I Hate iTunes

Please excuse me, but I’m going to rant a bit.

About two years ago right before moving back to Pueblo to enroll at CSU-P I was living in the Vail area making $15 an hour and decided I needed a new portable music player. I’d previously had mp3 players and they worked just fine, but I was getting tired of constantly having to put new music on them, so I went shopping. I looked at all the brands and models and the only type of device that would hold anywhere near what I have in CD’s was the 160 GB iPod. Yes, I have quite the extensive music collection, including hundreds of unauthorized live recordings not available in stores.

Anyway, I bought the iPod, and about $300 later I met an annoyance that would stay with me in my life for the next couple years: iTunes. First of all, iTunes converts files to AAC format, and a large amount of my music was being stored on my computer in mp3 format, so right there the amount of space taken up by my thosands of songs pretty much doubled. Second of all, the iPod and iTunes use a sync method of getting music to the device. I did not fully understand what this was and after I synced the iPod, I figured all the songs were copied and available on the iPod for retrieval so I deleted them from my computer to save space that I needed so much. Terrible idea. No more songs. Luckily I had most of them backed up in CD form, but I was devastated nonetheless.

So we move down the road about a year and I’m finally getting used to dealing with this program that I absolutely loathe. At this time I was spending probably about an hour a night backing up my music on a 160GB external hard drive so that crappy iTunes wouldn’t take up so much space on my computer. Then one night i was walking down my stairs with my computer, iPod and external drive in my hands and the external drive fell out of my hands and tumbled its way down the stairs. Following this came a plethera of curse words. I then plugged the drive into my computer and nothing happened. This was followed by more curse words. I suppose this incident wasn’t really iTunes’ fault, but in some roundabout way I’m blaming it.

One last example and I’ll call it a day. The other day I decide to burn one of my albums to a CD, but can’t find the original copy, so I attempt doing it from iTunes. I found the album, clicked ‘burn CD’ and the process pretty much began by itself from there. When it was finished burning, the CD began with track 6, ended with like track 2, and left two or three songs off the CD completely. The album plays in its entirety and in order on my iPod, so iTunes is just that retarded that it can’t figure out that 1 and 2 come before 6 and it should include EVERY song on the CD. OK I’m done. I’m feeling much better now.

Farmville: The New Drug

Lately I’ve noticed a new trend in social networking. It’s played through Facebook and it’s called Farmville.

From what I understand, Farmville is a game type of thing where you create an avatar of yourself and work on a virtual farm. I know that a farmer must buy crops, each of which has a different price and growth period, and then harvest the crops when it comes time to do so.

Personally, I’m hesitant to join Farmville for fear that it will occupy waaaay too much of my time, causing me to be even less productive than I already am. I think right now I’m one of the only Rev89 DJ’s that doesn’t have a farm, and I recently found out that my 72 year old grandma even has a farm that she tends to regularly.

The genius of Farmville is how it holds you; clutches you and forces you to keep returning and tending to your crops. When you buy a crop, it will say that it matures in however many hours, forcing the farmer to be awake and close to a computer at that time, binding them into a form of modern slavery. I’m not saying Farmville is necessarily a bad thing, I’m just making a note of how the application is totally addictive and how I’m extremely hesitant to join and allow this thing to control my life.

To all my Farmville friends that read this: Don’t be offended, I’m just kind of being a cynical ass, but thanks for reading.

Thoughts on Video Game Addiction

So I haven’t written a blog in a while, but I remember this one’s supposed to be about video games in some way. Video game addiction is a topic I’ve explored a little bit, so here’s what I think.

When I think about video game addiction, the first thing that comes to mind is that episode of South Park where the kids get addicted to World of Warcraft and consequently get fat, pimply, and too involved to leave the computer for a bathroom break. In fact, the most memorable scene in that episode for me is when a fat(ter) Cartman needs to use the bathroom but can’t leave the computer so he yells “Mom! Bathroom! Bathroom!” and here comes Ms. Cartman with a bucket to catch the excrement. After catching about half of it in the bucket and the rest on herself, Ms. Cartman comments on what a big boy her little poopykins is.

The sad thing is, once again South Park nailed it. There have been three reported deaths since 2005 involving one South Korean and two Chinese gamers that simply died as a result of ridiculously long periods of gaming. There have also been several murders involving highly addicted gamers that are one way or another deprived of their World of Warcraft or Halo resulting in violence. There was also a case in the United States where a man was so involved with a video game that he left his two children in the bathtub so long that they died.

