Sunday, 2 May 2004

Sunset 9:28:37 AM  Permanent Link 2 this Entry   Subscription Update I haven't been able to make up my mind...at all. On one hand I think the subscription service could be an excellent idea all around. A weekly or monthly dose of live recordings, works in progress, finished songs, interviews with people I find interesting, Quicktime files of rehearsals or shows, minus-one recordings (this is where I would take a mix and remove one of the guitars, or the bass, which would allow a fan to play along and assume Jon's role, or my role) would be pretty exciting... On the other hand, this would be a major commitment, and at this point I am not sure what I want to do next year. I have released a lot of music over the last decade, and feel a little worn out. Maybe I need a break... I also think it would be wise to await the reception "La Semana" gets this Summer. I mean, if I sell 50,000-100,000 copies of the new album, I can afford to hire people to keep a subscription service going, but if I only sell a few "La Semana" albums, it won't work. Therefore I will put the Suscription/Member service on hold until the Fall, when I can make a better-informed decision. Thanks for your patience. 9:24:07 AM  Permanent Link 2 this Entry   Fixing Nemo I have two cats, and every once in a while they get sick. Having a sick pet inevitably forces an animal owner into an uncomfortable moral calculus: How much are you willing to spend to save your pet's life? Everyone has a different number. Depending on my debt/savings ratio, I'd kick out about $1,000, which many people would no doubt consider berserk; christ, aren't there bigger problems in the world that could use that money? Yet I've heard of wealthy New Yorkers spending several orders of magnitude more than that. But how far would you go for ... a goldfish? In this week's New York Times Magazine, my friend Rebecca Skloot writes a superb article about the emerging area of fish surgery. And we're not talking about $10,000 prize goldfish. No, we're talking about people spending buckets of money to save the lives of fish they bought for, like, 25... [collision detection] Interesting dilemma. For me the question would be, should one spend $1,000 on goldfish-surgery, or buy a new goldfish for $25 and donate 975 bucks to a charity? I don't think that makes me cold-hearted. Its not a dog or a cat, it's a goldfish, and while all life is valuable, some life is certainly more valuable than others - chain of life etc....how did Ken Wilber once put it: Mother Teresa is more valuable than a guy from the Hell's Angels. If you are on a raft in the middle of the ocean and the raft can't support all of the people on it, who would you throw overboard - although, granted, the Hell's Angels guy would put up more of a fight, wouldn't he! 9:08:11 AM  Permanent Link 2 this Entry

© Copyright 2004 Ottmar Liebert. Last update: 01.06.04; 10:27:20.