Posts by Russell Brown
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The funny thing about Mr Moore's website is that it's being (erm) heralded as his own work but the domain name is registered to Cameron Slater (aka Whale Oil) the National activist behind the KIll the Bill campaign:
query_datetime: 2008-01-08T14:29:52+13:00
domain_name: dontvotelabour.org.nz
query_status: 200 Active
domain_dateregistered: 2007-12-31T16:29:14+13:00
domain_datebilleduntil: 2008-12-31T16:29:14+13:00
domain_datelastmodified: 2007-12-31T16:32:09+13:00
domain_delegaterequested: yes
%
..
%
registrant_contact_name: Cameron Slater
registrant_contact_address1: xxxxxxxxx
registrant_contact_address2: Howick
registrant_contact_city: Auckland
registrant_contact_postalcode: 1705
registrant_contact_country: NZ (NEW ZEALAND)
registrant_contact_phone: xxxxxxxxxx
registrant_contact_email: camslater@gmail.com--
Would that complicate things any?
Moore also mentioned the collaboration on the well-known masturbation site, SOLO Passion ...
http://www.solopassion.com/node/4005
Anyway, back to holiday ...
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sure, of course, but you're not saying you'd happily give away 'how bizarre'.
Which, if I'm not speaking out of turn, wasn't released as a single in the US. You'd still have your publishing revenue, and I think you'd still be able to sell the album.
But more to the point, 'How Bizarre' in the YouTube age would have been MASSIVE; it just screams "derivative use". And also probably a lot more interesting for Pauly than trekking through a thousand radio stations.
Anyway, thanks sincerely Rob for being such a game contrarian. It's an interesting thread.
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Wow. That Orcinus blog that's been tracking Ron Paul is awesome.
This astonishing (and possibly unreliable) "outing" of Paul as a regular in white nationalist circles by a fellow traveller is amazing (read the comments!).
And there's a bundle in Ron Paul vs. the New World Order.
He's a John Birch (or Zenith Applied Philosophy/Trevor Loudon) paranoid crazy from way back.
But returning to the idea of the essential unity of all conspiracy theory, couldn't the following, from an interview Paul gave to Conspiracy Planet, have equally come from any number of characters on the radical Left?
RP - Well, just everything they've done. Everything the U.N. does from day one, you give up a certain amount of your sovereignty. And, the worst giving up is this notion of going to war under U.N. resolutions, which we did very quickly after we got in the United Nations. There was a U.N. resolution and we sent off all those men to get killed in Korea.
Whether it's that, or the WTO that manages trade, or the IMF that we subsidize with our taxpayers' money and then they go off and play games with their special interests. They rarely ever help poor countries. The World Bank isn't any better. That's an international welfare scheme. It's sold as a scheme that's going to help poor people in poor countries. But, all these programs end up helping the very wealthy, connected corporations and banks.
Gotta love those global banking elites ...
In other news, one of the New Hampshire polls has Paul coming third.
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This guy has based his whole blog around pulling apart arguments made by denialists of many stripes
Good comments too. The first one for this post explains the Ron Paul thing quite well:
Ron Paul is a paleoconservative, the most mainstream American political tendency ideologically closest to neofascism. Other paleocons include Pat Buchanan, Lew Rockwell, Joseph Sobran, Justin Raimondo, Samuel Francis. They are not themselves neofascists, but there is a continuum of paleocons with white nationalists. (I want to be very careful with this, because "fascism" often gets thrown around imprecisely and incorrectly as a political weapon.) Paleocons, like neofascists, tend to be anti-Zionist, isolationist, antiglobalization, economically populist, and extremely culturally conservative. They also are prone to conspiracy theorizing. Both paleocons and neofascists identify neocons, as well as "Zionist" Democrats, as their main enemies on the American political landscape. There is a lot of heterogeneity within paleoconservatism, or within neofascism for that matter. Again, I don't mean to imply that Ron Paul himself is a fascist (even less so than some paleocons); rather, several of his policy positions are attractive to fascists.
Paleoconservatives can sound very appealing to many on the left of center when they talk about US foreign policy, US-Israel relations, economic populism, and globalization.
Although the economic populism thing doesn't really apply to Paul. Or perhaps it does, in a different, the-government-is-robbing-you way.
