The Internet takes "cool" out of America....

[FOTD]

The Internet Is Ruining
America's Movies and Music
By ELIZABETH LEE WURTZEL
August 9, 2008; Page A11

Pete Yorn is a Los-Angeles based rock and roller with a gold-record career and Jesus of Nazareth good looks. His songs have appeared in "Spiderman" and "Me, Myself and Irene," and his album's have reached No. 18 on the Billboard charts.

If this were 1978, Mr. Yorn would be a multiplatinum artist living in a Malibu mansion with mountains of cocaine on every horizontal surface, lithe, hippie-ish blonde groupies with names like Veruschka and Christie lining the hallways, and ridiculous Larry Rivers paintings on the bathroom walls. But as it is, he has a cultishly loyal following, solid sales, a long-term recording contract, and a pretty darn good life -- as good as it gets in today's music industry.

The old-fashioned rock star has gone the way of the dodo and the dinosaur. Never again will we have another crazy-as-all-getout Axl Rose, another Jim Morrison who mistakes himself for a poet and has the hypnotic ability to convince a substantial audience it is so, or another Bob Dylan who changes the way a generation sees itself and the world.

Today's music industry is either moribund or dead, depending on whom you ask. Downloading has destroyed it, and no one in the business is smart enough to figure out how to fix it.

You may feel that this is no great loss. But these rock stars were fun, larger than life people with real talent -- and bad habits. Now all we've got left are the bad habits. All we've got left is Britney Spears.

In the era of the online music store -- even if you buy from iTunes rather than stealing from LimeWire, the problem is the same -- no one knows how to listen to a complete album anymore. Everything is slanted toward the hit single. This means that the music industry is oriented toward one-hit wonders rather than consummate musicians, and talent development is just not worth the trouble.

The one thing the United States exports with serious success is our popular culture. We have conquered the world not with our weaponry, but with our music and movies. If these industries suffer, so does our economy. We are already in trouble abroad as a producer of raw materials, light and heavy industry, and most manufacturing. But people still clamor for our imaginative inventions, our artistic output. Internationally, American culture outsells our aircraft, chemicals, food and motor vehicles.

In Italy, people still learn English by listening to Bob Dylan's "Blonde on Blonde." Germans still discover our language through the subtitles in Francis Ford Coppola's "The Godfather." In fact, 47% of our gross domestic product involves intellectual property (IP) transactions, and about 6% of our national worth -- $626.6 billion annually -- is from our copyright businesses. These are the segments of our economy that are suffering, or stand to do so, as a result of the Internet. The Internet, glorious as it is, should be thought of as the plague of postmodernity.

Entertainment is such a crucial part of the American way of life -- because of the jobs it generates, the fun it engenders, the goodwill it creates world-wide -- that the potential for its undoing is a national emergency that ought to at least merit a congressional panel or governmental alarm. The U.S. was meant to be a nation of commercial creativity. It is our birthright. It's what we do.

It's not just the music industry that has fallen apart. Hollywood's motion picture factory is also blundering.

We tend to think of Hollywood the way immigrants envision America -- as a place where the streets are paved in gold. Movie stars might continue to trip the life fantastic, and indeed there are plenty of Bentleys lining the parking lanes of Rodeo Drive. But a November 2007 report, published by the data analysis group Global Media Intelligence, informs us that: "Making movies -- as distinct from owning libraries of fully-amortized films that continue to throw off sizeable profits -- has gone from a modestly profitable activity to one that now generates . . . substantial losses over the initial release of films to all worldwide markets, a period of roughly five years."

It's hard to work up a lot of pity for the overpaid film world. But between Internet piracy, the fact that huge markets like China tend to disobey IP protocols, and a foolhardy tendency of studios to make unwise, profit-sharing deals with bankable talent, movies are not making money the way they used to or the way they should. And now that any old anybody with opposable thumbs can operate a digital camera, international markets have found they favor the locally produced fare over yet another sequel to "Rush Hour." Bombay prefers Bollywood to Hollywood.

Hegemony is over. The days when everybody rushed out to Sam Goody to buy the new Beatles album as soon as it came out, the days when lines formed around the block at New York's Ziegfeld Theater because the latest installment of Star Wars had opened -- the days when certain cultural moments captured everybody together as if we'd all been granted a brief furlough from the prison house of reality -- live on only in mild forms. That would be in crazy Harry Potter fans, in those of us who will still preorder a Bruce Springsteen album from Amazon.com.

Today there is far more excitement at the introduction of a new Apple product -- look at how people flocked to get their iPhones! -- than over anything artistic. The one creative area hardly affected by the encroachments of technology, at least insofar as its market has not caved, are fine arts like painting and sculpture. At a Sotheby's auction in autumn 2007, Jeff Koons's nearly two-ton, nine-foot, hot-pink stainless steel sculpture, "Hanging Heart," fetched $23.6 million, a record for a work by a living artist. In November, Sotheby's and Christie's reported a return of $1.7 billion for that single month, up 24% from the previous November.

