an open letter to thesixtyone.com
I applaud you for trying to innovate but I think you should really step back from this a bit. Your changes have removed many of the best features of thesixtyone.com and now make music discovery a very tedious task.
The features I miss most are:
- social networking- t61 made it easy and possible for me to find and interact with enthusiastic and adventurous listeners who were interested in my music (independent, DIY, art music)
- genres- your intention of swapping genres with an “adventure meter” with is very subjective. I have no interest in browsing mainstream pop music so wouldn’t that be adventurous for me?
- the UI- the old lists (recently submitted, most active, genre) made it easy to find music that was interesting in a short period of time. When I suggested the site to friends who were initially put-off by all the pop music, I always explained that they needed to search for at least 5 minutes to get the hang of it. Right now your setup is more like Pandora which is like searching through the dirt for a few small gems.
The best thing about T61 is that you had found a very engaging way (maybe inadvertently) to connect artists/bands directly to their listeners which created small communities based on genres/micro-genres. Your kudos system of hearts and quests is a great way to encourage a wide variety of “adventurous” listening experiences and I encourage you to focus new development on that area. What is so amazing about how you had T61 setup is that it could help any artist find their audience. This in effect gave listeners (myself included) a very strong incentive to find value in music again and put my money behind what I was listening to.
I wholeheartedly (and many others on your facebook page) encourage you to rethink the redesign,
Sincerely Yours,
obsolete in aughts…
in the aughts i stopped:
- wearing a watch and now use my cellphone to keep track of the time
- using a landline and now use my voip/cellphone/text message/facebook/twitter) as my primary form of digital communication
- reading the newspaper and magazines now i skim news aggregators like slate, huffpost, drudge report (it’s useful to know what the right is thinking)
- reading and buying paper books and now i read them on my kindle
- using a thomas guide as a map and now use my nav system or google maps on the iphone
- listening to the radio for traffic reports (again hello google maps)
- listening to music on a stereo and now i listen on my iphone or laptop
- using a thomas guide
- listening to physical CD’s and mostly stopped paying for downloading music (hello lala, thesixtyone, and mog)
- using a desktop computer as my main computer and now i use a netbook/macbookpro/iphone as my main computer
- using windows products and became a mac and linux fanboy
- renting DVD’s at brick and mortar stores (hello netflix streaming)
- paying for cableTV and now we download/stream on the interwebs
- using our analog TV and started watching TV on the wall (using an overhead projector i bought for shows and work)
- stopped blogging on a regular basis and now i mainly tweet (except for long form posts like this)
the winners are already decided
after reading anne midgette’s washington post article Roll Over Beethoven about her new “alt-classical” genre i have a few bones to pick with with her description and logic.*
besides mixing up the alt.classical genre with the alt.classical transcription bandwagon. (Alarm Will Sound’s Aphex Twin transcriptions and Christopher O’Riley’s Radiohead piano music) she tries then label [...]
technical difficulties, please stand by
this year has also been a pretty big change for me personally. last fall (for a variety of reasons) it was in my best interest to put the pbe on indefinite hiatus. the simple answer is that i wasn’t interested in the long rebuilding process after carl stronach (nyc in 2007) and bruce gallego (stockton [...]
under construction (take 2)
2nd full install today… bigger and better things coming soon (once i get this stabilized)
update: most things are working now… i still need to fix some broken media links and update my blogroll. somehow by getting this site working again i feel pretty enthusiastic about things to come.
also i’d really like to thank veronica paez [...]
remodeling
if you actually visit this site (with rss feeds i’m not sure if there is much of a reason) you probably will notice that the themes keep changing by the day. i’m trying to find that magic balance of a theme that is very flexible and easy to customize, but doesn’t require much css [...]
Really??
just got this email from a pr flack at sony masterworks. i had to read it a few times before i decided it wasn’t fake.
yikes
“Heard around the world moments before Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th President of The United States of America, Air and Simple Gifts is now available for sale exclusively [...]
Requiem for a High Homicide Enclave (05-16-2008)
Requiem for a High Homicide Enclave (Live at REDCAT 05-16-08) from paul bailey on Vimeo.
