Some time in the last couple of years I stopped talking to the music business. When they shut off Napster I stopped caring. A few days before Morpheus shut down last month I downloaded the software and installed it. I had a specific mission in mind. My MP3 collection had almost no Elvis Costello, and, having heard an NPR interview with him, I was interested. So I booted up Morpheus and went looking and found lots of hits, mostly the songs I already had, and downloaded a couple I hadn't, and the quality was so low, I threw them in the trash. My time is worth money and of course I would have happily downloaded a curated and quality-assured package of Elvis songs, with written narrative (he's an interesting guy, very smart, a good story teller) for $39. Charge it to my credit card. I thought I'd mention that, because like others, I spend $0 on music now, and no that's not a story of Napster screwing things up, it's Eisner and Case that screwed it up. While I was using Napster I was a veritable pump of money into their coffers to make the point to myself and anyone else who cared that it wasn't about money, it was about love of music and wanting it to be able to come to me easily, conveniently and with high quality. For the 18th time, we want to work with the music business. Why can't they hear that. Instead they're lobbying Congress to rape the computer industry so they can keep all the money we would supposedly send to them after they did that. Oy. We'd burn their houses, figuratively of course. No money for losers.  [Scripting News]

I wish I could have put that better myself.

11:42:09 AM    

Tryin' Hard to Get Free, Via Rap on Your Own CD. Singers with day jobs and dreams of fame and fortune can produce their own discs with affordable consumer versions of studio technology. [The New York Times: Technology]

I have worked with a few people who were into producing their own CD's, some with the goal being a recording contract, others who were doing it as a lifetime hobby. If you can soundproof a 10'x20' space, you can have a studio large enough to play in with a full band all at once. Combine that with the recent advances in recording technology, and you don't neccesarrily need a huge studio to do your work.

While the services of professional recording engineer working your soundboards is vital, you can also learn a lot by doing it with a group of like minded friends. I am reminded that the fifth member of Rollin's  Band was theo Van Rock, who was their recording engineer who set up/ran the sound boards at their shows and in studio.

As a self confessed Cribs addict, I can also point out that many pros are putting recording studios into their own homes, so that they can roll out of bed and get to work.

11:35:01 AM