From: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org (precious-things-digest) To: precious-things-digest@smoe.org Subject: precious-things-digest V8 #165 Reply-To: precious-things@smoe.org Sender: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk X-To-Unsubscribe: Send mail to "precious-things-digest-request@smoe.org" X-To-Unsubscribe: with "unsubscribe" as the body. precious-things-digest Saturday, July 12 2003 Volume 08 : Number 165 Today's Subjects: ----------------- over bidding gone crazy on Taxivision [e m ] Lee McCaulla's company [e m ] Re: over bidding gone crazy on Taxivision ["trent \[Grr, Arg\]" ] Becka's Comments - BRAVO! ["Johnny Endicott" ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:42:33 -0700 (PDT) From: e m Subject: over bidding gone crazy on Taxivision Hi All, I am sure that some of you are aware of the over-bidding occuring in this contest. It has been discussed on the SONY message board. I was just checking the votes and saw how crazy its getting. Lee McCaulla has been getting hundreds of votes a minute and I am sure the other top directors have done their share of over-voting from what people were saying on the board. It really ticks me off that professional people in the arts are using this contest for their own benfit. I wish that there is something that can be done about it. It just seems so unfair to all the other candidates that don't have employees to vote for them all day. thanks for listening. - -ellen ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:49:16 -0700 (PDT) From: e m Subject: Lee McCaulla's company Just in case you wanted to use this website... for any reason... >:) http://www.creativeforces.com/bio.htm or email them: orders@creativeforces.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 12:57:42 -0700 (PDT) From: "trent \[Grr, Arg\]" Subject: Re: over bidding gone crazy on Taxivision i've yet to be able to watch even one of the contestants. they never load ... so i can't even vote once. e m wrote: Hi All, I am sure that some of you are aware of the over-bidding occuring in this contest. - --- remember, always be yourself. unless you suck. -- joss whedon ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 17:15:33 -0400 From: "Becka" Subject: Re: over bidding gone crazy on Taxivision well i'd vote, but i can't even watch the damn things.. i have the latest installment of quicktime, stable computer, no problems, etc.. but the damn things crash my computer every time i even access the page. much less think about watching the videos. i've really just given up on the whole fiasco that is Scarlet's Walk. Between the lack of singles, the charm frenzy in the LE, the crap that was/is Scarlet's Web.. I just really can't be bothered anymore.. Oh for the the simplicity of an album, 3 singles on disc and maybe the odd poster released here and there.. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 18:18:01 -0400 From: "Lisa Zwick" Subject: Re: over bidding gone crazy on Taxivision Same here. My internet connections have been horrible lately, and the movies refuse to load. How long are thye up for anyway? - -Lisa - ----- Original Message ----- From: "trent [Grr, Arg]" To: "pt" Sent: Friday, July 11, 2003 3:57 PM Subject: Re: over bidding gone crazy on Taxivision > > i've yet to be able to watch even one of the contestants. > they never load ... so i can't even vote once. > > e m wrote: > > Hi All, > > I am sure that some of you are aware of the > over-bidding occuring in this contest. > > > > --- > remember, always be yourself. > unless you suck. > -- joss whedon ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 19:09:17 -0400 From: broadway jack Subject: Re: over bidding gone crazy on Taxivision one time at band camp, Becka (katzwhiskers@hotmail.com) said: >well i'd vote, but i can't even watch the damn things.. i have the latest >installment of quicktime, stable computer, no problems, etc.. but the damn >things crash my computer every time i even access the page. much less think >about watching the videos. the one time i tried, quicktime started up fine but the streams timed out after about five minutes of waiting. so perhaps they (or their content delivery contractor) have been having server problems. maybe i'll try it again later tonight when everyone is out partying on friday night and ignoring the internet. ;) >i've really just given up on the whole fiasco that is Scarlet's Walk. >Between