i’ve been keeping pretty busy with work and life (more life than work lately, but i prefer it that way. even if the life shit isn’t all that great).

i haven’t been able to get out with my new nikon d5000 as much as i’d like, which is disappointing. i’m working on that though. i have been taking a beginners class from cord camera which is teaching me some stuff about my camera that i didn’t figure out on my own. hell, i even read the manual for the goddamn thing (and so far 2 photography books as well). i’m looking forward to the warm weather so hopefully i can get out and take some pictures. i’m not too comfortable taking it out into the snow and slush just yet.

here’s the new dillinger escape plan song/video. shit is \m/ as fuck

(yes i preordered their album and yes i opted for the $80 box set b/c i am a huge nerd)

while i’m on music, east of the wall (which used to be called the postman syndrome) is putting out what would have been the 2nd postman album. the only catch is that they need 100 people to preorder it so they can do a proper release, otherwise it’ll just be an itunes only type thing. so if you like good bands that are doing it diy then go over there to their site and preorder the shit. i promise you won’t be disappointed, especially if you like some weird-kind-of-mathy-metal music.

so that’s it for now i guess.

i know i still have a puppy at home, but i already kind of miss when he was this small…

i cannot believe how incredibly dumb the last line of this ad is.  while i don’t really find the content objectionable (at least it’s not a personal or completely false attack), the last line is just laughable.  the part about “this crisis… would be obama’s first crisis… in this chair”

wouldn’t it be mccain’s first crisis in this chair as well?  he’s never been president before either!

i know they crank these things out in like 8 hours, but you’d think someone would put a litte bit more thought into it than this.

so really, the whole point of this post is to talk about a particular awkward situation that i’m sure a lot of you have been in.  the previously mentioned coworker and i decided to sit outside.  if you’ve been by the campus pot belly’s you know that they have a few tables out there and most of them are baking in the sun all day.  we choose one that was next to the building but not in the shade, cause it’s hella nice out today and the sun was very nice.

anyway, after we’d been out there for a few minutes (long enough to eat 1/2 my sandwich) two ladies walk past our table and one of them turns to us (me) and says “will you reserve that table over there?” *pointing to the one table in the shade*  she continues on to say “just tell them two hot, older,  very cranky women want to sit there.”  her friend (found out later, sister) kind of looked at us apologetically and they continued on in to the store.  i would not have described either of these women as “hot” but i know a lot of people have very distorted self images (probably myself included).

now, did i go out of my way to keep an eye on the table (which was behind me and around a corner so i would have to strain around to even see the it, let alone keep someone from sitting at it)? no, of course not.  oh and never mind that there are actually two doors to the joint, and it would have been highly plausible for someone to exit the door we aren’t sitting near and snag their table without us ever knowing.

what baffled me even more was there were two nice looking dudes in blue scrubs sitting at the very next table. why she choose us to single out for her selfish table preservation is beyond me.  no wait, i’m going to attribute it to my amazing good looks and charm.

anyway, after a few minutes the speaker exits and tells me what a good job we’ve done because her sister is “one mean lady” (or something to that effect).  yeah, great job by us.

what i hate is, why put a complete stranger into such an awkward situation in the first place?  it really bothers me that people choose to do this.  it’s one thing if you are already sitting at a table or seat and have to get up for a minute.  it is acceptable in that situation to ask someone to keep your seat.  it is also acceptable to do so in movie theaters or other “first come first serve” style seating venues.  but to ask someone to save a seat for you  before you’ve even sat down is a little ridiculous.

what happens if someone takes that table?  how am i supposed to prevent that from happening other than to polietly ask them to vacate?  how does the original person respond when this happens?  we were lucky this time that it wasn’t very busy and that school isn’t in session.

it just boggles the mind that people will put a complete stranger into such an easily compromised position.

lately i’ve been reading the agitator a lot, which i guess is technically a libertarian blog.  what i tend to like about it is the author (radley balko) covers government waste, police state, and general stupidity on both sides of the spectrum (dem and repub) pretty equally.  granted, it has more of a liberal slant because libertarianism is definitely more left than right on a lot of issues, especially social issues.

