fillet-of-who?

Dear Consumer,

The Recording Industry Association of America. If you don’t know who they are already, let me summarize for you; They are a bunch of morons looking out of the music industry while single-handedly alienating music listeners and shooting themselves in the foot.

Ok, so maybe not every listener, but at least all of the ones who find their tunes on the internet. In essence, if you’ve ever copied a CD to your computer, listened to internet radio (Pandora included), recorded a song on your XM satellite radio to listen to later or downloaded anything from Napster, Limewire, KaZaA, Bittorrent, et al, You’ve broken the law.

And don’t you think for one hot second that you are outside their reach. The RIAA has sued corporations big and small, people young and old, the homeless and the computerless, even the dead!

So why would a company do such a thing? To protect their intellectual property of course. Unfortunately, they’ve become so preoccupied with protecting their property, they’ve alienated just about every demographic. The mentally handicapped are the only group that listens to music that hasn’t been sued by the RIAA yet. (citation needed)

“Well hold on now Travis,” you may say. “What if these guys are just out there protecting what is rightfully theirs?”

Let’s back up and look at the big picture for a few moments.

Back in the halcyon days of records, one needed a fancy studio to record the music and an even fancier machine to produce the records. Then you would need a PR rep to sell your album to as many executives as possible to get your name out. That is how you get your album into the hands of a million people.

Fast forward to 2008. The only thing you need to make studio quality music now is a quiet room, a microphone, and a computer. Getting the word out? Make a MySpace page. Now your music can be in the hands of nearly as many people and you did it all by yourself! Your mother will be so proud.

Which brings me to my next point; choice.  With all of this availability and niches (Turbo Folk, Mathcore, Powerviolence?), there are a lot more avenues in which people can people can spend their money.  This phenomenon has been dubbed The Long Tail, many niche items sold to a large number of people. The Long Tail model states that given free choice, users will favor the 20% of available options while the remaining 80% creates The Long Tail.

So let’s put it all together: Producing and distributing costs have dropped, leading to more small and independent labels not represented by the RIAA. User choice and convenience has increased through the power of technology, and yet the RIAA is still trying to sell us CD’s which - for them - have the largest profit margin. It’s no wonder sales are down every year since the dotcom boom!

But what of the oh-so-holy iTunes music store? That won’t help the RIAA at all either. Instead of making $20 off your Beyonce fetish, they only make $10, halving their profit. Or worse yet, you only buy Independent Woman Part 1 for a platry $0.99, thereby reducing their total profit by over a factor of 20!

For you, this is great. If this was 1994 however, you would have bought her whole CD as you would have had no choice.

THAT is the reason their profits are down. We were being swindled. It has NOTHING to do with the fact that people are stealing music.

Sincerely,

Travis

It’s always fun to look back and examine the fashion and trends of past decades. Perhaps it hasn’t yet happened to you, but surely you’ve at least overheard a parent or older sibling say something along the lines of “What was I thinking when I decided to wear that _____?” The 70s claim bellbottoms and a philosophy that holds orange, yellow, and brown as the primary colors. The 80s claim perms and neon everything. The 90s are a little fresher in my memory (has it really been 9 years?) but can probably boast hmmm… those zip-off pant legs maybe? So I like to ask myself what the current trends are that will induce a grimace when, years from now, we flip through old pictures? Well get fired up because I’m going to tell you. Golly this is going to get controversial! Let’s start with…

Plaid Shorts

You know exactly the ones I mean. They’re the ones your girlfriend asks you to buy (and even wear). Or perhaps as you live the single life, you glimpsed a happy couple walking hand in hand and you thought “Hey, I could go for some intimate times with a female… I dare say I could suffer the homosexual connotations of wearing those warlocks for the sake of attracting a proper mate!” Well that’s all well and good but just be warned. Years from now you will be dusting off the old album and hanging your head in shame as you gaze upon the pastel travesties that were your shorts.

Crocs (On adults)

Hey what do I know? Maybe these things are really freaking comfortable and easy to clean. I’ve never worn them and I don’t even care to talk about them.

Tattoos

Ok now we get to the heart of the post… my distaste for ink. This is the part of the show where I offend 90 percent of my generation who either has a tattoo or plans to get one with their next paycheck. “Hey everyone! Please look at how uniquely I’ve expressed myself via body art!” Well allow me to let you know that everyone and their freaking mother has a tattoo! It’s not unique. It’s retarded. Shockingly, even as the term “Tramp Stamp” has all but found its way into Webster’s, young women continue to line up to purchase one of their own. Think of how many soccer moms are going to have em in a few years. Let’s take a gander at all the frat boys who show off their Japanese symbols saying “Yeah, it means Courage“. No, it means “I like balls in my face” because you have absolutely no reason to identify yourself with eastern culture. I don’t care if you took Karate in 4^th grade, eat sushi, or loved The Last Samurai…You’re still a douche. I don’t think I even need to delve into the practice of getting the initials of your girlfriend or boyfriend tattooed onto your creamy thigh. Unless of course you think you’ll enjoy the daily reminder of whatshername/whatshisname who cheated on you that time. I miss the days where you only had a tattoo if you were a biker or a sailor.

If you really need to decorate your epidermis, tattoo “100 % GRADE A BEEF” on your ass. Or maybe you could do some research and put some Nutrition Facts right above your manhood. At least that would make me giggle. I might suggest inking some inch marks on your shaft but I’m pretty sure you’d need to go metric… I kid.

Ok, to be fair, I have seen one or two tattoos out there that I appreciate. My friend Dave has the Triforce emblem from The Legend of Zelda inked into to his shoulder as well as a memorial shield for the late Captain America on one side of his chest. However that more so speaks to my admittedly childish tastes rather than to the value of tattoos on the whole. Not to mention the fact that I would still never consider getting one myself.

To me, tattoos have become a manifestation of insecurity, a cry for attention, and a feeble attempt to define oneself as an individual. In our modern state that is plagued with a growing sense of disconnection from one another, we humans long to establish a legitimate notion of selfhood. I get that. But hear the prophetic words of Erv Blitzer as seen in the Walt Disney classic Cool Runnings. “If you’re not enough without it, then you’ll never be enough with it” Yes, he was referring to an Olympic gold medal, and perhaps I’m reading too deeply into the ritual of bodily defacement, but I think it still works. In fact I’m going to go ahead and throw around some statistics that I just now made up. 87 percent of tattooees regret their decision within 10 years. Think about what you were like 10 years ago. Are you even the same person? Are you still into the same crap now that you were then? Or have you perhaps undergone some significant changes? You understand where I’m going with this. And let’s say that somewhere down the line you opt to undergo tattoo removal. Haven’t you just negated everything you were originally going for?

As far as I’m concerned, the decision to tattoo yourself in this day and age ironically carries with it a contradiction to the original intention. That is, it makes you a sheep; a follower of the majority who lacks the creativity to express yourself on a more meaningful level.

Believe me when I tell you all that I am not of the goth/emo/punk/screamo/hardcore/grindcore schools of thought which discourage conformity at all costs (especially when such nonconformity demands that you adhere to a predetermined set of trends and fashions of a specific subculture). I like Dane Cook, I enjoy F.R.I.E.N.D.S., love South Park, and have even been known to watch America Idol on occasion. Though it can be incredibly tempting at times, I don’t condemn a trend simply because of its popularity. What I do condemn is the false idea that a permanent marking on one’s person somehow shapes one’s identity, perceptions, or self-worth. I imagine people are now going to explain to me the actual meaning and reasoning for a personal tattoo and I say this… Let it rain down upon me.