vooootted fooooor theeee warrrrrrrrrr..."

Yes...Yes...Yesssss...He did! HE DID! No sense in fighting now...what I need is sleep...sleeep...sleeeeeeppppp...

WAKE UP! The majority are with us! More than half of all Americans are pro-choice, want stronger environmental laws, are appalled that assault weapons are back on the street -- and 54% now believe the war is wrong. YOU DON'T EVEN HAVE TO CONVINCE THEM OF ANY OF THIS -- YOU JUST HAVE TO GIVE THEM A RAY OF HOPE AND A RIDE TO THE POLLS. CAN YOU DO THAT? WILL YOU DO THAT?

Just for me, please? Buck up. The country is almost back in our hands. Not another negative word until Nov. 3rd! Then you can bitch all you want about how you wish Kerry was still that long-haired kid who once had the courage to stand up for something. Personally, I think that kid is still inside him. Instead of the wailing and gnashing of your teeth, why not hold out a hand to him and help the inner soldier/protester come out and defeat the forces of evil we now so desperately face. Do we have any other choice?

Yours,

Michael Moore
www.michaelmoore.com
mmflint@aol.com
posted by Ken , 10:09 PM Þ 

Drinking Mug Klein Bottles - for the Thirsty Topologist

-- now back in stock! --

Two Klein Bottle Drinking Mugs. One empty, the other full

This looks like a glass cup. But wait -- it has two big chambers connected by a hollow handle. In fact, it's actually a Klein Bottle.

Hot ziggitty -- a Klein Bottle that delivers liquid straight to your waiting lips. Yep - you heard me right. You can drink right from this cup. Pour in beer and it's a Klein Stein. Would you believe Einstein's Klein Stein?

Klein Bottle Mug Cross Section

This cheezy diagram shows a cross section through the Acme Klein Bottle Drinking Mug. With a single hole, it's a true genus-1 manifold and topologically identical to our other Klein Bottles.
Acme's Klein Bottle Mug holds about a pint. There's ~230 mL in the outer chamber (which topologists will recognize as equivalent to the inner chamber) and ~250 mL in the inner chamber (which topologists claim to be the same as the outer chamber). You can fill the inside with coffee and the outside with tea. Or Coke and Pepsi. Or Chardonnay and Zinfandel. However, realize that the outer chamber (which topologically connects to the inner chamber) is almost impossible to clean, so don't pour in any milk. [...]

http://www.kleinbottle.com/drinking_mug_klein_bottle.htm
posted by Irdial , 8:13 PM Þ 

The All Music Guide is definitely using automated feedback messages to deal with user complaints! See:

A Message From allmusic.com Regarding Your Feedback

AMG Response
to me
More options 8:14am (5 hours ago)

Thanks for your feedback. We realized when we designed the tab system that we would make some folks unhappy, but we felt the trade off was worth it. If we stuck to the one page approach it would limit our ability to add additional information. The one page design approach just doesn't scale as we expand content. Its a particular problem with artists with extensive discographies. We think that once you take some time exploring the new site, you'll see that there is much more information available now than there was on the old site. The addition of the Songs and Credits tabs are both good examples of information that just wouldnt be possible in a one page format. We hope you continue to visit and enjoy allmusic.com

Please visit the Site Guide and the FAQs on allmusic for more explanation of the new features and formats.

Best Regards,
AMG

----- Original Message from on 9/18/04 3:18 PM -----

I am sure you have heard this enough, but your new site site design is a disaster. There are so many problems with it, I don't have time to name them all. From the "read more" button instead of a full album reviews, to the inability to go back without getting the POST-DATA interference, to the moronic flash-twirling thing on top. I was once an active All Music Guide user (from 1999-2004.) Now, I am currently trying to get my music information elsewhere and also telling my friends to stop using your site, and to no avail, as it usually turns out that they have stopped using AMG as well. The bottom line is this. You may be happy with AMG's new look, but you have lost a long time user, which is sad, and that is your loss. Bad business, Bye Bye.
posted by telle goode , 6:30 PM Þ 
posted by Irdial , 6:10 PM Þ 

Monday, September 20, 2004, 8:30 a.m.
20/09/04

This morning on The Current, a group of teenaged girls in Boston set about combating the negative impact of music, which contains violent and sexist lyrics, by starting their own radio station.

