Soloing Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody – Every Note, Every Instrument, Every Harmony, Just One Guy.
Granted this isn’t just some random guy, Richie Castellano has a Master’s in music from SUNY and has been the guitarist and vocalist of Blue Oyster Cult since 2004, but you still gotta admire his moxy at seeing one of rock’s most complex songs and saying “Hold my calls, I got this.” It’s almost unfair at how well he pulls it off too. I won’t quite say it’s effortless, but it’s damn fine musicianship and must have taken a fair bit of time to break down, plan out, and pull off.
And boy does he pull it off…
After Apple’s Q4 numbers, I bet a number of politicians are going to ask why we’re expected to prioritize the entertainment industry over the tech/internet industries.
And if not, they damn well should.
Jay Leno & NBC Sued For Libel Over Mitt Romney Joke - Deadline.com
NBC’s legal position is expected to be that the event in question is impossible, as Jay Leno hasn’t actually told a joke since 1996.
Art of the Steal: On the Trail of World’s Most Ingenious Thief | Magazine
Man this was a fun read.
Rumor has it this is the bill that SOPA will be merged with: The Protecting Children From Internet Pornographers Act of 2011
Yep, from the very same Lamar Smith, with 5 CA co-sponsors. When all else fails, lump the objectors together with pedophiles and/or terrorists.
Tough capcha.
How to actually deal with a ton of email in your inbox.
Coming back from a two-week vacation, I have a ton of emails in my inbox. This isn’t an uncommon situation, but my preferred inbox status is “under ten.” As this seems unfathomable to many people, I often get asked how I actually make this happen.
So here’s how I get my inbox into single digit territory:
- Sort my emails by date, with the newest being at the top.
- Read all my email from the top down, without replying to any of them. This way I have context for conversations and actually force myself to read everything.
- Then I go back through and reply/delete/archive/sort starting from the the bottom up.
- If I’m not going to reply to an email, I file or archive/delete it immediately. If I’m going to reply, I do so immediately.
- ONLY if it’s something that REQUIRES I wait to handle it at a later time/date, can it stay in my inbox.
- I give myself a time limit in which to do this (usually an hour) and don’t do anything else within that time period - no phone calls, no meetings, no web.
You’d be amazed at how much time and energy you can save by simply recognizing that so many of those old emails can be deleted because they’re A) not relevant anymore, or B) any reply should come in response a newer email in the chain. You’ll spend less time on email which, if we’re to be honest, ends up being a huge time-suck and stress point for all of us.
It’s 6am. I’m awake. This made me laugh.
It’s chili-cooking time, motherfuckers.
I don’t always cook, but when I do there’s 3-5 pounds of meat simmering in alcohol, in a giant pot.
(see: Cioppino, Chili, and Mussels, for examples.)
So a racist, dimwitted, power-hungry hypocrite won a GOP primary?
You don’t say…
Make good stuff, then make it easy for people to buy it. There’s your anti-piracy plan. The big content companies are TERRIBLE at doing both of these things, so it’s no wonder they’re not doing so well in the current environment. And right now everyone’s fighting to control distribution channels, which is why I can’t watch Star Wars on Netflix or iTunes. It’s fine if you want to have that fight, but don’t yell and scream about how you’re losing business to piracy when your stuff isn’t even available in the box I have on top of my TV. A lot of us have figured out how to do this.
Just about a zero percent chance of this not being photoshopped, but I laughed my ass off anyway.
Thoughts about yesterday
Several months ago, I joined a group of entrepreneurs and VCs and met with various members of the House that were supportive or undecided about the bill. I think we had 12 or 15 meetings.
It was a sobering experience. I learned a few things on that tiring day:
1. Many elected officials told us that this bill was going through. If you recall it was passed unanimously though the Judiciary Committee. They told us we have zero chance to stop the bill and the only thing we could do was to provide feedback on portions we didn’t like.
2. Several members of congress had never read the actual language of the bill. I questioned a number of them asking what was wrong with DMCA and will be addressed in SOPA. No concrete response.
4. Hollywood’s lobbyists are far more organized than the technology world’s lobbyists. Every member I met with said they hadn’t heard from our side and they have had several mtgs with Disney execs etc.
I sent @fredwilson a Kik after my first mtg (we divided up that day) and said something like “that was an ugly mtg and this is gonna be a long day”.
It was a long day and i left Washington bummed out.
Fast forward to yesterday.
Yesterday was a historic day. So many people stepped up and provide amazing leadership. Brad Burnham has been tireless on this issue. Protests in NYC and SF brought communities together. Thousands of websites went dark in protest including Wikipedia. And Google did a fantastic job educating people about the problems with SOPA.
And our voices were heard. It’s clear that many supporters of SOPA are now changing their vote.
I had goosebumps all day.
But we can’t give up.
I read almost every major newspaper yesterday and today about the protests. As far as I can tell *none* of them got our side of the story right. I read horrible things like “the tech community doesn’t like paying for content” in the WSJ. The NYT not once spelled out why this bill is problematic. WTF.
And we know the other side will outspend our side with a torrent of lobbyists.
But the web is bigger than any lobbyists effort. So we need to keep it and keep going. We know the Senate is at work right now to try to jam something through without any meetings or feedback from the anti-PIPA movement.
Yesterday was not the end. It is just the beginning.
(via wilwheaton)
Calif. Senator District Office Visit
FightForTheFuture.org is urging us to pay visits to our Senator’s district offices this week to really nail home the impact of the protests, online and off, today.
For those of you in Calif, our Senators, Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein, are against SOPA.
We can stop by their district offices to tell their staff to pass on a “thanks” for that.
Sen. Feinstein’s office is 11111 Santa Monica Bl. #915 (corner of Sepulveda, right by the 405). Or call her office in Washington: (202) 224-3841.
Sen. Boxer’s office is downtown. 312 N. Spring St. Suite 1748. Or call her office in Washington: (202) 224-3553
According to everything I’ve read, this is incorrect - Feinstein and Boxer are both in favor of SOPA and PROTECT-IP. In fact, both are co-sponsors of PROTECT-IP. As of today, they both still have voiced their support for these bills. Feinstein in particular has refused to meet with constituents, and has shut off her publicly available phones.