i’ve always identified myself as an economic conservative and a social liberal.  i tend to find value in government social programs but at the same time like the idea of lower taxes and less government intervention in business.  i don’t really know where this puts me, but generally i lean more left when voting.  in the recent primaries i voted republican, moreso because i thought the dems had a better handle on their candidates than the repbus.  (i wanted ron paul, for what it’s worth)

i’ll freely admit i’m not an obama freak.  i don’t see too much in his policy to scream out “OH MY GOD THIS MAN IS JESUS” like a lot of other people.  i like some of his ideas (a renewed interest in science and technology, especially related to alternative fuels) but really dislike his complete disregard for new oil drilling (yes, even in the ANWAR) and his stance on no new nuclear power.  as far as him as a person, i think he’s just like any other politician, albeit a much more polished and better orator than we’ve seen for quite some time.  he’s probably better than clinton (billy, not wifey) in the speech giving realm even.

mccain on the other hand…. well, i would’ve voted for him 8 years ago when he seemed like more of a maverick and less of a rank and file republican.  i don’t find his support of the iraq war very comforting, and his selection of sarah palin really screams desperation to me (although it seems to be working, based on the latest polls).  on the subject of sarah palin, i think she’s exactly what mccain says we don’t need in obama; inexperienced, shady, and overall just a weak leader.  granted, she’s pretty hot, so there’s that i guess.  beyond that, i find the republican view of less freedom = more security very scary and something that i think needs to be avoided completely if we are to really keep america great.  i don’t think i need to get into the recent republican love of religious conservatism and their staunch opposition to abortion and gay marriage.

so who am i going to vote for?  right now i’m leaning towards obama.  not because i feel so great about his candidacy, but rather because i feel not so great about mccain’s.  i’d rather give the democrats a few years to fuck it up in new ways than let the republicans continue their current course of fuckary.

but yeah, politics is like religion.  everyone has an opinion, and they always think their opinion is the only one that’s correct or matters.  i guess i’m no different, sadly…

this commercial has started playing a lot lately here.  while i don’t really find the content of the ad obectionable (i always think public awareness is a good thing) the tone of it is way too fearmonger-ish. the website has some useful information, but i really wish they would have toned down the ad some.

the main concern seems to be over avian bird flu (which has been spotted in ohio, though in low risk cases only).  i guess some warning is better than no info or head in the sand syndrome.

but just remember… IT WILL HAPPEN AGAIN *dum dum duummmmmmm*

who writes this stuff?

anyway, i’ve been thinking a lot about that community and the distribution method there. the site is all torrents (of course) as they offer the fastest distribution possible. they also allow the site administrators to basically avoid a lot of legal trouble by hosting nothing on the site but the torrent files. this is a very common setup in the “piracy” world. i hate to use that word to describe the community, because i think, especially related to music, these sites are the future and someday these “pirates” may be looked back on as innovators and forward thinkers.

so if you’ve never been a member of one of these file sharing communities before, the way they tend to work is thus: how much you download is tracked. as you download the amount of data you’ve downloaded is stored in your profile on the site. your download total is then matched up with the amount of data you’ve uploaded to give a “ratio.” this ratio is then used to track your status on the site, with penalties for people that do not keep their ratio high enough (essentially not sharing what you’ve downloaded).

this tracking accomplishes a couple of things. first, it helps to keep things available for other users longer. it’s in the user’s best interest to keep something “seeded” to allow other users to download it as well (as this helps their ratio by uploading data). second, it helps to keep file transfer speeds up, as again it is best for the users to keep things open on their end. the more people you can potentially download from, the faster your download will be. that’s really the essence behind torrent technology in the first place. lastly, tracking a user’s ratio is good for the community as a whole. it promotes sharing and helps to keep the community growing, in regards to the amount of music available and shared.

so how can this model be applied to a “legitimate” music distribution source? i think that most people that are a part of these communities (and these communities do contain artists and bands as well as your average music fan) realize that what they are doing is taking something from an artist and not providing the compensation they deserve. the majority of these people i think are fed up with the price of music, they way they are treated by record labels, and a general overabundance of music that just kind of sucks. there are plenty of great bands out there, but finding them is almost impossible by going to the record store or listening to the radio anymore (don’t even get me started on mtv or vh1). most of that music is so tightly controlled by record labels that it’s hard to find things new and interesting.

the system in place already on these sites is pretty well designed. these sites have been through a few iterations now, and the community and policies used are well developed. i don’t think the system needs to change in the way it works, but i think that it can be adapted to a pay model for music distribution, which in the long run would benefit both music listeners and artists (and even to an extent record labels). here’s what i would suggest.

