August, 2009

Music — No Comments
27
Aug 09

Joel Tennenbaum and Jammie Thomas-Rasset Were Not Fined for Downloading Music

With the news about the recent decisions in both the Joel Tennenbaum case and the Jammie Thomas Rasset case, there has been a lot of uninformed complaining going on. The biggest error among the misinformed is this: they think people were fined for downloading music.

They weren’t.

In most articles you’ll read online, the act of downloading is the focus, like this one over at Gizmodo.  I understand that a lot of people online like to steal music, and that they’re upset that some people got in trouble for it – but the fact is, they’re wrong about what the people got in trouble for.  The people (Tennenbaum and Thomas-Rasset) got in trouble for downloading and distributing music.  They were found to do so willingly, and while knowing that to do so was illegal. Continue reading →

Marketing / Web — No Comments
11
Aug 09

Corporate Love

In our current state of constant communication and sharing of information we take for granted the fact that we can say pretty much whatever, whenever we want. Because of this, it’s fairly easy for us to let our guard down now and say what we really feel – at least the moment we say it – without thinking too hard about who might be listening.

Sure, there’s a lot of talk about making sure that you’re Google-search-safe and “OMG what if my prospective employer looks me up on Facebook” – but for the most part we’re fairly secure of anonymity. Or maybe we’re just understanding of the fact that the world is changing, and that we all might have some warts and that that’s okay. Continue reading →

Life / Publishing / Technology / Web / Writing — 4 Comments
10
Aug 09

The Genocide of the Creative Class (A Work-in-Progress)

In a recent post, I mentioned that I was working on a new novel. This is true, but what I didn’t mention is that I’m also working on a new piece of nonfiction. This work focuses primarily on the cost and value of creation, and the damages that are happening to the creative class due to some aspects of modern culture. In fact, a working subtitle for the book (at least as I’m writing it) is The Genocide of the Creative Class.

Here’s a snippet of the current work-in-progress.

For a lot of people, creation is their livelihood. For others, it’s where their livelihood should be. I may be modest at times, but I know I’m no Picasso. For people like him, there obviously was a motivation to create – but there was also a cost. In his lifetime, Picasso created an estimated 50,000 individual works. If nothing else, that’s a lot of paint, paper and time.

Still, the obvious question here is “What if Picasso had not been able to create as his profession?” Of course there is no way he’d have created 50,000 works – there simply isn’t enough time in one’s life to do something like that as a hobby. Or, if somehow he could have still produced as many works, it is highly unlikely he would have had the drive to do so, much less perfect his craft to the level which he did.

Continue reading →

Publishing / Writing — No Comments
8
Aug 09

Kindle Edition of My Debut Thriller, The Trouble With Being God, Now only $3.50

Have an Amazon Kindle? Looking for a low price on a quick read?

Now you can get The Trouble With Being God, my debut philosophical / psychological thriller, for just $3.50 on the Kindle. (Or download the free sample to take a peek first).

Also, if you have an iPhone, don’t forget you can also download Kindle books to it with the Kindle iPhone app.