While video game addiction is not a diagnosable disorder, it is considered a psychological addiction, much like gambling addiction. I have a hard time even fathoming that a person could get so addicted to playing video games that they allow their bodies to deteriorate to the point of death, become murderous or so neglectful that they allow young children to be left alone long enough to die. I think these people must have something seriously wrong with them psychologically to allow themselves to get to that point. I hope I’m not out of line when I say this, perhaps I just don’t understand, but I think that any person that allows a loss of human life in exchange for feeding their video game habit needs to be smacked around a little bit and SERIOUSLY evaluated. I’m sorry if this offends anybody, but I think this topic is absolutely ridiculous and am seriously sad that it actually exists.

A Brief History of Video Games

1948 Patent issued for the Cathode-Ray Tube Amusement Device
1952 Graphical version of Tic Tac Toe called OXO created
1958 Tennis For Two created by William Higinbotham
1961 First influential computer game Spacewar! created
1966 First video game displayed on a TV set Corndog created
1969 First UNIX application Space Travel created
1971 First coin operated video game Galaxy Game created
1972 Atari founded
1972 Magnavox Odyssey released
1975 Dungeon, first RPG created
1976 Atari 2600 released
1979 Intellivision released
1980 Pac Man released
1981 Donkey Kong, first platform game released
1982 Pole Position, first game to use pseudo-3D graphics released
1982 Caleco Vision released
1982 Atari 5200 with joystick, keypad, start and pause button released
1985 Nintendo Entertainment System released
1989 Sega Genesis released
1989 Game Boy, first handheld console, released
1991 Super Nintendo released
1994 Sony Playstation released
1996 Nintendo 64 released
2000 Playstation 2 released
2001 Xbox released
2005 Xbox 360 released
2006 Playstation 3 released
2006 Nintendo Wii released

Thoughts on the Future of Newspapers

The Annenberg School for Communication’s 2009 Annual Internet Survey by the Center for the Digital Future produced some sad, yet expected statistics.

The decline of print newspapers is not really a surprise. After all, most of the information is also available online, for free. Major online presences such as Yahoo and AOL supply the masses with breaking news in mass quantities, much quicker and more effective than print newspapers. In addition, services like Craigslist and other online marketplaces and/or communities provide the same information, often in larger quantities, as most local classified sections.

However, the report did give some promising information. Center director Jeffery Cole announced that “for the first time in 60 years, newspapers are back in the breaking news business, except now their delivery method is electronic and not paper.” This could be a really great thing for these companies, if they can benefit financially. It’s good to see that newspapers are more trusted than Joe Shmo blogger, but people are getting very used to getting their information for free, which could be a problem for news providers. There was also an increase in the people that stated that they would miss their print newspapers if it were no longer available from 2007, which I found refreshing.

The report also stated that the use of cell phones and wireless computers has reached its highest level this year. I think that portability is huge in the future of technology and it is one advantage print newspapers still have. If newspaper companies could take advantage of the rise in demand for portability in a more convenient and digital way, they may have a chance at getting an upper hand in the market.

Thoughts on Crowdsourcing

Crowdsourcing is an interesting topic to say the least. There are advantages, such as the large amount and variety of input and the inevitable reduction in cost of goods and services provided, but there are major disadvantages as well. I kind of relate it to the example of a small town full of mom and pop businesses that serve the community and have worked hard throughout their existences to remain vital, that gets plagued by a brand new Wal Mart moving in down the street. The businesses have already established themselves and proved their worth, but face an enormous crisis at the mercy of cheap plastic knockoffs from China and the convenience of one-stop shopping.

The major disadvantages to crowdsourcing are similar to those in this scenario as consumers are less likely to have available to them a product of the same quality. Also, similar to the stock photography example in the Wired article, legitimate businesses suffer immensely and are often forced to close their doors for good.

While it is unfortunate, it appears that crowdsourcing will become more and more relevant in the future and in turn businesses like the one in the stock photography example must make drastic changes to their means of conducting business. Again, this could mean a decline in the quality of products and services, but some kind of change in this direction seems inevitable.

Shakira meets Danzig

God bless interactive media. I’m sure this video is in violation of some sort of defamation or appropriation laws, but it is probably one of the greatest things ever. It’s a video of Shakira’s “Hips Don’t Lie” featuring special guest Glenn Danzig on vocals.

Glenn Danzig was originally the lead singer of horror punk heroes The Misfits, but left to pursue other projects such as Samhain and the ridiculously evil metal band Danzig. Although Danzig probably takes his music quite seriously, he is often seen as a sort of tongue in cheek cornball of a musical icon. Even fans of his music often have a hard time taking the man seriously, and this video does not help matters.

The video was spliced together with footage from Shakira’s original “Hips Don’t Lie” music video and random Danzig clips including a few of him decked out in leather, running and singing with a wolf. A track of very Danzig-esque music was also added to the clip complete with the infamous crappy guitar solo from The Misfits’ “We Are 138,” able to be heard at 1:56.

