Ethan Johnson’s The Compleat A-List.
Looks like my wish for a more media-enabled Blackberry is about to come true. Of course just because it’s coming doesn’t mean it’s coming to Verizon, where I just signed a contract. But any progess is good progress.
Techdirt on the RIAA’s last profitable business model.
The most recent Web 2.0 lottery was held- and Grouper won.
Tags: kents news, links
Susan Getgood on the Gatekeeper Debate: “A bunch of white guys linking around.” A good read, and I largely agree with her point, even though I’m sure she’d say I perpetuate the problem.
Shelley Powers takes on a roomful of rowdy commenters. I really like her writing, even though I know she could punch me in the nose at any second.
Matt Craven on the echo chamber chamber chamber chamber…
Mathew Ingram on a better, funnier Digg. I always find at least one hilarious thing every time I look at Fark.
Dave Winer has begun using a Blackberry, which is a good thing for the rest of us, because he will drag applications out of developers and, if all else fails, write them himself.
The format of the New York Times’ Newsriver that Dave writes about is exactly the way mobile content ought to be pushed- though I’d like to see it updated more frequently. There’s nothing to set up, no registration, just quick and easy like mobile content ought to be. Hey Dwight, how about something like this for the Chronicle?
I have used a Blackberry (or Crackberry, as they are often referred to) for years, recently having the good fortune to lose my old one, which required that I buy a new one. That post contains my mostly positive thoughts about my Blackberry- including the best feature. The model I have lets me connect my laptop to Verizon’s wireless broadband network.
It works great in Bandera, where Verizon can hear me now, but not so well in Concan, where it cannot. The best use of course is in airports and hotels in order to avoid high daily connection rates.
Here are some things I really want for my Blackberry. Hey Dave, can you help a brother out?
1) I want a media player that is easy to install and works. I pay for Verizon’s broadband service, so I want to be able to use it. Any of the features on the Sprint phone that Dave and I both got for free would be a good start. The Sirius Radio capability alone is enough to love that phone.
2) I want an application on my Blackberry that will let me listen to my office voice mail via email, the way I do at the office. For years my voice mail has been delivered to my email inbox, where I listen to it via the possibly abandoned Lucent Voice Player. It sounds silly if you’ve never tried it, but once you get used to getting clickable voice mail via email, you’ll never go back.
3) I want some reasonably priced GPS functionality. My Blackberry has GPS, but as far as I can tell only for 911 calls, etc.
4) And of course, I want to have Blackberry network capability in a Treo, but that’s a gift for another Christmas I suppose.
The biggest impediment to writing killer Blackberry apps, in my opinion, is the lack of a flash memory drive. With all that extra, swappable, memory, it would be a breeze to expand the Blackberry’s relatively meager media offerings.
Hopefully Dave will figure out a way to get us there anyway.
Stowe Boyd talks today about fame as a motivator for blogging. His piece originates from the recent gatekeeper debates and was inspired by an article in the New York Times exploring the general concept of fame as a motivator of human behavior.
There’s a lot of interesting stuff here, and I want to add my thoughts, specifically as it relates to fame as a motivator for bloggers in general and, because Stowe mentioned me is his post, me in particular.
Here’s the quote from the New York Times article I want to start with:
“People with an overriding desire to be widely known to strangers are different from those who primarily covet wealth and influence. Their fame-seeking behavior appears rooted in a desire for social acceptance, a longing for the existential reassurance promised by wide renown.”
I think that’s generally true. Paris Hilton seems to me to be the the poster child for this sort of motivation. Of course the financial rewards of fame, however undeserved, can lead some to hide one goal behind another.
The other thing that occurs to me is that to be “widely known to strangers” is the badge not only of fame for fame’s sake, but also of being a visible and valued part of a process. The postman in our neighborhood is widely known to and valued by many, but he’s not famous.
In other words, inclusion in a process can make you known to strangers but not necessarily famous.
Is fame a motivator for my blogging? It’s a fair question.
We must be careful, however, to remember that those of us who lament the gatekeeping issue all have our individual motivations. Fame, inclusion, jealousy, logic and just the love of a spirited debate probably all fall in the mix somewhere. The key is to sift through the collateral motivations and identify the emotive reaction that leads you to pound out a response whenever the issues arises.
By pound out, I hope to mean write a heartfelt, but thoughtful, rebuttal. Not just calling the other side assholes like Mike Arrington does. Or dismissing them out of hand, like Scoble sometime does. When I am arguing with someone in real life and they call me an asshole, I know I have them beat.
I don’t blog to be famous. In my mind that would be like playing jacks to get famous. As I pointed out in the post that got this last debate started, you can be the most read blogger in the world and nobody in the real world will ever hear or read your name.
