Down, Down to the Marketplace Edition
Todays links of interest:
- Pre-taped People’s Choice Awards bombs on TV
Good. - Radiohead debuts at No. 1 despite digital giveaway, announces U.S. tour
So lets review: despite allowing totally and utterly FREE downloads, the CD version of "In Rainbows" debuts at #1. Why? Because it was pretty great, and the fact that it was passed around with impunity helped it, as opposed to hurt it. Conclusions: free downloads aren’t killing the music industry; the music industry’s own continual opposition to how digital music lets artists be heard by uncounted new people is killing it. - Hillary Clinton 1, Chris Matthews 0
Why you may have been surprised that Hillary won New Hampshire last night. The sudden declaration over the weekend that Hillary wuz dead never made much sense. A highly unscientific (margin of error = +/- 98%) poll taken by one of your ‘lopers of his staunch Dem family over Xmas showed all three major candidates running neck and neck and neck with 33% of vote each. Even the ‘loper who knows for damn sure that he’s voting for Obama knows that we’d all do best to heed Yogi Berra’s advice on when it’s over, not Chris Matthews’ or Bill Kristol’s. - MS: no iPhone rival in works
Remember when Zune was a family of products and not just a line of media players? The Zune phone was supposed to be the next big Microsoft product launch. Looks like MS is finally coming to grips with reality. Too bad. Imagine the fun we’d have with the zPhone. - Spears Clan Calls Foul on Dr. Phil’s Blabbermouth
Which is what we kind of figured. Still, on the dickweed scale of 1 – 100, it goes like this: Dr. Phil – 99; Spears Family – 97; K-Fed – 90. - US delays global warming decision on polar bears
This is one of those deals where you wish that the polar bears could come down and testify in front of a Congressional subcommittee about just how confused they are about all of the melting ice. And then eat whomever in the Bush Adminstration is responsible for this. - Paramount to back out of Toshiba’s HD-DVD
Leaving Universal to stand alone. - Copying music legally in the digital age
Apparently, the British are no longer with us. New proposal will allow consumers to copy digital music for "private use". The RIAA, naturally, is concerned that this might interfere with new policy that prohibits the playing of music for one’s friends as every song heard constitutes a lost sale…