Want to know more? Visit the The Current website:
http://www.cbc.ca/thecurrent/

....

I just listened to this story, fantastic! Should be archived soon.
posted by mary13 , 5:46 PM Þ 


Johnny Stewart Distressed Baby Raccoons
Model CT104A
Chittering babies attract adults.
posted by telle goode , 4:34 PM Þ 

posted by meau meau , 2:43 PM Þ 

Sonic Arts Network presents The Agents of Impurity - a Night of Sound,
Poetry and Sound Poetry

Sonic Arts Network invites you to The Agents of Impurity, a special free
broadcast benefit event for Resonance FM on Sunday 17 October, 7.00pm

The Museum of Garden History,
Lambeth Palace Road
London
SE1 7LB
Tube: Lambeth North

SAN is honoured to present an exclusive presentation of the work of Henri
Chopin. Chopin has been a tireless explorer of the grain of the voice since
the 50s and his work opens new ways of listening beyond the separation
between music and language. Kenneth Goldsmith will interview Henri Chopin
prior to the presentation.

We also present an exclusive performance from Caroline Bergvall whose sound
poetry represents the disintegration of speech in spoken performance and a
meeting point between various languages; physical and verbal, French and
English, live voice and ventriloquised technology. Bergvall will present a
complete performance of "About Face", a project that uses the live, oral
performance of a written text to explore speech residues, spittles,
hesitations and micro-particles of sense.

Also performing will be Kenneth Goldsmith, mastermind of the epochal
ubu.com. Goldsmith¹s writing has been described as the most ³exhaustive and
beautiful collage work yet produced in poetry² by Publishers Weekly.

Sue Tompkins, another of our special guests, presents "More Cola Wars",
performance poetry that moves from the page to the voice, from speech to
song, from song to signal, from signal to pure sound. A process of writing
and a process of thought revealed in poetic performance.

The evening is rounded off by the London debut of Birmingham¹s Frank
Cougar, inhabitant of a surreal and enigmatic world between music and the spoken
word, cabaret and a half remembered Raymond Chandler novel, darkness and
the void.

http://www.sonicartsnetwork.org/
posted by telle goode , 2:42 PM Þ 

posted by meau meau , 2:34 PM Þ 



(the alternative was, how shall we say...)
posted by meau meau , 2:24 PM Þ 



The line of questers. All failed.




The stairwell ("spiral of lies") at The Express.
posted by Irdial , 1:34 PM Þ 

A tale of woe from a failed knight...

I invited a friend to visit Axe with me.
He arrived just before 9, and we're a 10 minute drive from Axe.
But! 'Wife and child will come,they're getting ready, just nip home to get them'
We arrive at Axe after 10. Distraught. Plans tattered. It's queued to fuck.
We leave.

Even Monument was crowded, so no solace there.

So now I'll have to resort to string pulling to get up Axe. But just where did I leave those strings?
posted by Alun , 9:29 AM Þ 

iPodDownload 1.0 Mirror

First of all: I'm a long-time Apple customer. I really like Apple's products, both software and hardware. The products are easy to use and innovative. But I dislike Apple's "cease and desist" politics only because someone has developed a tiny and helpful plug-in for iTunes wich allows user to copy their songs bought through the iTunes Music Store to another Mac. While introducing iTunes Music Store this was Apple's biggest argument for their own Digital Rights Management technology called "FairPlay": Buy a song and use it on three different Macs. I think the guys at Apple should read their own credo more often: http://www.apple.com/thinkdifferent/.

You can download the file by clicking this link:
iPodDownload1.0.sit

Another Mirror provided by Chris:
http://www.dudewheresmyblog.com/verbophobia/2004/09/ipoddownload_10.html

Note: I'm not the developer of this plug-in, I'm only providing this mirror because Apple has forced the developer to remove the download from his own web-site. When do you think this mirror will be offline because of Apple's lawyers? -Write me an e-mail and let us bet! ;-)

posted by Irdial , 2:38 AM Þ 
Sunday, September 19, 2004

Who among you entered therin?

This man got in, but he is a blasphemer.

TKOTStMA

will punish him!
posted by Irdial , 9:44 PM Þ 

posted by Irdial , 9:27 PM Þ 

We have another set of events coming up for anyone who's interested.
posted by Ken , 7:34 PM Þ 
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