And I certainly don’t blog for money. I am on record over and over again about the folly that is blogging for riches.
But, upon reflection, there is an element of recognition that, if I am to be honest, does come in to play, at least indirectly.
I rarely talk about my real job on this blog, because it is largely unrelated to what I write about and a lot of what I do is subject to rules and agreements regarding confidentiality. But the fact is that I am very well known in my industry. I’m not going to belabor the point, but I’ll give one small example. Not long ago, some of my partners and I went to another city to interview some lateral hire candidates. When we walked into the conference room to introduce ourselves, the senior partner of the group we were interviewing commented that they already knew me because “everybody knows Kent- he’s famous.” We all laughed, but the fact is that I work on a lot of high profile stuff, I do a lot of writing in old media and I speak at seminars and conventions across the country.
I also have written a bunch of songs, a few of which are on records and I was a major player in the internet message board space during Bubble 1.0.
None of this makes me truly famous, but it does result in being widely known to strangers. In the real world.
But very little of that pre-existing recognition translates into the blogosphere.
On the one hand, that is appealing to me, because it gives me a chance to earn my stripes again. But sometimes, deep in the back of my mind, I find myself getting a little irritated when people who would be very pleased to include me in any real world conversation ignore me in the blogosphere. That sounds petty even as I type it, but it’s true. I don’t dwell on those thoughts and I try to ignore them, but they happen.
I don’t think that’s about fame, though. I think it’s a matter of what you’re used to and your expectations, right or wrong, that you’re as smart and valuable in the blogosphere as you are in the real world. I joked in a post the other day that if I were starting over, I’d blow my vacation money on a few conferences so the people who currently link around my detailed analysis in favor of 10 word posts by their buddies would think I was one of their buddies and ignore other detailed analysis in favor of my 10 word posts. I was trying to be funny, but there’s an element of truth to that. A lot of these so-called A-Listers see and hear each other at these conferences and build friendships and mutual respect for each other.
I have no doubt that if I spent a few months going to these conferences, meeting these folks, having dinner with them and getting to know each other beyond the occasional email and cross-blog conversations, I’d get to the top of blogger’s hill in no time. But I can’t do that, so I have to take the harder trail. That’s not unfair. It’s just the way it is.
Blogging for me is not about fame and it’s not about fortune. Whatever I end up with in those regards will be determined by real life, not by what I blog about, who I link to and who links to me. Nor do I feel disconnected or alienated. I would hope my posts about family life and all the fun stuff we do with our friends would be evidence of that.
For me, the primary motivation in blogging is to converse with people who share interests of mine that aren’t generally shared by my real world friends; to learn about things that interest me; and, now that I have some readers, to be active in bringing new voices to the conversation.
I’ll repeat once more my recent slogan: the blogosphere is not an equal opportunity place. Life isn’t either. It’s OK that they aren’t, as long as you don’t try to pretend they are.
It sounds like I am disagreeing with Stowe, but I’m really not. I’m only saying that my motivations for blogging are different than those described in his post.
I’ll leave you with another of Stowe’s patented home run paragraphs, from the end of his post:
“The crowd — occasionally wise, but always judging — collectively decides who to look at, to listen to, to pay attention to. And some play to the crowd, trying to grab that attention, and hold onto it. Some succeed. There is a scissors-like inner logic to this, and the outcomes are decidely not equal to merit, effort, or wants. But a statement that sounds like a poet explaining chaos theory is unlikely to comfort those that feel shorted by a capricious and uncaring law of the universe. And those that have achieved fame will always want to believe it is by their own merits, not because the whole lunchroom is rubbernecking at the guy with the loudest voice sitting with the cheerleaders.”
That, friends, is a beautiful summation of the blogosphere- and life.
I’ve been waiting for podcast tours of museums, historical places and cities to become more mainstream. It just seems like a great use for podcasts. Now all we need is a central place to put them. Hey Jimmy, doesn’t this sound like a natural addition to Wikipedia?
Believe it or not, I was wondering last week whether anyone ever survived a parachute jump when their parachute didn’t open. This guy got up like Wylie Coyote, shook himself off and walked away.
Something about this just seems wrong to me. Let’s play ad-infested music for people we think can’t afford better….
Stupid shit like this makes me glad I’m a Methodist, but it still makes us all look like idiots. Tim LeBouf (here’s his blog) should count his blessings that I am not a member of his congregation. I would stand up during a so-called sermon about women learning in quietness and submission and expose it for the horse manure it is. This really pisses me off, in case you can’t tell.
Does anyone really care about Paris Hilton, other than for the ridicule value?