You cannot, after all, download a painting or a sculpture. The thingness of the thing itself -- all that stuff Heidegger talked about when you read him in college -- cannot be translated, even if an exhibit poster will do for poor college students and poverty-stricken bohemians looking for kitchen decorations. But the rich will still pay for the actual original.

This is antithetical to the American mission. I have nothing against all the great fine artists this country has produced, but they are a carryover from Europe. They are Old World. We'll never overwhelm the planet with brushes and clay and pencils the way we did with celluloid and vinyl and acetate. If our most original painter was Jackson Pollock, he was still no Picasso, and we all know it.

Our movies and music are America. And the day the music dies, the party's over.

Miss Wurtzel, an attorney, is the author of "Prozac Nation" (Houghton Mifflin, 1994).


http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121824228638426137.html

[waterboy]

I wish the author had some answers to how the industry can revive itself. No one seems to know other than to sue as many people as possible for piracy which isn't working. Governments are losing tax dollars and requesting people to estimate their internet purchases so they can pay taxes on them. Yeah, I'm guessing $0 this year.

Not all change is good. Especially on a local level. The internet has had the same effect on small retail stores too IMO. Just drove down 15th from Yale to Cincinnati. Formerly known as the bohemian Cherry Street shopping area. Am I the only one who sees more "for lease" signs than interesting storefronts? Its gruesome considering that it was once a haven for small start up retail, jewelry, clothing, resale, and services. It was unique in that it hadn't changed much, the rents were cheap and the offerings eclectic.

Not now. East of Lewis to Yale on 15th is gasping for air. West of Utica its all about "lofts", buckets o' beer, bar/restaurants and franchise medium fast food. A couple of art studios and a gas station converted to landscape items. In between is insurance, lawyers and doctors offices. Its back to being just plain old 15th street.

Music, arts, and retail are offering less diversity, less quality and less sophistication both online and in person but we're getting stuff faster and without having to be personal. I'll be glad when it all settles out and we figure out the best ways to utilize the tool.

[FOTD]

quote:Originally posted by waterboy

I wish the author had some answers to how the industry can revive itself. No one seems to know other than to sue as many people as possible for piracy which isn't working. Governments are losing tax dollars and requesting people to estimate their internet purchases so they can pay taxes on them. Yeah, I'm guessing $0 this year.

Not all change is good. Especially on a local level. The internet has had the same effect on small retail stores too IMO. Just drove down 15th from Yale to Cincinnati. Formerly known as the bohemian Cherry Street shopping area. Am I the only one who sees more "for lease" signs than interesting storefronts? Its gruesome considering that it was once a haven for small start up retail, jewelry, clothing, resale, and services. It was unique in that it hadn't changed much, the rents were cheap and the offerings eclectic.

Not now. East of Lewis to Yale on 15th is gasping for air. West of Utica its all about "lofts", buckets o' beer, bar/restaurants and franchise medium fast food. A couple of art studios and a gas station converted to landscape items. In between is insurance, lawyers and doctors offices. Its back to being just plain old 15th street.

Music, arts, and retail are offering less diversity, less quality and less sophistication both online and in person but we're getting stuff faster and without having to be personal. I'll be glad when it all settles out and we figure out the best ways to utilize the tool.

This happends when too many peeps have too many desires as supply can't keep up with emotional demand.

It's a drag....so is Peoria, Downtown, Jenks, etc.

That map of downtown with all the different colors is atrocious.

Now, back on topic. The internets did not damage 15th street....er, Cherry Stweet.

[cannon_fodder]

quote:Originally posted by FOTD
That map of downtown with all the different colors is atrocious.

Then get off your donkey and volunteer to help make a better one.

This is the same line that was fed in the 1960's, music we now regard as among the best.  in fact, most of the music from that era that I consider great was not doing terribly well on the pop charts.  While I agree with the line that most pop music sucks... you can still find great musicians if you look.  

Don't follow the heard if you don't like it.  When enough people stop following the heard, all of a sudden it changes course.  See NIN, Manson, Deftones, Primus, Tool... a good number of bands that were different and made it big.

Cheer up, we're just in a slump atm.  Pop stars that can't pop, thug rappers that make up a history, and candy corn lyrics on top of canned tunes.  They figure out why this crap isn't selling very well... or they'll fade away and something better will take its place.

[FOTD]

quote:Originally posted by cannon_fodder

quote:Originally posted by FOTD
That map of downtown with all the different colors is atrocious.

Then get off your donkey and volunteer to help make a better one.

This is the same line that was fed in the 1960's, music we now regard as among the best.  in fact, most of the music from that era that I consider great was not doing terribly well on the pop charts.  While I agree with the line that most pop music sucks... you can still find great musicians if you look.  

Don't follow the heard if you don't like it.  When enough people stop following the heard, all of a sudden it changes course.  See NIN, Manson, Deftones, Primus, Tool... a good number of bands that were different and made it big.