Interactive media such as audio and video editing software and video sharing services like YouTube make such brilliant, beautiful works of art like this possible. Please watch and enjoy.

The Most Metal Video Game EVER

Forget about Guitar Hero Metallica or AC/DC Rock Band, for what sounds like perhaps the most metal video game ever has just been released for Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.

It’s called “Brutal Legend” and revolves around a heavy metal roadie’s adventure through different worlds, each represented by a different metal sub-genre, after being sent back in time. But wait, it gets even more metal than that. The main character, Eddie Riggs, is voiced by one half of the most metal duo of comedy actors with acoustic guitars, Jack Black.

Other cameo appearances include Judas Priest’s Rob Halford, Ozzy Osbourne, Lemmy Kilmeister of Motorhead and Lita Ford. The soundtrack to the game is also delightfully brutal, featuring 108 songs by 75 different bands ranging from juggernauts like Black Sabbath and Judas Priest to lesser known underground bands such as Angel Witch, Cloven Hoof, Riot, Brocas Helm and Slough Feg. This extensive play list took about two years to compile and was thought out very carefully. “It became a hunt for the best metal I could find,” music director Emily Ridgeway said. “I was after metal that should have been famous but wasn’t. I wanted to expose people to really great music they would have never heard of.”

The game has been described as fantasy incorporating elements from every facet of heavy metal music in one way or another. Screenshots show Jack Black’s character atop a mountain of human skulls with a large bloody axe and an electric guitar slung across his back. The president of the company that created the game, Tim Schafer, perhaps described the imagery the best. “Every frame of this game looks like a heavy metal album cover.”

On a closing note, I’m sad to say Metallica fans will be disappointed to find that the band refused to grant the rights for their music to be used in the game. Oh well, its certainly not the first time Metallica has disappointed their fans, and probably not the last.

Mr. Bungle is Everywhere!

So after reading the “Rape in Cyberspace” article, i got to thinking about one of the story’s effects on pop-culture, the band Mr. Bungle. I was pretty amazed that a situation like this could have such an effect that a band would choose the character’s name for their own and even put a crude drawing of the clown on the cover of their first album. Not only that, but the leader/driving force behind the band was Mike Patton, on and off frontman and songwriter for the very successful 90′s band Faith No More whose notable songs include ‘Epic,’ ‘Surprise You’re Dead’ and ‘Mid-Life Crisis.’ I’d encourage everyone to listen to a little Mr. Bungle, even though it is quite possibly the most bizarre music on the planet, just to see the correlation the band was trying to make with the music and the evil clown character.

Anyway, later I typed Mr. Bungle into YouTube to see what results came up and, as I predicted, it was mostly music videos and live performances of the band. However, one video came up that I found very surprising. It was a pseudo-after-school-special about manners that appeared to have originally run on The PeeWee Herman Show or PeeWee’s Playhouse or whatever. And what was the name of the character with very bad manners? Mr. Bungle! Now I wonder, is this another instance of the “Rape in Cyberspace” evil clown appearing in pop-culture or just a coincidence? After all, Mr. Bungle doesn’t appear in the video, he is just talked about negatively throughout. Please check it out and decide for yourselves, it’s hilarious.

The (Grateful) Dead Live Online

So not too long ago I found out that another Grateful Dead live set was being released semi-posthumously. The Grateful Dead are primarily known for their extensive jams, armies of arguably the most loyal fans since Christ walked the earth, and their reigning status in the hippie counter-culture scene. The new box set consists of NINE (9) discs and covers the band’s entire stay at San Francisco’s Winterland Ballroom from June 7 -9, 1977. But wait there’s more! If you order now you get a tenth (10) disc free!

After deciding that I didn’t need to spend $100 on something that I probably had in my closet, (I used to be a very avid tape-trader), I started to notice that the Dead’s website was very interactive.

The first place I went was the so-called listening party at which ordinary joes could listen to tracks from the new box set that changed periodically. I thought this was impressive, but was even more incredible was the number of comments left by Dead-Heads on the listening party page: 31 PAGES of comments at roughly 10 comments per page. Another section called the Taper’s Section is pretty much the same thing, except various tracks from past shows are made available each week, and met with the same enthusiasm and participation.

The site also has a community which features discussions, fan photos and a chat room. I’m not sure how many of them were in the chat room, but when I was visiting the site there were 125 people online with me. There is also a forum with thousands upon thousands of posts by registered users.

Back in the 3.5 decades that the Grateful Dead were active (with Jerry Garcia), the Dead Heads were still very connected. They traded tapes of shows, camped together, followed the band together, and kept in contact with one another. But with today’s technology, it seems like Dead Heads are more connected than ever. Of course, this kind of technology does allow for laziness and possibly less passionate Dead Heads to become involved, but the numbers are absolutely astounding.