((If you’re tagged in this note on Facebook, it’s because I value your opinion and am interested to hear what you have to say. Or because I’m pretending to value your opinion and would be interested in proving you wrong. 😉 Either way, you may want to read the first […]
Music
130 posts
Lateralus is – hands down – my favourite song. Last week, I found myself on its Wikipedia page and my mind exploded a little bit more. Counting between pauses, the syllables in Maynard James Keenan’s vocals during the verses form the first few Fibonacci numbers, ascending and descending… The Fibonacci […]
In a Saturday op-ed in the NY Times (via Techdirt), Billy Bragg argues that musicians deserve royalties for the use of their music on the web. Bebo, a social networking site which rivals Facebook and MySpace in popularity in the UK, was recently sold to AOL for $850 million. Bragg […]
The other day, I wrote a (ridiculously long) post announcing my commitment to free culture, and more specifically, to free music. I didn’t expect anyone to read the entire thing, but my friend, John, not only read it but also responded to it on Facebook. I’m not sure what his […]
Over the past few months, I have been researching and reflecting on free culture and what it means for my music. Free culture is about freedom, not price. Today, the vast majority of music (and other art) is not free due to a combination of technology, law and economics. The […]
Language is important. It shapes our view, our thinking. It’s necessary for our expression and understanding. It’s important to pay attention to the terms we choose. The commonly used phrase “intellectual property rights” is loaded and problematic. Intellectual property rights: Ambiguous; it lumps copyright, patent and trademark law all under […]
Music alone is often not enough to catch your attention. I hear a lot of good music all the time, but I couldn’t possibly come to love and know all of it. I find what makes the difference between the music that crosses the threshold and that which remains unnoticed […]
The latest Nine Inch Nails album has been released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license (via Lessig). While the license isn’t quite free as in freedom, it’s a huge step forward; it allows sharing (copying, distribution, performance) and remixing, though only for non-commercial purposes. Reznor, now label-free, released the album […]
Bob Lefsetz thinks that MTV is responsible for Barrack Obama’s success. Maybe “thinks” is the wrong word. The outlet has featured a rainbow of human beings. Of all ethnicities. Not only black, but brown and multiracial… I won’t say those under thirty five are without prejudice. But I will say […]