...From the Treehouse with the Ocean View

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Thursday, May 03, 2012

Sunday, March 04, 2012

Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Is Seth Godin Important? a Joke?

Saw this tweet where @jeffjarvis sticks up for ...nevermind ..here ya go: "Apple rejects @sethgodin's book because he linked to buy @dweinberger's book. Not good."

By the way, Seth doesn't use @sethgodin because??? . He uses @ThisIsSethsBlog. "@sethgodin Seth is not active on Twitter. This is a placeholder. BUT! You can follow my blog by following @thisissethsblog. Anyone who says they're me on Twitter is lying." really?

Over on The Domino Project (.."a new way to think about publishing. Founded by Seth Godin and powered by Amazon, we're trying to change the way books are built, sold and spread. Find out more about our mission here.") Seth whines about Apple rejecting his next book (excuse me, his Manifesto) Stop Stealing Dreams because "inside the manifesto" are links to buy the books he mentions in the bibliography at Amazon.

Really? Apple doesn't want to sell your book because you are going to have links in the book to go buy stuff from a competitor? A link that likely results in a commission paid to you?

Everybody is the new digital revolutionary. Seth has "powerful" ideas. Just ask him!

Some of these guys really don't get it.. A trojan horse is a trojan horse.. was yesterday, is today and will be tomorrow..

This is a free country. Apple can sell whatever it wants and as Steve would say, "if you don't like it, don't buy it".

As for Seth and his jumping up and down because he won't get his way? Now that's how I want to be.. how about you?

I subscribed to Seth's newsletter for a few days. It was some of the most simpleminded garbage I'd ever read. Spare me. Your mileage may differ.

BTW, I know how to set links but didn't in this piece. Easy enough to right click and search if you want to check my sources.

Tuesday, February 07, 2012

How does your digital music sound? What do you do about it?

Neil Young made some waves (in my head anyway) last week talking about Steve Jobs being a digital music pioneer but listening to "records" when he went home. I have no evidence of that one way or another even though I did hang out with Steve once in his favorite audio porn emporium in Palo Alto (the Audible Difference). I know he didn't like "tape", but never heard him talk negatively about cd's.
Have heard the similar refrain from Peter Gabriel who surely knows a thing or two about making music sound good.

I have been told that lossless (which I use as much as possible) is equivalent to a redboard cd (which is good but not great). I'd like to get some feedback from folks in the know. Or not in the know...Maybe some links and comments about what you hear and what you do about it..

For years I bought master recordings and them put them on master tape to play in the car. They sounded great. When I plug my iPhone into my car and crank it up, I'm sometimes impressed (even with 320kbps) and sometimes not so much. It seems to me that it's all in the preparation and UE. Like apple computers, the specs don't necessarily determine the performance..or perceived performance.

I have ears.. played music professionally from the time I was 8 until I was 25 and then was a concert promoter and tour manager. Left the business long ago but my ears could tell who was out of tune in a 100+ piece orchestra and they still don't like laptop speakers (etc.).

4 years ago I started the process of putting a 4000 cd collection onto servers. Backed them up and backed them up again ..and again. Had moved them 3 times and just didn't want to do it again.. We are starting to do the same thing with books. We are near 60 and have accumulated a lot of "stuff" along the way. I got rid of the turntable in the early 90's and will not go back. Most of our listening is casual. So, please tell me what you have found and what you've done. Appreciated..of course. Thanks.

Tuesday, January 17, 2012

the goat.

Posted via email from paul's posterous

Sunday, January 01, 2012

a relaxed start

Posted via email from paul's posterous

Saturday, December 24, 2011

boat graveyard

Posted via email from paul's posterous

Phil's Sign

Posted via email from paul's posterous

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

our neighbor billy

Posted via email from paul's posterous

Sunday, December 18, 2011

The Internet Needs Your Help (SOPA)

I posted a link to the White House Site (please go there and sign the petition) tonight on Facebook and Twitter. I, like many others, who spend so much time on-line are shocked at the implications of a bill to shoot now and aim later as it pertains to content on the Internet. The view of its necessity to me is summed up in some tweets by Jim Cramer: "We all kid ourselves about the web. It is just a way to destroy great media institutions and steal value from the good guys. We know that." and previously, "I wish people really knew how corrupt the web is. How it is all a game of search engine optimization and intellectual theft. Do you think the truth will ever come out about the web? People pretending to be others, Stealing from others. Gaming everything? I am simply saying that all of the papers i applied to or worked for are hurt or killed by the web."

Techmeme rips headlines and curates one of the most read site on-line. Jim's point it seems. He rightly points out: "I can be Seeking Alpha. All i have to do is report what Jim Cramer says and then misquote him, grade him, trash him, praise him."

I see it differently.

My friend Aaron Breden on Facebook said, "between the national defense authorization act and this (SOPA) and some of the other actions the government is taking it leads me to believe we are in deep shit."

I have a sense of the same thing from time to time.. then I think SOPA is nothing more than big business acting out of pure self interest. Knowing that there are principled leaders running companies with reasonable ideas about competition and success, not acting out of pure greed, is small comfort. This bill is a grab. The Internet still represents freedom. Yup.. it's so overly commercial and noisy. Trolls all over the place and individuals cowardly posting under assumed names etc..I asked a reporter (@acarvin) to stop with the non-stop tweets ("write a blog dude") tonight (he dominated a list of "journalists" which is very active-has 69 members). He YELLED at back at me and told me to "unfollow me" (spell check unnecessary).. then caught a troll who was posting under "URaDouchbag" with no avatar giving me the clear view of a pimpled 16 year old virgin on meth about how freedom is being able to say and do whatever you want. It's a graceless age. Maybe the Internet doesn't matter. But hidden in all the noise is a great deal of our collective intellect.. That's what I came here for. Not success measured by followers, users or readers but in the quality of the search (thanks Wikipedia, BING and Google). Google+ has it right. Publish under your own name or at least be visible.. this is no place to hide. I'll write my confession about how I got tossed out of chat rooms on the original aol in the late 80's.. maybe early 90's? It was dial up at 9600.. that was fast!

I was one of the first 100 guys with ISDN at dual 128. WooT!

Maybe we just need to learn some manners and reread the 10 commandments.

I helped build 10,000 route miles of the westcoast Internet backbone in the 90's. Between the Phone Companies with their greed and the trolls it's sometimes hard to feel good about that.

Now and then I hear a story of information saving a life or communicating vital information to better mankind.. just more of the same thing.. the yin with the yang..the ocean keeps wearing away the shore.. see below and keep breathing.