Well, now you can support the model locally with a concert coming up September 2nd. The Ripple Effect one day concert event on the State Capitol lawn is selling tickets at whatever price you feel is worth it. So support the model!

I’m looking forward to seeing Michael Franti and Spearhead, myself.

• Paul Westerberg (there’s the MN tie to justify the post ;o) has released his latest “album” for 49 cents on Amazon.
• Sampling maestro Girl Talk has jumped on the NIN/Radiohead bandwagon and released his latest album using the “pay what you want” model.
• Not new but new-to-me: KCRW’s Guest DJ Podcast
• If you are an eMusic subscriber and haven’t yet logged in this month, do so. They’ve started a (long overdue) revamp of their site. Haven’t spent a lot of time with it yet, but looks to be a good improvment. Alas, this update also comes with a price hike. If you’re already a member, you’ll be grandfathered in at the higher rate, but with more downloads than new members. Alas, the price increase doesn’t make them quite as appealing anymore now that Amazon has made it so easy.
• And finally, a random thought/wish/dream: An online MP3 store that for an extra buck or two will then ship you the LP. The more I’ve been purchasing music online, the more I realize how much I miss vinyl.

1. DJ Edna – an open-source website framework for musicians, including streaming, store, gallery, all that stuff.
   

   “…allows the artist to bypass traditional distribution middlemen in order to interact with and sell directly to their fans.”

   Kinda like if MySpace was actually useful.

2. Localtone Radio – Kinda like if Digg was streaming indie music.
   

   “It’s radio that is not only created by local artists, but artists you can see in the Twin Cities in the near future.”

Both projects care as much about the musician as the fan, which is rare.

http://www.engadget.com/2007/07/31/switched-on-apples-brash-flash-clash-rehash/

I find my mac loyalty waning as they become a bigger player in the world of consumer electronics. Has anyone noticed that Best Buy is now an Apple Authorized Reseller? I’m sure that has something to do with CompUSA closing half it’s stores, but I digress.

I was excited when I heard about the iPhone and although it’s way outside my budget and not really a necessity, I’d been thinking that an iPhone was in my future somewhere. Now that this Flash support issue has been a present for over a month and there’s some possibility it may not get resolved anytime soon, as a flash developer I’m thinking this may not be the phone for me.

Now I’d still tell you any day of the week that Apple is on so many levels, a better company then Adobe. Don’t even get me started about Microsoft. That said, I’ve got to start to consider what (from a Flash Developer’s perspective) is the best mobile device competing with the iPhone? Any thoughts?

From what I’m reading, here’s the opinions so far:

Yays:

• “It’s about time”
• More choice for the consumer
• Others will follow soon
• Higher bitrate = good for audiophiles

Nays:

• This is just a ploy to get an extra quarter for each song sold
• EMI is small fry, this is their desparate last-chance to stay above water.
• Dangerous as if EMI fails, this will slow down the rest of the industry from adopting DRM-free product

I think I’m leaning towards the ‘yay’ side of things. I’ve slowly been trying to ween myself off of iTunes in favor of eMusic. But iTunes is still so much easier to use. I’d gladly pay a few extra cents for not having to deal with DRM.

Some other intereting takes on the announcement:

MacWorld’s take.

A rather strong ‘Nay’ POV from the inquirer.

Wired thinking MS might be the big loser. 

P.W Fenton’s Rest In Peace installment of DigitalFlotsam.org proclaims the death of the major label recording industry citing these cease and desist letters as the first nail in the coffin.

This means podcasters will no longer do the marketing and promoting of major label-distributed music. It also means that if an artist wants to build a fan base a quickly as possible, they should avoid the record labels and just send mp3s to their favorite podcasters and start a podcast themselves. Independently. What Doc Searls calls the demand side supplying itself.

It’s been working for the Gentle Readers, Brad Sucks, Jonathan Coulton, the Lascivious Biddies, and Cruxbox – and it’s barely been a year.

There are more than 100,000 podcasts – and more each day – it’s nice of the major labels to hand the entire market over to independent musicians. That decision is admission of their irrelevance in this new our media world.

Now it gets interesting.

Say It Ain’t So – Another Weezer Tribute was formed in the summer of 2004 as a side project from 2 Minneapolis band that shared members; jskullcrane and DieselJenny.

As featured on Weezer.com