Tags: kents news, links
There are a lot of old, rare and out of print LPs that I want to add to my music collection and access via my music server. So I took a flyer and ordered an Ion USB turntable. It came today, and I tried it out tonight. Here are my first impressions.
It was very easy to assemble and connect to my computer. I already use Audacity for making podcasts, so I didn’t need to install the version that came on the CD. I just put the CD in my CD Drive and plugged the turntable into a USN port and, presto, it installed the drivers and I was ready to convert an LP to MP3.
I selected the most excellent and hard to find 1969 self-titled debut by Area Code 615, a band comprised of some of the best musicians in Nashville, including Mac Gayden, who I know a little through a mutual buddy.
Recording from the LP to the computer was simple, once I got the levels right- all LPs will record too low and need to be boosted up, which Audacity makes simple. Splitting the tracks took a little more time than I’d hoped, but overall the process was easy and relatively quick. I haven’t tried it yet, but you can save a little time by recording 33 rpm LPs at 45 rpm and adjusting the speed via Audacity. There is a preset adjustment for doing that.
I’m sure there are other software applications specifically designed to record LPs and convert them to MP3s. I’ll look around for some of those and see what I come up with.
But I can already tell that I’m going to be trolling eBay looking for some hard to find LPs. I’ve aleady bought one out of print LP by Billy Swan.
Here’s Nashville 9, N.Y. 1, an excellent song off the recently converted Area Code 615 LP.
This is good news for our podcast listeners who like hearing the hard to find stuff we like to play.
Tags: lp, mp3, digital music
Not satisfied with suing people, both alive and dead, who enjoy listening to music, now the priority-challenged music industry is threatening to sue guitar tablature sites, where users exchange tips on how to play songs.
For those who aren’t familiar with tablature sites, they are web sites that contain a database of guitar tabs, usually indexed by artist and by song. I use tab sites regularly to learn songs. Sadly, my site of choice, Olga.net (Olga standing for On-Line Guitar Archive), and others have bowed to the pressure and taken their once expansive database off-line.
Normally, the way it works is like this. Let’s say I wanted to learn CCR’s Bad Moon Rising. I’d go to a tab site and search for either CCR or the name of the song. The page I would find would look something like this:
D C G D D C G D I see the bad moon rising, I see trouble on the way D C G D D C G D I see earthquakes and lightning, I see bad times today Chorus: G D Don't go around tonight, well it's bound to take your life C G D There's a bad moon on the rise
(I have no idea if my tabs will translate to a feed. If not, see my blog for what it is supposed to look like.)
The letters, of course, are the chords used to play the song. Guitar players will recognize that these chords are the easy way to play the song. And that’s just the point- most tab sites are all about easy and none contain the full music notation found on purchased sheet music. In addition, tab sites often contain easier tunings that make songs easier for novice guitarists to play.
All of which tells me that the music industry is once again engaging in knee-jerk lawsuits (or threats thereof) that are addressing a problem that isn’t there. Lawsuits that will ultimately hurt the music industry from an economic as well as public relations perspective. Here’s why.
Many people who use tab sites for learning songs are either novice players or intermediate players trying to learn how to play more songs. Expert guitarists and most professional musicians typically either play by ear, use traditional sheet music which they purchase or use one of the various numbering systems that are completely different than traditional music notation. I’ll never forget the first time I was in a recording studio while someone recorded one of my songs. The session players listened to the demo tape once, without pausing, and then listened to the chorus and the bridge a second time as they transcribed the chord progressions into a numbering system. Then they sat down and played the song better than it had ever been played before.
This, of course, means that the typical user of a tab site is not going to run out and buy sheet music they likely can’t read to try and learn a song. They’ll just learn some other song or give up altogether.
Sure, they could go buy a fake book (a book that has chord notations similar to what I did above in addition to music notation), but those books are created for professional musicians, formal music students and others who are doing more than just trying to play Wild Thing and Louie Louie using the only three chords they know. Many of the people playing Wild Thing and Louie Louie today may continue into more formalized lessons later- or not. But it does nobody any good to stop them in their tracks before they have a chance to decide.
All it accomplishes is to quash someone’s musical ambitions before they have a chance to become a lifelong customer of the music publishing industry.
The music industry should stop suing all the music fans or there won’t be anybody left to buy their products.
I would really like to interview the decision maker behind this latest scorched earth attempt at stuffing the cat into the bag. If anyone can hook me up, please let me know.
Technorati Tags:
music industry, tab sites, music
In the I Almost Wish I Were Italian or Catholic Department: Working too hard, even for those leading the Catholic Church, is bad for the spirit, Pope Benedict XVI said Sunday as he greeted tourists at his summer residence outside Rome. In other news, Americans are cutting back their vacations.
