Saw this for sale today - The Rutles - Archaeology (2007). It's a re-release of the album, with all the Japanese bonus tracks, plus 'Under My Skin' and 'Rut-A-Lot' which are both new tracks, as far as I know.
And it's only a fiver. Maybe Neil can be persuaded to bring The Rutles back once more.
Fun in Second Life.
I posted this earlier. In it, I argue that Free Culture advocates need to embrace Free Software generally, even if it means they can't play Second Life.
This is intended to stir up some debate.
Principles, Software and Freedom by American freedom tycoon, Mako Hill is also a very good read.
Dear The 1970s,
Please return the comedian 'Eric Idle' to us immediately. He has become a shadow of his former self and dick at the same time.
Yours in time,
2007.
Don't look up your mates poncy portfolio picture or random girls you fancied a decade ago on a social network. Both are unappealing.
Please make your adverts for technology companies easier to understand.
I have no idea what the IBM 'Are you special?' campaign is about; same with Microsoft's 'people ready business'...
Not knowing what they're about, makes it really hard to take the piss out of them, if required.
Yours,
Matt Lee
Comedian
Here's my reply to Daniel Ayers' (Columbia Records Digital Marketing) post 'Do you really want free music?'
Copied here for posterity. FYI - GoodBooks is the band my friend Anna manages.
I want free music, but I'm happy to pay for it.. let me explain.Someone recommended GoodBooks to me - I went to try and LISTEN to the track, The Illness, just to see if it was any good. A reasonable task, you'd surely agree?
Nightmare.
I should say, I don't have Flash Player. That makes this task so much harder.
MySpace? Nope. Flash required.
GoodBooks website? Nope. Flash required (for the player thing)
YouTube? Flash required here too, but because it's a video, and the way that YouTube works, I am able to work out where the video file is on their servers, and download it manually.Okay, so I've got the video. I can now extract the audio part of the YouTube video, and I've got a fairly low-quality MP3 file, that I can do anything I like with, really..
Now, based on this, I bought the record, instead of the CD. Records are way cooler, and even though I don't have a record player, except at the club where I occasionally DJ, I've done my part for the band. Of course, I would have happily just-downloaded-it-from-eMusic, but it's not there.
Why is this so difficult? I'd happily pay a few quid each month for a band I really liked where I could download all their releases, as high quality MP3 files, plus high quality copies of album artwork, but also, remixes (and let people upload their own!), separate tracks for the various tracks, so I could make my own remixes without them sounding like crap. I'd also like these remixes and samples to be licensed in a way that actually encourages people to make their own remixes.
I'd leave eMusic for such a service. I have my fill of Joanna Newsom and obscure punk-rock bands for a while. Their downloads don't even roll over, which is just stupid.
Specifically, please should have the freedom to distribute their remixes, even commercially, but under a few conditions. First condition is that they must identify the original creators, and secondly, their remix must be available under the same conditions.
The commercial usage clause is likely to be the more difficult one, but it creates a revenue stream for the band themselves, and the record company. Because everyone would have the freedom to put out their own CDs of these remixes, it is fair to assume that an 'official' band release of remixes, perhaps even on CD/DVD combo that gives all the source material on the DVD-ROM, would sell extremely well, compared to, some dude selling his own CD via CD Baby or eBay, etc.
The solution to music piracy (yarr!) is not Digital Restrictions Management, the solution is value. If I download your latest single as a shitty MP3 from some P2P network, what do you really care? If I would have never bought it in the first place, then you've got exposure for nothing, and maybe I'll buy the next release. With the system I propose, it is very unlikely that your casual pirate (yarr!) would be able to download all that stuff from a P2P network, let alone be bothered downloading it. Record labels should make reasonable quality downloads of the title track of a single, and a bunch of tracks from each album (at least) available as just MP3 files from their website. No Flash, just a link to an MP3. Here's a little secret that most people seem to have forgotten.
A search engine can't read Flash. If you offer up a straight link to an MP3, they will index that. Someone searching for your single gets a chance to listen before they buy the CD or join the club I propose.
Take the club to the next level. Charge me a fiver a month, and for that, I'll get a signed copy of every GoodBooks release, the week they're released. That'll count towards your chart position, and you're getting the records cheap enough, since you're making them, and not having to pay HMV.. the rest of the 60 quid a year goes towards the cost of the service and profit.
What do you think?
So, there's a band your friend tells you about - maybe they're the manager - and the band has a new release out. It's on a major label, but you're happy to overlook that for your friend.
There's a problem though - the CD is in the stores, there might even be a vinyl version, but the only digital service offering it is iTunes, which using Digital Restrictions Management and is proprietary software. So, what do you do? You want to hear it, because even though your friend recommended it, you don't want to pay out for a CD or record you don't like, after all, if you're going to give money to a major label to support your friend's band, it's going to be for something you at least want to listen to, right?
But thankfully, they've put the video on YouTube. Of course they have! Everyone uses YouTube, right? Well, almost everyone, it would seem... hell, we've almost got Gnash working with YouTube.
So, here's how you do it. This works on GNU/Linux, but should work on Mac OS X or Windows, too.
Requires:-
Here's how to do it...
youtube-dl http://youtube.com/watch?v=RQzkU0pqi3Emplayer -dumpaudio RQzkU0pqi3E.flv -dumpfile track.mp3Voila! You have a slightly shitty quality mp3 file of the video. Have a listen, and then buy the CD or Vinyl. If you're buying in the UK, you should know that HMV will sell you a CD over the web, and have it count toward chart position.
Of course, this would all be much idea if more people would support eMusic.
Sometimes things don’t always work out the way you want. Sometimes the things you want so much never come along, and you have to find a way to deal with that. Looking back at nearly ten years of CNUK, I find myself feeling bad about all the things I wanted to do, and never did. Sometimes, I’d make excuses, sometimes I’d just not say anything. The important thing is, I don’t think CNUK has ever been a failure. When you’re doing your own thing, running it all yourself and paying for it out of your own pocket, you can’t fail at it because it’s yours. You hold it so close to your heart, it’s like a piece of you, and sometimes when I feel down about the world, I look at what I’ve achieved here, and it might not be much, and whatever we do might not be the funniest, or the best, or the most well produced, and while I knew this, I never admitted it, not even to myself.
I’m happy to admit that now.
Moving on, things will be better. I can stop pretending that somehow everything we do is perfect. Sometimes, things that are rough around the edges are the most beautiful. A handwritten letter is more beautiful than the nicest typed letter will ever be. The idea that I can just put up something on here and people will read it excites me, and moving forward I know that not everything has to be perfect. Perfection will be achieved by having a place where creativity can happen, not by trying to refine the process.
This is my new perfection.
