Archives for January 2009

The Daily Loper – January 6, 2009

January 6, 2009 by Lopy

I Say Oh My And A Boo Hoo Edition

Todays links of interest:

The Stooges guitarist Ron Asheton found dead at 60
Sometimes his guitar sounded like a giant door creaking as it opened directly into another dimension.
Apple changes iTunes prices; removes copy protection
It’s about fracking time.
Sting Teaches You to Play Guitar in Garageband ’09
Too bad he’s a bass player. Couldn’t they get Andy Summers to do this?

Apple Gets Smart With The DRM and the Pricing

January 6, 2009 by Jim Connelly

Well, all I can say is that it’s about godsdammed time. Today’s big news out of Macworld — that the iTunes Music Store is going DRM-free AND adding a tiered pricing structure — is good news for everyone involved.

It’s good news for consumers because — from the consumer standpoint — DRM sucks fully, totally and utterly. No matter how it was spun as one of those “for your protection” things, or as “protection for the artist,” it’s been proven time and time again to be a big pain in the ass for consumers. Anytime you purchase an artifact — including a digital file — with eithervsome kind of purely arbitrary use restriction and/or dependency on the large corporation that sold you the artifact to keep it working, that’s potential trouble. Period.

The Daily Loper – January 5, 2009

January 5, 2009 by Lopy

Random Acts of Meaningless Violence Edition

Todays links of interest:

Battlestar Galactica: Ron Moore talks about the final season
Sigh.
Twitter Gets Hacked, Badly
Either that, or Bill O’Riley really is gay. He really does protest a bit too much . . .
And now the Oscar for best movie blurb!
Ah, we do love a snarky column.