Saturday, February 21, 2009

News roundup

A couple of items from Reuters. First, hilarity:

You're in big trouble now, Mr. License!

Then, you think we're not living in Cyberpunk 2020 yet?

China's artificially induced snow closes 12 highways

In hockey, check out the value of draft picks on TSN.

Also, in terrible news, apparently Limp Bizkit is back.

The Pirate Bay trial continues in Sweden. This is the latest showdown between the medieval guild priviledges of content producers and consumers, and it could very well be one of the most important lawsuits of our lifetimes in terms of cultural history. Finnish readers can keep track on the Piraattiliitto website.

Also, the Finnish singles chart #1 at the time of this writing is Lady GaGa's Poker Face. In many ways, that song exemplifies what's wrong with pop music today. Yes, the hooks are well crafted. That's exactly the problem. The song, lyrics and artist are crafted, scientifically designed to appeal to your senses. The whole thing is so unrelentlessly artificial. This really is music as a mass-produced commodity. There is no art here.

In fact, the only thing that can be categorized as art in the song are the clothes she wears in the video. I like those, and when she climbs out of the swimming pool in that skin-tight outfit, hey, I'd hit that. And that's exactly what I'm supposed to think. It's human nature to resent being manipulated.


But for those of us with any conception of music as art, there's nothing there. And that's a shame.

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