Lord Gonchar

I’ve wonked a few times about the devaluing of music as a product. About how multi-millionaire artists give away so-so releases and claim they’re sticking it to the man and tout the greatness of the internet as a tool for musicians of any level to get in the game and all that crap. You can go back and check those posts out if you’d like:

November 6, 2007 – Your Music Is Worthless
November 8, 2007 – Your Music Is Still Worthless
May 6th, 2008 – NIN The Slip
February 2, 2010 – The Plan To Save The Music Biz

What can I say? It irks me that this mentality took hold.

Today I saw this story showing how much (or rather how little) musicians earn online and what they’d have to sell to make minimum wage.

From the article:

If recording artists ever go the way of the blubber merchants, it won’t be because there’ll be no demand for their product. It will be because making recordings makes no economic sense.

Here’s the same info in chart form if you’re illiterate or like pink circles.

I dunno. It’s a pet peeve of mine. Mostly because something like music seems to me to be one of the most valuable things there is. I know it sounds weird to say I think there needs to be an incentive to create art, but I do.

I posted this on Facebook too, so if you don’t read my blog and just see the posts come through on Facebook, then this is a double-post for you. Too bad.

I’ve grown to enjoy Red Eye over the past few months. Very entertaining more often then not and I liked this little conversation on Health Care reform.

(link)

And if you disagree, you’re probably a racist homophobe who wears fur to whale eating parties.

Carrie wrote a nice little bit on embracing regret on her blog. (go read it, I’ll still be here)

Done? Good. Neat post, huh?

I have a slightly different view. Mostly it comes down to semantics, but it changes the perspective entirely. I have no regrets. Not by Carrie’s definition. I subscribe to the “play it safe” or “good enough” or “fear of the unknown” method of looking back. That is to say the choices I made and the things I did put me where I am now and made me who I am…and I’m pretty damn happy with both. Could it be better? Probably. Could it be worse? Surely.

But to really suggest that there’s nothing you’ve done or experienced in your life that you feel sorry about or wish would have been different, is just not likely.

Feel sorry about? Ehhhh…maaaaybe. Not sure about that.

Wish had been different? Nope. Not one.

Wonder how things would be different had a given event in the past gone differently? Absolutely. But I don’t wish they were different – not one – because changes in the past most likely put me in a different place now – for better or worse.

I attribute it this way: If there is something in my past that, if given the chance, I would apply the 20/20 hindsight I now have and go back and do differently because I didn’t like the outcome, then it’s classified as a regret. Simple as that.

And by that definition, I can honestly say I don’t. If it’s small enough to have not changed my life in any major way, there’s no reason to sweat it. If it’s big enough that it could have changed my life, I probably still wouldn’t change it for fear of how it changes everything. As corny and cliched as it is, it’s that those things didn’t play out in a way I thought best that made me who I am and put me where I am in life…and I have no complaints so far.

No regrets.

Curiousity. But not regret.

Plus, it was a good excuse to use a Metallica lyric as a post title…which I’m already starting to regret. Damn!

I originally saw this on Tyler’s blog:

“… Although I’ve gotta say, when I hear critics talk about out of control spending I start scratchin’ my head. I can’t help but remember, those same critics contributed to a $1.3 trillion deficit that I inherited when I took office. [applause]… I mean, seriously, I’m now president, so I’m responsible for solving it, but I don’t think we should have a selective memory. You hand me a $1.3 trillion dollar bill and then you’re complaining 6 months later because we haven’t paid it all back. [applause] A debt, by the way, that was partially the result of two tax cuts that went primarily to the wealthiest few Americans, and a Medicare drug program that wasn’t paid for. These are the same folks who are now complaining about health care, we can’t afford health care. You pass a prescription drug program and didn’t pay for it! Handed the bill to me. [Obama laughs]…”

… .. Nobody is talking about some government takeover of health care. [applause] I’m tired of hearing that … These folks need to stop scaring everybody. [applause and cheering]… .. …”

- Obama in Raleigh, North Carolina (rough transcript)

What does that even mean?

Pass my health care bill because I inherited a deficit? It’s ok for me to spend too much on bad ideas because those guys did too?

And what does that second part about takeovers and scaring people even have to do with the first part about the old guys spending and handing Obama the bill?

What’s the message supposed to be in that quote? Seriously, I’m not being facetious. Would one of my liberal friends take a moment to explain it to me either on my blog or on Facebook when it gets syndicated over there.