Cheer up, we're just in a slump atm.  Pop stars that can't pop, thug rappers that make up a history, and candy corn lyrics on top of canned tunes.  They figure out why this crap isn't selling very well... or they'll fade away and something better will take its place.

You can find grate music if you listen! Look? But read the article. I think you miss her point....

With regard to the mapping, Tulsa has too much want for too little demand. I'd label the areas magnet school district, residential, retail/mixed use ....oh BARS and BOOZERIES!

[bugo]

quote:Originally posted by cannon_fodder

quote:Originally posted by FOTD
That map of downtown with all the different colors is atrocious.

Then get off your donkey and volunteer to help make a better one.

This is the same line that was fed in the 1960's, music we now regard as among the best.  in fact, most of the music from that era that I consider great was not doing terribly well on the pop charts.  While I agree with the line that most pop music sucks... you can still find great musicians if you look.  

Don't follow the heard if you don't like it.  When enough people stop following the heard, all of a sudden it changes course.  See NIN, Manson, Deftones, Primus, Tool... a good number of bands that were different and made it big.

Cheer up, we're just in a slump atm.  Pop stars that can't pop, thug rappers that make up a history, and candy corn lyrics on top of canned tunes.  They figure out why this crap isn't selling very well... or they'll fade away and something better will take its place.

The last few years remind me of the very early 90s musically.  In the late 80s and early 90s, the pop-metal scene had run itself into the ground, and talentless hacks like Trixter and Firehouse ruled the charts.  Recently, bland bands like Nickleback and Fuel have been extremely popular, and don't get me started on emo.  There are still talented artists but most of them are unknown.  Hopefully the "next Cobain" will come along and rescue us from all this mediocrity.

[bugo]

quote:Originally posted by FOTD
The old-fashioned rock star has gone the way of the dodo and the dinosaur. Never again will we have another crazy-as-all-getout Axl Rose, another Jim Morrison who mistakes himself for a poet and has the hypnotic ability to convince a substantial audience it is so, or another Bob Dylan who changes the way a generation sees itself and the world.
[/quote}

I guess this guy has never heard the name "Winehouse."  She's at least as nutty as Axl.

Today's music industry is either moribund or dead, depending on whom you ask. Downloading has destroyed it, and no one in the business is smart enough to figure out how to fix it.

No.  The music industry's antediluvian business plan and draconian actions ruined the music industry.  I, for one, will not mourn its loss.

[USRufnex]

I thought Xerox copies and cassettes destroyed the music industry... where's my mix tape?  []

[AMP]

Back in the 50's and 60's when my mom opened the record department at Oertle's store on 11th street, there were other free standing record stores in Tulsa.  I recall the 45 single with that plastic insert seemed to be the popular way to buy pre-recorded music, so I don't think the single hit song format has changed much. Those that had more cash bought the 33 rpm LPs, Long Playing Albums.  Prior to that there were 78 rpm and very thick.  Many were orchestra, opera and piano recordings.



Some 45 rpm  singles records were made with colored vinyl.



There were also Reel to Reel pre-recorded music, I still have several of those in their original boxes somewhere, along with a few crates of vinyl albums dating back to the day.



With four older sisters and a mom that loved, wrote and played music, our family had most every record produced that we carried at the store, and some that were unheard of as the record peddlers would always have extra samples they provided.  

Records then were big entertainment and most folks owned some sort of record player, be it a small portable or a larger home unit complete with cabinet, larger woofer, tuner which may of included multi-band frequencies including Short Wave.   Most were mono as stero had not been introduced, however audio buffs hand built some pretty cool players even then with the single metal pointed looking mono needle.

I remember the record store being a cool place to hang out, look at album covers, look at people, meet other people and even get lucky.  

Bill's T Records later Bill's T Records and Tapes, Greers Records and Tapes, Honest John's Records and Tapes, Sound Warehouse, Starship and a few others were popular places to go browse through tons of albums.  Browsing was physical then and not done sitting in front of a monitor. LOL



I think it is interesting that several of the most popular radio stations in Oklahoma such as KMOD Tulsa and KMOA Oklahoma City still play a large number of selections from those days.



Anyone remember the Spud Gun?

[waterboy]

Yeah, we all had spud guns though mine looked like a Buck Rogers ray gun. The well equipped 10 yr old in the early sixties had a transistor radio with ear plug, a spud gun or spring loaded BB gun, Jack Purcell blue tips, a Schwinn Stingray, double bubble or lik-m-aid and a dime for a coke at the filling station.

We found a bunch of giant LP 33 1/3 vinyl records in the basement of our old house growing up. They were Savings Bond LP's meant to raise money for the war effort. Lots of famous old names but they meant squat to us. My older brother got hold of some M-80's, plugged them into the center hole, lit it and threw them through the air like the yet to be invented Frisbee.

Turns out they had a soft metal core with vinyl sandwiched around the metal. They in effect were flat hand grenades. They shattered up real well. How did we live through the fifties?