Not a lot happening round here today. Went for a stroll around Moseley Village, had a coffee at Jibbering (nearly bought a Stanley Clarke compilation), listened to some borrowed CDs, had an afternoon nap, made myself some fried rice, watched a BBC4 doco about Prog Rock, and finally – when I couldn’t procrastinate any further – I marked a bunch of student radio dramas, which were actually pretty bloody good on the whole.
I also spent a bit of time downloading large sections of the internet to my hard drive. Here are some of the things I found noteworthy…
Eyes on the Screen
This groundbreaking documentary series about the American Civil Rights Movement has languished unplayed for a decade because of insane copyright laws that just keep getting more and more ridiculous. Download it, screen it, tell other people.
Music Thing
Gadget porn for musicians. I want the Hand Band™ – Wireless, rechargable spandex music gloves so that when I play air piano, actual music will come out – but sadly, they only fit the hands of 8 year-olds.
Is this the best music radio station ever?
Minnesota Public Radio’s new station 89.3 The Current has no format – they just play good music – hip hop to doo wop. Best of all, they have a “CD-quality” (it’s not… but it’s close) AAC-plus stream – the first radio station I’ve listened to in that format – and I’m SOOOO sold on it.
Hip Hop Appreciation Week at Duke Uni
It’s normally hip hop appreciation week at Duke, but now the lecturers have joined in.
Sabadabada: Brazilian music from the 1960s
There’s nothing better than a spot of bossa nova to clean out your ears and refresh your palate – aural sorbet and mental floss all in one.
PodCasting vs Radio
My French is pretty rusty – but the gist is that the radio industry has started an advertising campaign along the ‘You heard it here first’ lines that seems to directly position itself as inherently superior to ‘other’ forms of audio consumption.
Music’s future: Smaller, faster, richer
Check out the surround sound mp3-playing headphones…
Sirius and XM to merge?
Looks like a monopoly on subscriber digital satellite radio is on the cards in the USA.
Digital music, free and clear
Mercora have found a way to make p2p music sharing legal: no downloads. Everyone’s playlist on their local hard drive becomes a streaming channel.
BBC re-launches internet radio
RNZ take note: you don’t have to do this – we understand about the budget. But you’re supposed to try…
Freevo: Freedom For Your TV
Actually, there’s more to this than just an open-source PVR, but at present the geekery entry-level is set pretty high.
JHymn Goes Behind Atoms and Apple To Bring DRM-Free Music
How to de-cripple your iTunes store-purchased music and future-proof your collection against Apple buckling to pressure from the record industry.
Dethroning King Gillette
The reason the iPod is such a success for Apple is that they’ve found a way to make money on both the razor and the blades. Nice tip on the forthcoming iPod Movie player towards the end too…
Hitch-Hiker’s Guide is Mostly Terrific
Review of an unfinished test-screening reports what we probably all suspected: Martin Freeman is the perfect Arthur Dent, Mos Def is an odd choice for Ford, there are some disappointments as well as plot changes to fit the new medium (the tv show made the mistake of trying to be the radio show only with pictures in it), but most of the words it uses come from Douglas Adams – so how bad can it really be?
‘Plan 9’ from Google
Extending the Google trajectory forward and prophesying an entirely Googlised computing experience is nothing new – but John Dvorak makes it sound plausible.
Disc writers now print the label too
The poor old record industry just can’t catch a break, can it? Now burned CDs will look like the real thing – not just sound like it.
Will Mac Mini spur petite-PC revolution?
I just can’t get past the fact that they want me to use my old finger-smudged screen and coffee-stained keyboard. I get the idea of the Mac Mini – but I’d far rather have a whole computer.
Interview with founder of Radio Free Zion
I like the idea of this: a distributed internet radio broadcasting system based around a specific community of interest (people who play a Matrix PC game online). I can’t imagine I’d enjoy it – but I do like the idea.
Web radio takes Spanish rap global
Another promising trend in the internet radio field – but to me the problem is that you can’t accidentally stumble across this stuff as you tune across the dial. You have to be deliberate about web radio. If you find a way to introduce pure serendipity to the web radio experience – please let me know. Essentially, I’m looking for a USB web radio tuning knob peripheral.
Things You’d Love to Say at Work, but Can’t
Actually, I really like my job and the people I work with – but I can relate. I’ve worked in a bank.
A Simple Prop To Occupy My Time
Proofreading pedant-blog ‘A Capital Idea’ are impressed with Peter Jackson’s efforts to make a movie newspaper actually look like a real one in the King Kong movie.
The Benefits of the Radio Edit
I’ve always been agnostic about whether bands should make radio-friendly versions of their songs. I suppose it comes down to personal choice. But it’s surprising to find someone who prefers the radio edit of a track by a band they like. Listen to this new LemonJelly single and see if you concur.
From scriptable clock radios to the digital hub
Richard BF describes (in terms that fellow sound engineers will immediately grasp) the trend toward hub design technologies: single access points to all consumer technologies – say, a Mac Mini as the central entertainment hub for the whole house – and the misspent energy in the area of DRM that keeps getting in the way of useful progress. Note to the tech industry: breaking your own device’s functionality is not a feature – and getting bullied into it by the record industry is not an excuse. Make it their problem, not yours.
Podcasters: What is “HE AAC” and why should you care?
Another blogger talks about the AAC-plus format I mentioned a couple of days back, and gets rightly excited about it. Incidentally, as I’ve been typing this (which, I have to say, takes me a lot longer than you might think), I’ve been listening to 89.3 The Current (see above) and I’m a convert – both to the station and the AAC-plus format.
Michael Powell’s Invisible Legacy
Michael (son of Colin) Powell is the Chairman of the FCC. He’s quitting, having given the American population (and probably, soon, the world) the digital broadcast flag which “will clamp down on fair use rights, stifle innovation, turn hobbyists and tinkerers into criminals, create inconvenience, raise prices, impose new regulatory burdens — and infuriate law-abiding citizens who no longer control the technology in their own homes…” Good one.
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Apart from The Current, I’ve been listening to:
81. The Headhunters – Survival of the Fittest Arista 1975
82. Hugh Masekela – The Boy’s Doin’ It Verve 1975
83. Brian Blade – Fellowship Blue Note 1998
…and finally – is it just me, or is the Chemical Brothers new single ‘Galvanise’ a complete waste of Q-Tip’s talent? The song’s not dreadful, but Q’s one of the best rappers on the face of the planet – I was looking forward to hearing the collaboration – but they might just as well have got him to read out of an instruction manual.