Who’s Your Mommy: Polygamist’s children rally for their families. “Speakers said that with ‘dozens of siblings’ and multiple ‘moms’ they are well supported, encouraged to be educated and can make their own choices about marriage.” Do bad ones count?
Instabloke has 10 reasons why he doesn’t like your blog. Really good advice for bloggers new and old. (via Darren Rowse)
I was wrong when I thought arguing about what is or is not a planet would be the height of boredom. That would be arguing over what it or is not a blog. The confusion results from the fact that the term blog is used to describe both a content management platform and a particular type of content. People can use a blog platform to create non-blog content. Is that a blog? Who cares.
Tags: kents news, links
Brad Kellett has a post about that inevitable combination of kids and phones. He asks “when is too early,” and then goes through a thoughtful analysis of kids and phones.
He cites an article on C|Net that says that the average age at which kids get mobile phones is currently 8 years old- and that the average age is expected to drop to 5 years old next year. The only thing that dropped so far is my jaw when I read that.
I have three kids. One is 8, one is 5 and one is a baby. While the oldest is a dedicated landline phone user, she does not have a mobile phone and she has not asked for one. To my knowledge, none of my kids’ friends have mobile phones. And to my knowledge (every parent knows after a while never to make absolute statements) none of my kids will be getting a mobile phone any time soon.
In fact, I can only think of one phone carrying classmate my kids have ever had. When my oldest was around 4 or 5, one of her classmates started carrying around a cell phone. I and the other parents I talked to about it thought it was ludicrous. In my opinion 5 or 8 or even 10 is way too early.
Brad concludes that mobile phones are appropriate somewhere between the 5th and 7th grade. Another of my blogosphere pals, James Kendrick says his kids got phones in the 7th or 8th grade. That sounds about right to me.
My concerns about phones are partially the distraction resulting from the instant ability to call anyone you want, and even more so from the danger resulting from the instant ability for anyone to call you. Add text messaging and photo taking to the equation and it gets really scary.
On the other hand, there are certainly benefits to connectivity. My oldest has taken to calling me before bed when she spends the night with a friend. I look forward to talking with her, and it’s comforting to hear from her without having to risk her wrath by calling her at her friend’s house. I am certain that when my kids are older, the “one rule” in our home (never, ever lie to your daddy) will be supplemented by the “other one rule” (answer your mobile phone within 3 rings or prepare to be grounded for a very long time).
Also, I am intrigued by the GPS possibilities. It is my fervent hope that by the time my kids are out and about without daddy close by, GPS will have evolved to a point where I will always be able to track their travels via GPS and my computer. Redundancy via phone and car would be nice. It’s an open question whether they will know about that redundancy. Technology to enable “other one rule” compliance might also be useful to confirm compliance with the “one rule.”
I suppose I could be convinced that one of the specially made phones for kids might be appropriate at an earlier age. As long as I can control who they can call and who can call them, the benefits of connectivity become more evident.
Brad wondered about one thing I can answer for sure. When you have kids, you feel differently about most stuff- including phones.
But the answers are still not as clear as we’d like.
Tags: mobile phones, family life
I have been thinking about the best way to mine the blogosphere for the good, new voices that are coming online every day, as well as more good established bloggers. One tool that I have not used nearly enough is the Del.icio.us “For” tag. I’m about to change that, for me and maybe for you too.
You will see that I have added a “Submit a Story” link to the Site Index in the left column. That link is a jumplink down to the submission form at the bottom of the left column. I dug into the Del.icio.us API this afternoon and wrote a form to automate link submissions. All the reader has to do is be registered at Del.icio.us, add the link and click the Submit button, and it will automatically show up in my “Links for You” list at Del.icio.us. Without the convenience of a form, users have to manually tag links. I think this way is much easier and I hope it will encourage more conversation, with both new and established voices.
The form is not hard to write, if you’re used to writing forms into APIs. The good news is that now you don’t have to. I’ll email the content of the form to anyone who wants it. Just let me know (preferably by linking to this post and sending me your link via the form as a test drive) and it will be on its way. If you really don’t want to do that, of course, you can grab it via a page source view. All you need to do is change my Del.icio.us user name to yours, and you should be good to go.
And, of course, if you have something interesting that I might want to discuss with you, now there’s an easy way to let me know.
Specifically, if you are a new blogger (say at least 10 posts and fairly active) on a topic that I cover (tech, music, family life, etc.), send me your link. I can’t promise I’ll get you to the top of blogger’s hill, but I’ll at least show you where the trail starts.
UPDATE: I couldn’t find a way to do a mass delete of bookmarks at Delicious and deleting bookmarks one by one is a pain, so I created my own form that will email me the submitted information. The link to the form is in the same place near the bottom of the left hand column.
Newsome.Org 