• the base fee for a site could be $5 – $10 per month. i think it’s already been proven that people are willing to pay for monthly services as long as those services provide what they need and are updated frequently. take a look at the popularity of MMOs or netflix and you’ll see that people are willing to pay monthly for entertainment.

• keep the ratios, and make them hold an incentive. what i think would work well in this regard would be a fee adjustment for uploading and keeping a “good ratio.” for example, as long as your ratio for a particular month is say, 1.00+, then you save a certain amount of money off the next month’s fee. if your ratio is in the range from 0.75-1.00, then you save still, but not as much as if you had a higher ratio. the same would go for uploading a quality rip or fulfilling a user request. you could save a certain amount of money for any requests filled, or new uploads that you provide.

• the record labels have to give up some control. that’s the biggest hurdle to any of the new age p2p type sharing communities or systems. the record labels would need to provide the servers to host the site, but they should not provide the content (yet…). they need to let users upload from their own collections. this is especially true in the formative stages of this kind of service. as cds and other physical media become less and less available, and all music is initially released digitally, the need for users to share their own collections will become less necessary. but until that time, record labels have to give up their physical control of the product and rather let their control come from the distribution.

• artists need to have a stake in it too. the sites themselves could be owned by record labels, but they should allow artists to receive compensation when their music is added. because the site tracks users, torrents, and all kinds of other data, it would be easy to track the amount of downloads an artist receives. this should allow for a good profit sharing amongst the parties involved. in fact, i would argue that the labels themselves should only make profit from ads. all download dividends should be given directly to the artist.

• file formats and quality should still be enforced. i think the best aspect of these communities now is their “snobbish” approach to digital music quality. i think this absolutely needs to stay the same. i think it is in the best interest of everyone involved to have the highest quality product available, as well as to only reward those users that conform to those quality standards. the policing should continue to be done by community members with assistance from some paid employees.

by moving these sites from the underground to the mainstream you gain acceptance from the public at large. you also open the community up for a much broader range of music and opinions. while many people might feel special because they are a member of these communities, i think that attitude might be the most damaging to something like this in the long run. as it is now, music is controlled by large corporations that really have no desire to promote or manage an artist properly. they only care about the bottom line. i think a system such as i’ve outlined above still allows them to maintain their bottom line (granted not to the tune of millions of dollars, but really who expects that to keep up?) as well as provide a method for distribution of any and all artists.

could you imagine if you could hook up to an online music repository that contained literally hundreds of thousands of releases via your xbox 360 or other home media center? that’s the potential for something like this, if only the recording industry would get off their asses and do something about it. because, i guarantee if they don’t, someone else will (and already have, but to the loss of the music industry).

so instead of spending time searching for info on this i thought i’d implement a little experiment here. if you know of any good articles related to this idea, post them in the comments.

later in the movie when malkovitch is portraying teddy kgb (a part of the movie so completely full of classic one liners that it itself is probably worth an entire blog post) i started to think about the infusion of “catch phrases” or movie line quotes into everyday speech.  seinfeld is a particularly good example.  there are many lines from that show that i say daily without really realizing that i’m quoting the show.  some phrases, like  “not that there’s anything wrong with that” are probably forgotten to even be from that show by a lot of people.  someday that phrase may still be popular, and people will not remember the show it came from.

i think the phenomena of quoting lines from movies back and forth is a way that people  show a shared culture.  in this country we don’t have a uniform set of religious experiences, cultural traits, or art.  what we have is a shared culture of media.  i think most people in this country have seen at least one movie in their lives.  letting other people know you’ve seen a movie is a good way to set some common ground between you.   i think it helps to create a bond between individuals and generate a sense of shared experiences and culture.

it can still be pretty annoying to witness sometimes though…