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There's an article here by a space journalist attending a presentation by Richard Hoagland, the Face on Mars guy. The parallels are obvious, and overall it's actually pretty sad and dreary:
This was a major problem for the anti-GE lobby here. I had a bit of contact with them, and there were genuinely concerned and knowledgeable people involved -- and then there were what I referred to as the "UFO fanciers" like Jonathan Eisen -- who really is a Face on Mars guy.
My impression is that Eisen and his mates had the energy of crazy people and to some extent ran away with the movement, and there was a lot of emotional upheaval. I asked Bic Runga (who was a celebrity supporter) about it in an interview once, and she really didn't want to talk about it.
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No Right Turn comprehensively sorts out the Herald's latest guest denial tract, the one from Brian Leyland (whose connections are not even mentioned in connection with the story).
This is getting ridiculous. Could the Herald possibly get someone with some credibility to write on this issue?
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But the model is changing and I'm not sure if Madonna is the right person to point at.
Sure. She was a trophy signing and it seems Live Nation doesn't really expect to make its money back. But it's the next batch of artists it signs that will be interesting.
In my experience New Zealand has been extraordinarily well served by major label MDs over the years...people that actually like and go the extra mile for the non-money making thing that is NZ music often. Adam has put his neck on the line countless times (Dawn Raid and the fact that he was crucial to OMC's international success are just two).
You might also add the time he spent on the SJD album, which wasn't going to sell big retail numbers (on the other hand: two big synchronisation deals for TV commercials!). I really appreciated that Adam and Jim came to us to design a campaign for that album. It was cool.
(BTW, the current internet advertising set-up serves music and other entertainment companies very poorly. I'd quite like to do something about that.)
And I reckon Mike Bradshaw's view on where record companies will go -- more vertical, more 360 -- is spot-on.
I think people like that will still be working in the music business in 10 years' time. Just maybe not for the same old companies.
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you're forgetting that the major label fronts the cash for the venture. indies front the cash for theirs.
No, I think this is happening on P&D deals: if you signed away digital distribution you're liable to be fscked.
I know of at least one bedroom recording artist who was treated extremely poorly by his major. And, of course, some of the biggest artist in the world have been taking their labels to court over similar issues. FRom the post by Simon Grigg I linked to above:
the major record companies on the contrary are often using the digital move as a way of reducing the amount paid to an artist. For example most acts signed to majors have a "new technologies" deduction..which they actually used to try to apply to CDs until a couple (as recall Dire Straits and Simply Red) of acts sued. this can vary between 10% (unusual) to 30%. Which means that the act only get paid on 70% of the wholesale. Then there are packaging deductions which majors apply...20-25%..so the royalty base is now down toabout 45% of wholesale..and there are more. The fact that there is no packaging on a digital download is ignored.
That's hard to justify.
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that's a bit of a broad generalisation. some major label acts negotiated very favourable contracts for themselves, and the labels that represent them don't screw them over. others get royally shafted as in any business.
I've talked to people involved, and sighted some of the contracts and it is my understanding that the major label deals on download revenues are generally markedly worse for the artists than those from independent labels, the difference being as much as 25% vs. 50% of retail revenue.
The key thing is whether you signed away digital rights at the time of your label contract. If you did, you'll probably be screwed. That's not because people here are bad -- but because the decisions are made overseas.
And that's leaving out the seriously dodgy charges and deductions that have, in some cases, brought the artist's share down to 4.5 cents in the dollar.
The New Zealand act that gets the best deal on iTunes is Fat Freddy's Drop, because they've been able to deal more or less directly with iTunes.
That whole evil major label schtick as a means to justify theft is a little tired and people should know better than to perpetuate it. Its just a diversion from the real issue. one of ownership and the right to control that which they own, be they small time artists or major label wankers.
I probably see more of the major label managers in NZ than you do, and there are some good people involved: Adam Holt and Mike Bradshaw, for example. But globally, the major label model isn't good, and it's going to change. When Madonna's Warner contract expired in September, she didn't sign with another record label, but with Live Nation (for $120 million!), which will participate in all her revenue streams, including merchandise and live ticketing. They're out hunting for more signings, and they'll get them.
But I have to take you up on the idea that retail pricing is mostly governed by the level of piracy. I just don't think that's true.
And not every unpermitted copy is a lost sale. Rob, how many sales does piracy really cost you?
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He seems willing to risk the damage the ancient scandal might cause rather than the fuss a summary caucus execution might cause.
Or has calculated that whatever it is is more likely to backfire on Labour, especially if it's historical. They've managed to shoot themselves in the foot fairly reliably over the past year.
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