The Pottycast is back! This week I’m joined by A&R Producer and digital music industry veteran, Gregg Ogorzelec. We talk about how online tools have changed the landscape of the music industry over the last decade and look ahead to a “cloudy” future.
Subscribe to the Pottycast using the links below.
So the big news today in the tech world is that AT&T Wireless will be drastically changing their smartphone data plan options on June 7th.
It boils down to the following for smartphone users:
Naturally, the first thing that went through my mind when i saw this was, “ZOMG WTF!! FUCK YOU AT&T YOU ARE THE WORST!”
Then, once I was done nerd raging, I thought, “Hmm, how much data do I actually use each month?”
Here’s my last 6 months of usage (You can find your graph by logging into your AT&T wireless page and clicking “Past Data Usage”):
I’ve gone over the hypothetical 200mb plan only twice, and didn’t even come close to a 2gb limit. I can’t remember what I did in November, but I do know that in May I had been streaming more live baseball games using the MLB At Bat app. Using the iPhone for Twitter, Foursquare, and looking random shit up while you are out does not use up a ton of bandwidth. It’s pretty clear streaming media is going to be the deciding factor for a lot of people. Since I’m paying $30 a month for data currently, I could be saving either $15 or $5, depending on how much I want to limit myself to.
That’s the good news. The concerning news is how this will affect rumored features in the new iPhone, such as video calls and a cloud-based iTunes. According to Wired, 200mb is roughly 7 hours of streaming audio. Thats like 2 baseball games, or a few commutes. Live, 2-way video streaming just sounds like it would eat up bandwidth like Brian ate poop in last month’s Family Guy episode. While I don’t see myself using video chat regularly, I’d like the option to, without feeling like I’m wasting precious allocated bits.
Maybe it was just wishful thinking to assume I could save $15 a month on my phone bill. It’s looking pretty tough to get by on only 200mb if you’re looking to stream any sort content. Ideally, Pandora, Spotify, iTunes, or whatever music cloud service ends up winning will over a robust caching feature so I can just preload all of my music at home before heading out into the wild.
Another silver lining in all of this is that AT&T will let you figure out which plan you want without much dicking:
The carrier’s going to be very flexible about changing between the DataPlus and DataPro plans — if you’re on DataPlus, for example, and you discover that you’re blowing past your allotment, you can choose either to start DataPro the following billing cycle, pro-rate it, or apply the higher plan retroactively to the beginning of your current billing cycle.
I look at this whole thing as hey, at least I’ll probably be saving $5 a month at the very least.
Trent Reznor, I love you, but you’re bringing me down. With your music, that is. Honestly, it just isn’t that great.
I’m not trying to hate; I honestly just haven’t really liked anything you’ve put out since Year Zero. Remember that Nine Inch Nails song, “Wish”? That song kicks so much ass, I just want to hear something new like that. But your new stuff’s gotten more experimental, downtempo, inaccessible, and for lack of a better word, “meh.” I gave your new band/project, How To Destroy Angels, a shot because of your pedigree, but I’m sad to report that the underwhelming single “A Drowning” is the best song on it.
That being said, I still love your acceptance and knowledge of how to distribute your wares on the internet. You provide pristinely encoded mp3s for the low, fair price of an email address. You make it easy for us to tweet, blog, facebook, and share your music without treating us as thieves. I’m glad you’ve offered me the chance to come to my musical conclusion by sampling your music for free.
I am sure there are people out there who enjoy your new musical direction and I don’t fault them for it. It looks like you’ve already “sold out” a $50 tshirt package on your merch site, so congratulations on that too. It’s just that I don’t think your music is for me anymore.
<3,
Andy
Warning: This game requires patience. If you have none, stay away. It’s not a straight shooter.
If you’ve ever wanted to be as badass, cunning, and ruthless as Jack Bauer in a video game, Splinter Cell Conviction is the game for you. Do you want to act out one (or several) of Jack Bauer’s famous interrogation scenes? Done. There are almost an excessive number of situations for you to brutally ask bad guys where stuff is. Conviction’s situation is a departure from previous games in the series. Longtime protagonist Sam Fisher is not ostensibly working with any sort of government agency. For most of the game Fisher’s only contact with “the good guys” is with a woman he used to work with in the government. Sound familiar?
I loved the way new objectives are presented to you in this game. Many have called the way the game projects text onto the game world “Fringe Lettering” (yes, referring to the JJ Abrams show). I’d say it goes a bit further, as the show’s lettering is limited to large block letters hanging in mid air introducing new locations. Conviction goes a step further and blends the text into walls and objects in the world seamlessly. More games need to do this.