Requiem for a High Homicide Enclave is a mashup based on excerpts from the from the LA Times Homicide Report which documents every murder that takes place in Los Angeles County using blog posts, comments, and Google Maps combined with a deconstruction
sorry its taken a while to get this one up, that’s what a busy fall will do for you. this performance was based only one the LA county homicide statistics through may 16 2008. right now i’m planning to update the piece and perform it a few times in 2009, but this is complicated with the fact that the LATimes suspended the homicide blog in november. i have a few ideas of how i’m going to update it. we are also planning to get together this spring and make a proper recording.
the audio is from the premier performance of the requiem at the REDCAT spring studio spring studio last may at the roy and edna disney cal arts theater at disney hall) featuring my co-conspirators sylvia desrochers (soprano) paul cummings (bass) bruce gallego (electric guitar) and myself playing the korg kaossillator, and a macbook pro running ableton live triggering a deconstructed looping continuo (henry purcell’s man that is born of a woman) with a fcb1000 midi pedal.
Music: Henry Purcell/Paul Bailey
Video: Paul Bailey
Libretto: LA Times Homicide Blog latimesblogs.latimes.com/homicidereport/2008/11/a-note-to-our-r.html
jumping the tweet
i have been tagged in a meme from the very talented and geographically fortunate alex shapiro (who composes and contemplates life from her wonderful fortress of solitude in the pacific northwest. i know i have not been very social this fall (unless you participate on the twitter) so along those lines, i’m going to jump [...]
the world is not a stage
but if its just a movie why do we feel so bad? in movies things are supposed to work out, we are supposed to learn the higher truth and grow. except he gives a story that isn’t that. nobody grows, nobody changes, just life, pain and death. are movies like real life? or real life like the movies?
welcome to the new site (alpha)
i am in the process of moving and combining my dreamweaver site and blogger blog into one new home. so this will be very alpha for a week or two. the good news is the importing of my old blogger posts was painless.
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dead to me
latimes music critic chris pasles is one of the 80 people either taking a buyout or being fired. http://tiny.cc/c8HEd
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ars antiqua
“unison, fourth and fifth. all other intervals are shit!”
the beginning is a little slow, give it about 90 seconds.
thanks to david ocker at mixed meters
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breeding stock
i just heard from martin perlich that next week’s pledge-drive at KCSN has been canceled and this probably signals the university wanting to change the format and ship all the programming to a syndicate like minnesota public radio.
most of this town is already run from elsewhere, we have seen how that is working with first [...]
requiem for a high homicide enclave
here is early view of the trailer for my new piece;
requiem for a high homicide enclave
based on a deconstruction of purcell’s funeral music for queen mary
(its probably viewed best in full screen)
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222
Since January 2008 there have been 222 homicides in LA county.
I’m not sure what to do about it, but I can’t stop thinking about it. It started when I came across the LA times Homicide Report (blog). For over a year reporter Jill Leovy and Rueben Vives had a simple and horrendous task, to [...]
carne asada is not a crime
Dear Supervisor Molina,
I am writing to express serious concern regarding the actions you have taken against the taco trucks in our neighborhoods. As a member of the Eastside community, I greatly value our local street vendors–for their food, service, and especially culture.
Taco trucks fill many voids left by traditional restaurants, whether it is more authentic, [...]
thanks
“Whatever institution you as an individual commit to will somehow find a way to betray you… Unless of course you’re willing to play the game without regard to the effect on others or society as a whole, in which case you might be a judge or the state police superintendent or governor one day….”
Or, for [...]
i’d offer you a mint
my apologies for those who turned in to listen to the radio interview today. unfortunately mr. perlich became ill and was not able to conduct our interview. once we reschedule i’ll be sure to post the new time and date. thanks for concerned calls and emails i was happy to hear there was so [...]
fake old new world
just listened to the kpcc (los angeles) zocalo podcast that featured uber architect thom mayne. like most discussions the interesting quotes start in the last five minutes (about 46:38). enjoy…
we are living in a time where the majority of people (maybe even some of you) prefer to live in fake french provincial or [...]
give a man a fish
ok go with bonerama on david letterman
“that’s something, everybody all right?”
Give a man a fish, and he’ll eat for a day.
Give a fish a man, and he’ll eat for weeks!
- Takayuki Ikkaku, Arisa Hosaka and Toshihiro Kawabata
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we cannot not change
my apologies up front for posting a political blog. you know i’m not the type to get “the sky is falling”. i have had enough of being cynical about our political system. if you were like me and 8 years ago thought that politics didn’t matter then this post might be for [...]
