jr conlin's ink stained banana

Let's be honest. Even though the MPAA and RIAA are out to destroy the internet at all costs, you're not going to stop listening to music or watching movies, or generally consuming the media they produce. The problem is, all that consumption still goes to them and they pump all that cash straight into the lobbying efforts to forcibly exert control over the web.

So what's a soul to do?

Turns out that a rather clever person came up with the idea of MPAA Offsets. They're like carbon offsets for the soul. What you do is match your media consumption with a donation to EFF. Spend a buck buying a track off iTunes? Send a buck to EFF. Got a Netflix subscription? Fork over $8 a month to keep the web open. This is particularly great if you've got cable or satellite, because those services aren't cheap.

Hopefully, this will have a two fold effect. One, you're going to be a bit more prudent about going with indie labels or direct to artist sales for media. You're probably also going to seek out what the web has to offer, like the various short form movies you can get off of Youtube. You'll also get a fairly sizable tax credit if you're a US citizen. (If you're not, i'm also fine with you supporting your local equivalent.)

This is about money, plain and simple. You're the one with money, so it really matters what you do with it. If this crap matters to you, vote with your wallet.

Right, so with SOPA and PROTECTIP, the media industry has declared war on the Internet. Thankfully, a few folks have decided that since money is free speech in this modern world, they're not speaking to the theaters.

That doesn't mean sitting around listening to Gran'ma talk about the war all Christmas, though. The Internet provides lots of options for holiday fare. What's more, since a lot of laptops/tablets/doo-hickeys have HDMI output, you can even plug these into the big screen and watch there. Plus, if you decide to donate to or buy any of these, you'll be giving money directly to the folks, which is what the MPAA and RIAA have been saying we should do anyway. (Which is odd, considering how little they give, but that's beside the point.)

Here's a list of movies that are going to be more fun than paying $100 to take the family to watch a regrettable flick:

Rufus the Dog's Christmas Carol – A heart warming classic that reminds me more of Henson's Muppets, than Disney's.

Cinematic Titanic's Santa Clause Conquers the Martians – A personal holiday tradition of mine. A horrible movie improved by the original cast of MST3K.

Rifftrax presents the Magic Christmas Tree – The other half of MST3K present their own commentary on a classic (and disturbing) movie.

If you're not into that sort of thing:

Sita sings the Blues Honestly, if you haven't seen this movie yet, you need to. It's funny, charming, sweet, poignant, and it was blocked from theatrical release over music rights issues regarding the public domain songs used.

Louis C.K. Live at the Beacon damn funny $5, from a guy absolutely not motivated by greed.

Toss a 1/4 cup of popcorn and a tsp of oil in a brown paper bag, nuke for 2:30 (or until it doesn't pop as much), crack open your beverage of choice, and enjoy some holiday fun where you can pause for bathroom breaks.

i'm pretty sure the last movie i sat and watched was "How to Train Your Dragon". Partly because it was on during one of those free preview days and i figured i'd record it. About two months later, i got around to watching it because i was sick. There are a couple of other movies clogging up my DVR that i should also consider watching. Maybe.

i'll also note that i have no idea what the currently popular story lines are for most TV shows, or who's leading in what reality game show, or whatever.

Truth be told, if the TV is on, there are about 5 shows i regularly record and watch, otherwise it's local news and weather.

This doesn't mean that i sit in a cave, it means that i just find the internet far more entertaining than the latest steam-punk, high action adventure of some previously public domain work (that was better in the original form anyway). My wife is kind of the same way, and she watches far more TV than i do.

i know that this scares big media. To be honest, if i were in the business of making sure that the limited content i produce is under my strict control, i would be too. i think the worst part is that the internet also shows that creativity is actually pretty cheap. There are millions of great ideas out there (along with the trillions of horrible ones), and the "wisdom of the crowds" helps do what a lot of studios used to do. We no longer need professional filters. Amateur ones work pretty well.

Granted, there's an easy model that studios could adopt that would guarantee that they stay profitable and useful for decades, but it's not my job to tell them, and considering their constant attempts to kill what i find far more interesting than them, i'm sure as hell not going to help them.

For now, i'll just ask a question that's been bothering me since i first heard about ePARASITE, SOPA, and the other Death to the Free Net bills that are out there: In light to what the Internet has contributed to society, what has the MPAA and RIAA done to improve things in the past 30 years?

For those of you who still use Google Reader, you may have noticed a change recently. Other than a borderless redesign apparently inspired by a Beatles Album cover, Google also dropped their internal share feature. That feature allowed you to see what other folks thought was interesting, as well as mark stories to share yourself. i had about five people who i followed, so when the feature got dropped, i had less interest in using the product.

i'm sure there were a lot of valid and invalid reasons for the change. i'm sure it was a pain and the market adoption rate wasn't up to expectations, so Google dropped the feature that only a small albeit vocal minority used. i'm fine with that, it's their service.

In some respects, i view it as having a free bus line that ran from my office to work. It was pleasant, ran on time, and reliable. This pas week, the bus changed, it's newer, still reliable, but the route changed and now i need to walk half a mile to get it. Honestly, the best solution would be for me to take my own car, or in this case, use my own news aggregator. That way, if it were ever to disappear, i would know who to blame and how to fix the problem.

Now, all i need to do is find the time to build it.

[The following contains swearing. A lot of it. You've been warned.]

This Article pisses me off. Actually, no, it reminds me how dumb my generation tends to be.

Hi, i'm in my late 40s. i entered the workforce in the late 80s during the recession this article mentioned. i lucked out and managed to get a job in the Defense sector, making me a cold warrior for the first part of my career, where i was woefully underpaid, but still worked long hours "keeping our nation safe". My jaw still drops when i hear folks venerate the same guy that created Trickle Down Economics and was a non-stop gaffe machine. Still, i put up with it all, because at least i had a job, and i wasn't in control.

i got older, as did the rest of the folks in my generation.

For the next 20 years we all did what we could. We built a lot of stuff, did a lot of things, and now we're still not willing to take the blame for any of it.

Yes, blame.

Need i remind you that most of your favorite villains are GenXer's? Sure, some congress critters are, but the driving thrust of the Tea Party are all in their 40s, as are a good number of those out-of-work physicists that went to go work for Wall Street companies and concocted the whole credit-default swap crap. Take a look at those pictures of the douchebags looking down at the protests while sipping champagne, they ain't 60 year olds, bucko. We have no right to say "Shut up" about the bullshit. We're providing just as much as anyone else is, quite possibly, we're the current source of it.

Frankly, if you're of the age where you remember watching Saturday Morning Cartoons or hanging out in a video arcade. The current mess is YOUR problem to fix. You've sat on your collective asses long enough, start doing something. Run for goddamn office, you're old enough. You're also probably managers and hiring agents, how's about turning some of that profit into jobs? For that matter, since you're also stock holders and hedge fund managers, how about rewarding companies that think longer than 3 months? You idiots invented day trading and micro holding, cut that shit out and go back to the way that stocks are SUPPOSED to be used. You know, as investments in companies that are rewarded through dividends. Oh yeah, and pay your fucking taxes.

Yes, we had it hard. Guess what? We'll continue to do so. We're grown ups now and we're supposed to be thinking of something other than ourselves.