the lack of singles, the charm frenzy in the LE, the crap that >was/is Scarlet's Web.. I just really can't be bothered anymore.. i understand and pretty-much agree, but i'm glad to see the record label is trying something else. even if they wrongly perceive file sharing to be the problem they are trying to solve with exclusive websites, non-cd goodies with special editions and other claptrap, they are offering more stuff to go along with the music. even if they screw it up (proprietary audio stream formats, stupid baubles, stupid contests and promotions, etc.), at least they are doing something besides just releasing the record and letting it go. which is all atlantic did at the end. woj ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 23:35:46 +0000 From: "Johnny Endicott" Subject: Becka's Comments - BRAVO! Hi Everyone, I TOTALLY agree with what Becka wrote. BRAVO!!!! I've been with Tori since the days of the Crucify CD5. She's the reason I first bought a CD player, because those 5 songs didn't come on cassette yet. I've traveled thousands of miles to see her perform 24 times. I named my dog (rescued from the shelter) after her. I have over 100 OFFICIAL releases from her. I think this qualifies me as somewhat of a fan. When I heard that she was leaving Atlantic, and read her remarks about THAT giant rip off machine I thought, "Oh, good, Tori's too smart to let THAT happen again." I kinda thought she might go a la Ani DiFranco and put her music and stuff out herself. So now we have Epic. ANOTHER giant rip off machine. Only this one is too stupid to release any "real" non-cyberspace singles, and instead is offering invisible-could-disappear-at-any-minute-if-my-computer-has-a-bad-day stuff. I emailed them and asked about this. They didn't even have the f***ing courtesy to send me a computer generated blow off response, let alone an answer. Oh, of course these are MY OPINIONS, I'm not trying to SLANDER any GIANT CORPORATE MONEY MACHINE. Go ahead, sue me, you'll get a convertible with no roof and a beat up old laptop. It's just that every week I get a slick packaged CD from AOL, or a junk mail CD, all nicely packaged, all colorful, and they are sent to me for free. I can buy a classical music CD for $3.99 at Tower. The same people who want TWENTY F***ING DOLLARS for the latest Jewel CD. Twenty dollars for a CD that probably costs about 25 cents to make, and they wonder why NAPSTER existed? Thank God for Rockaway and Ameoba and selling used CDs. Look, I understand all about creative license, profit, capitalism, getting paid for your creations, all that. I never went to NAPSTER once, for philosophical reasons. But TWENTY DOLLARS? Any of you moms out there ever have to explain to little Sally or Jimmy why you're not going to plunk down a fifth of a c-note for the latest Aaron Carter CD? NOW these greedy bastards want to charge me money for NOTHING! I have to store the music, I have to provide the materials or machines to have it, I have to do the work of publishing it to myself, and THEY want me to pay THEM. Horsebleep. CONSPIRACY THEORY: What if... WHAT IF someday we all find out there was some widget built into all the downloads, and now we have to pay a renewal fee to hear our music? Ever thought about that? And, AND, AAANNNDDD in the case of Scarlet's Web, I can't even get the songs I'm supposed to get as a perk for buying the CD and loading it into my computer! IMHO the whole thing sucks. This is exactly the kind of web experience I expect (and ALWAYS get) from any website (AMTRAK for example) connected in any way to the US Government. Private enterprise websites (Southwest Airlines for example) usually perform perfectly. I just don't know what Tori is thinking. Maybe that's the problem, she professes to not be an internet person, maybe it's time she surfed her own website and did a little ass kicking!!! Tori, if you're listening, I love you. You are the Goddess. Thank you. But please, PLEASE, take a look at what they're doing to your fans. Johnny >From: "Becka" >To: "pt" >Subject: Re: over bidding gone crazy on Taxivision >Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 17:15:33 -0400 > > >well i'd vote, but i can't even watch the damn things.. i have the latest >installment of quicktime, stable computer, no problems, etc.. but the damn >things crash my computer every time i even access the page. much less think >about watching the videos. > >i've really just given up on the whole fiasco that is Scarlet's Walk. >Between the lack of singles, the charm frenzy in the LE, the crap that >was/is Scarlet's Web.. I just really can't be bothered anymore.. Oh for the >the simplicity of an album, 3 singles on disc and maybe the odd poster >released here and there.. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 20:23:27 -0400 (EDT) From: Richard Handal Subject: Re: over bidding gone crazy on Taxivision woj intoned: > the one time i tried, quicktime started up fine but the streams timed > out after about five minutes of waiting. It's clearly having some problems, which surprised me when I saw it's a dedicated Apple QT stream server. Trying later may be a good idea. I went to the source code for each video and copied the direct URLs for the videos. It's possible folks may have better results pasting the URLs for the videos into QuickTime itself once starting the program. Pull down from 'File' in your menu bar to 'Open URL...'. On a Mac the keystroke is 'command-u'. And yeah, the music I was getting was intermittent, although the overall experience was better than trying to watch these from within a web browser window. If nothing else, watching directly in QT lets you size the screen, and I think you may even be able to save them if you have QT Pro, but I'm not sure. Anyway: http://stream.qtv.apple.com/qtv/sony/rtsp/taxivision/mingwang_tr_vidfull_ref.mov http://stream.qtv.apple.com/qtv/sony/rtsp/taxivision/johnquigley_tr_vidfull_ref.mov http://stream.qtv.apple.com/qtv/sony/rtsp/taxivision/oliverbrooks_tr_vidfull_ref.mov http://stream.qtv.apple.com/qtv/sony/rtsp/taxivision/krishixson_tr_vidfull_ref.mov http://stream.qtv.apple.com/qtv/sony/rtsp/taxivision/pauljude_tr_vidfull_ref.mov http://stream.qtv.apple.com/qtv/sony/rtsp/taxivision/susanherbert_tr_vidfull_ref.mov http://stream.qtv.apple.com/qtv/sony/rtsp/taxivision/brianhamm_tr_vidfull_ref.mov http://stream.qtv.apple.com/qtv/sony/rtsp/taxivision/leemccaulla_tr_vidfull_ref.mov http://stream.qtv.apple.com/qtv/sony/rtsp/taxivision/bdeveau_tr_vidfull_ref.mov Rotsa ruck. Frankly, I don't know why art has to be turned into a contest all the time, anyway. Let a thousand videos bloom--or something like that. Be seeing you, Richard Handal, H.G. There are clouds, but they are beautiful purple-grey clouds. And while they might not have silver linings, they always have thunderstorms. And sometimes that is better. --Andrea Norstad, 1996 ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2003 20:30:35 -0400 From: David Mobley Subject: Re: Becka's Comments - BRAVO! You'll have to excuse the record labels, they're dying and have nothing else they can do to keep themselves alive (aside from churning out less crap and more quality, but that will never happen). They're not accustomed to people not buying their crap in stores without question, so now they have to figure another way about it. If they can manage to get you to pay for nothing, or something inconsequential in order to buy a record, that's the name of the game for the next few years until something else happens. If you need any more proof that the labels are dying and not letting on enough about it... http://abcnews.go.com/sections/business/Entertainment/forbes_concertcash_030711.html now they want to get a cut of the concerts! lovely isn't it? How much do you want to bet that causes a bit of a spat between the artists and the label now, yeah? I'm sure Tori would LOVE to give 20 percent of her take to the label that offers silly trinkets to fans on the web, rather than promoting her properly, right? It's not a matter of if anymore, it's just a matter of when, and what comes to replace them. Artists can't D-I-Y it, most of them are too ignorant of how to make things like that happen, especially in the starting points of their careers. Want to make a fortune in the next 30 years? Find a way to get music to people cheaply, compensate artists properly and make customers happy. Record labels aren't doing it anymore, are they? Friday, July 11, 2003, 7:35:46 PM, you wrote: JE> NOW these greedy bastards want to charge me money for NOTHING! I have to JE> store the music, I have to provide the materials or machines to have it, I JE> have to do the work of publishing it to myself, and THEY want me to pay JE> THEM. Horsebleep. ------------------------------ End of precious-things-digest V8 #165 *************************************