Diehard Splinter Cell fans lamented the loss of certain gameplay elements such as hiding bodies. I found it refreshing. Hiding bodies always felt like a chore, rather than “ooh, this is cool because it’s realistic.” Fisher has a new trick called “Execution” where you can mark anywhere between 2-4 targets (depending on how much you’ve upgraded your gun) and can instantly kill them all with one button if you are within line of sight. It’s balanced since you have to “earn” the right to do this by successfully melee killing someone. While some critics may complain this cheapens the gameplay, at the end of the day, it serves to make the player feel like a badass. I’m ok with this. I want to be the action hero I see in the final cut of film. I’m ok with cutting out “realistic” elements for more fun.
Broken down into its core elements, Conviction is a sequence of situations in which Sam Fisher has to deal with bad guys who don’t know he’s there. Usually, I’d start off trying to take out everyone stealthily from the shadows. I’m not one for elaborate planning, so invariably I’d get seen, shit would hit the fan, and I’d have to shoot my way out of the mess. Oftentimes this would end in failure, but since I’m an above-average shooter player, I imagine I brute-forced my way through more than most players would. Generally, Conviction does a good job of preventing you from just run and gunning your way through the game, as a veritable clown bus of bad guys will swarm you if you try to do this. (Protip: There are always more dudes in the room than you think there are.)
I played through the single-player campaign through on “Realistic” difficulty. I usually play most games on normal difficulty, but I strongly recommend that you play this game on “Realistic” if you do. Playing through on anything less will give you far more leeway to run and gun your way through the game and I think that detracts from the experience. The most memorable moments you will have while playing will be the stealth kills and planned gadget kills, not the machinegun kills you get from playing Call of Duty style.
My favorite moment in the game was a planned attack where I planted a remote explosive on the ground next to a pair of armed guards. I scaled the building to their right, overlooking another guard from behind. Jumping down, I broke the neck of the hapless guard from behind. The original pair saw this and began to run towards me. Calmly, I pressed the button, detonated the explosive, and took out the remaining guards LIKE A BOSS.
The biggest complaint people have of Conviction is the “insta-fail” section well-into the game. I can’t defend this; it’s some bullshit. I’d like to think there’s a better solution to forcing players to act in a stealthy manner. However, part of the reason I got through it with minimal yelling at the screen was due to my Realistic difficulty training. By the time I got to the chapter in question, I was already used to basically “insta-failing” if I was detected (due to the immense swarms of enemies and inability to absorb much gunfire). It still sucked, though, because I could do everything right except for one tiny mistake, and I’d be forced to reload a checkpoint. Perhaps a better way of enforcing this would be to elevate the difficulty level to Realistic for everyone, regardless of what they are playing at. It’ll train the player to be more stealthy, but also give them the feeling that they could progress even if they make a mistake.
It’ll take a certain type of mindset to succeed and have fun with Conviction. You need to be prepared to be methodical and inconspicuous. If you can and are willing to do this, I guarantee you will have a great time with this game.
Kanye’s new track “Power” leaked on the internet earlier today and it’s pretty fresh-sounding. Co-produced by underground Dallas beatcrafter, Symbolyc One and featuring R&B singer Dwele at the end, “Power” is a return to “College Dropout” form for our favorite “douchey” rapper/producer.
Most of the talk is going to be about the King Crimson sample of “21st Century Schizoid Man”, but I love the dirty drum beat juxtaposed with an African chorus chant. It definitely evokes memory of the epic “Jesus Walks”. The little piano melody halfway through is a nice touch too.
“What about the lyrics?” you may ask. Check out the beginning of this verse:
Fuck SNL and the whole cast
Tell ’em Yeezy said they can kiss my whole ass
More specifically, they can kiss my asshole
Or this gem:
I don’t need yo’ pussy, bitch, I’m on my own dick
Yeah, man, Kanye is a potty guy. But props for backing it up with a well produced track.
Last week, Arcade Fire released two clips of songs from their upcoming album, The Suburbs. Music blogs and the indie station on XM/Sirius trumpeted these 30 second previews as ZOMG MEGATON ANNOUNCEMENTS.
Come on.
What is this, 2003? I’d like to think Arcade Fire of all bands would not stoop to the “hype game”. Just give us the whole fucking songs.
Anyway, the songs are now up in their entirety. You can listen to “The Suburbs” and “Month of May” via the cleverly designed Flash Widget below.
