Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.
scriptingNews outline for 7/22/2000
Author: Dave Winer Posted: 7/22/2000; 7:30:20 AM Topic: scriptingNews outline for 7/22/2000 Msg #: 18918 Prev/Next: 18917 / 18919
Saturday with Blondie
Blondie is singing to me tonight. "Dave, Dave, Dave, let's have some fun, I'm going to be your number one. The tide is high but I'm holding on, I'm going to be your number one."
New feature in our still unnamed playlist editor. Put the cursor on a song. Choose Google Search from the Playlist menu. A browser window opens with the results of the search. It almost always gives you the song lyrics as the first item. I've yet to stump Google. (Here's an example of a query.)
When the music industry comes to its senses, and decides to like their users again, they can make it up to us by shipping CDs with MP3s on them. Help the hardware industry transition to the new format. Sales will double. What a relief, we're not at war anymore.
Doc Searls: "Hold it right there. Don't move. Now put down the customer and step away from the marketplace."
BTW, we bought a sexy name for a new site we're working on. It'll live up to its name for sure. First we're going to tell it what our favorite songs are. Then we're going to make it easy for you to do the same. And your friends, and so on. Is it viral? Do people read charts? What's number one on Napster? No one knows, not even Napster. Let's find out!
Today's Other Song
Harry Chapin: "We both got what we asked for such a long long time ago."
A beautiful song about lost love.
Explanation: When I say "beautiful" it means it reached something inside me, resonated, and opened space for an emotional release. A fairly technical description for tears running down my face and a feeling of truth, resolution, relaxation, happiness.
A memory of young love, there's nothing more sweet, except perhaps the young love itself. Someone else had a similar experience, and at an emotional (ie real) level, it calls my own procedure, and I'm young again, in love with a fresh young woman (one my own age) and we're dancing, dreaming and loving; happy beyond anything I could imagine.
I think of the young people with Napster, what an incredible gift for them. I wonder if any of them are exploring the music of their parents' generation. If so, perhaps you can give us older folk pointers to music your generation creates that you think we'd like. But wait a few months, we're still exploring our youth, next I'll want to explore yours.
The generational connect
It's obvious. Napster was created by a young man, only 19 years old. What a privilege to have lived long enough to relish a revolution whose courage came from such a young man!
Speaking of young men
I just got an email from Joel Spolsky who has a new essay entitled Microsoft Goes Bonkers. I can't wait to read it.
"If you go too far up, abstraction-wise, you run out of oxygen. Sometimes smart thinkers just don't know when to stop, and they create these absurd, all-encompassing, high-level pictures of the universe that are all good and fine, but don't actually mean anything at all."
After reading all the way through, thanks for the kind words Joel. I forwarded a URL to a friend at Microsoft who does understand what you're saying. Now if they would listen to him. ";->"
There's no time like now
Next Wednesday there's a good chance that Napster's servers will be shut down, or their service curtailed.
If so, then that's what was meant to be. Of course the IP issues are murky. But the application is so compelling, speaking for my generation, which controls the money in the music business, can't we find some way for everyone to be happy?
Music is about so much more than money. It provides context for humans to be loving and to share. Without music to write about, I'd have to inch up to the core questions, one slow step at a time,. What's common about our life patterns, how are we all alike? Every generation has to figure this out for itself, many times through our lifetimes. A vote for romance and glory. Music opens the door so wide.
No matter what happens
Everything changed, again.
We're working on a new server, this morning I wrote about its privacy policy.
"The purpose of uploading your information is to share it with others. There will be a privacy policy clearly stated in many places so you can't miss it. The information you flow out this way is public, one hundred percent, no privacy."
That's the Web philosophy, as concisely stated as I've ever seen it. Could the statement have been so concise if it had not been for Napster?
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