Personally, I am not that impressed. Both songs are fairly straightforward and serviceable, if uninteresting. “Month of May” is the uptempo rocker, while “The Suburbs” is a more happy-go-lucky indie track. Consider my expectations tempered for the full album when it comes out on August 3rd.
Click this link if you would like to give Arcade Fire your hard earned money.
Protip: You can drag the spinning record in the widget back and forth like a real LP. Neat, huh?
There’s an article in yesterday’s New York Times about the Department of Justice opening an inquiry into Apple’s “bullying tactics” in digital music sales. The biggest example given of said “bullying” was threatening the record labels if they worked with Amazon:
In March, Billboard magazine reported that Amazon was asking music labels to give it the exclusive right to sell certain forthcoming songs for one day before they went on sale more widely. In exchange, Amazon promised to include those songs in a promotion called the “MP3 Daily Deal” on its Web site.
The magazine reported that representatives of Apple’s iTunes music service were asking the labels not to participate in Amazon’s promotion, adding that Apple punished those that did by withdrawing marketing support for those songs on iTunes.
First of all, I find it deliciously ironic that the record labels are now the victims of bullying. Secondly, is anyone actually surprised by these tactics? Maybe I’m just jaded, but when I worked in radio implicit threats were an acceptable tool in the arsenal for record promotions.
Record Label: “If you don’t play this record by <insert new band the label is trying to break>, don’t expect to get <multiplatnium selling artist> for your summer festival show.”
Those words were never said explicitly, but the general idea was understood. It also worked the other way:
Radio Station: “You gave <competing station across town> an exclusive interview with <large band>? Don’t expect to get airplay for <your next baby band>.”
Tit for tat business tactics may not be the nicest or most optimal solutions, but they’re human nature. We get wronged; we want revenge. New girlfriend sees you talking to another chick at the bar? DOGHOUSE. The same thing is essentially going on here with Apple, Amazon, and the record labels.
Granted, those were bygone days in which both parties had leverage on each other. It was a symbiotic relationship; a give and take among equal powers. Now, it seems as if Apple has all of the power here. The record labels are so desperate for iTunes’ short-term sales that they’ll acquiesce to these types of demands and whine to Mommy (the DoJ) about it.
At the end of the day, I think this is an irrelevant battle. Inquire and regulate all you want, but you can’t change human nature. On top of this, I don’t see digital a la carte sales being the music market of the future. We’re seeing consumer excitement shift more towards cloud/subscription/social services.
But that’s a discussion for another day.
Wow.
This news pretty much blindsided me this morning. I (like many others) assumed that Insomniac (Ratchet and Clank, Resistance, inFamous) was wholly owned by Sony. The deal is only for one game, but I’m pretty sure when it succeeds, they’ll continue making more of them for everyone.
Could the platform exclusive title be an endangered species? Bungie’s (Halo) liberation to Activision and the land of multi-platform releases last month certainly raises some eyebrows. Developers want to own their IPs now and who blames them? Wouldn’t you want to get in on movie-licensing and branded Mountain Dew flavor money? Like in the music industry, once you establish yourself as a bonafied rock star, your dependence on the record labels shrinks to just product manufacturing/distribution.
Personally, I’ve never had a problem with not being able to play a title due to the consoles I’ve owned since I own them all. However, I imagine most people have picked only one of the 360 or PS3. There’s a lot of quality titles that you’re missing out on if this is the case. Having our rockstar titles available on both platforms serves to only benefit the end user. After all, nothing kills a recent video game conversation more than “Have you played God of War 3 yet?” “No, I only have a 360. ” =(
Joystiq’s got an interview with Insomniac’s CEO, Ted Price, if you want to read more.
I thought that terrible piece on how the Black Eyed Peas was the #1 reason to be excited about music was the most insulting thing the Rolling Stone had done to music lovers this decade.
I was wrong.
I received the above email earlier today. Apparently, I forgot I had subscribed to The Rolling Stone (and it’s email newsletter) many years ago. I can deal with the unwanted email; I probably should have double checked the newsletter preferences more closely. But to squander a communication attempt with a former subscriber on this tripe?
Come on.
Band Pairings I Never Would Have Conceived of: Ben Bridwell (Band of Horses) with Pearl Jam covering All Along The Watchtower.
Having seen it in action though, can’t say it didn’t help my mental judgment of Bridwell. Dude can play a tambourine hard. Maybe if Band of Horses rocked harder, I would find their latest album, Infinite Arms, less… mediocre.