Don’t be the Almost Guy.
Who’s the Almost Guy?
He’s the guy who almost did something unique, who almost made a little ding in the universe. Maybe he almost started a company. Maybe he almost wrote a book. Maybe he almost talked to that girl.
Don’t be the Almost Guy, sitting in a bar or cafe telling the world about how you almost did it.
Bruce Lee said that. His point is that we shouldn’t get lost in complexity. A lot music would be better if the band focused on the groove and just beat the hell out of the 2 and the 4.
Filed under Music
Get used to it, you’ll eventually have to pay for everything. Information systems start out as wild, open-source orgies of utopianism but they always end up corporate money-making monsters.
My go to examples are the telephone & radio. Telephone lines were locally installed, usually by the hardware store but the US gov’t created a monopoly (Bell) to control the system. Radio was also a wide-open royal rumble before regulation stepped in. Without regulations it was impossible to set standard ad rates (read: monetize).
The truth is, you can’t break the cookie jar and not replace it. The Web is cannibalizing all kinds of “old media,” but our economies have to replace those dollars somehow.
If you’re interested in Information Systems I highly recommend The Master Switch by Tim Wu.
Filed under China
God knows there has been enough written about Mo Yan, but what the hell.
A lot of attention has been focused on Mo Yan’s ties to the Communist Party and whether or not that somehow discredits him. I don’t really find that debate very interesting. A cursory reading of almost any Mo Yan text makes it obvious that he’s not some Party hack dutifully towing the Maoist Line.
What I find more interesting, however, is why the Party would elect to have a writer who graphically depicts Party sponsored violence and rural poverty “in the fold.”
My take is that by giving Mo Yan an official position, the Party effectively muted his critique. Mo Yan’s rank & literary celebrity banalize the political undertones of his work.
Filed under China
Tech in Asia reported that Chinese e-tailor 360Buy is planning on expanding overseas. Well I’d like to wish them good luck because they are going to need it. E-tailors are supported by a complicated logistical infrastructure, with shipping and storage creating huge costs. I have no idea how 360Buy is planning on getting purchased goods to overseas consumers. Wouldn’t the cost of international shipping either drive up costs or decimate margins? Maybe Buy360 has some kind of logistical magic bullet, but I just don’t see it.
Filed under China
How many 1/8s of weed would get sold if the first hit wasn’t free?
You don’t buy drugs because of an advertising pitch, you buy them because someone–maybe a dealer, maybe a friend–gives you a taste for free.
Eventually you start paying for drugs because, sorry D.A.R.E. they deliver on their claim. They get you high and people like to be high.
For musicians to get buy in this economy, we’ve got to have hustle like drug dealers do.
We have to find a corner and own it, even if that means taking it away from someone else.
We have to give away our music and hope that it hooks people.
Actually, hope is the wrong term. To make it, you have to be so great that your art forces people to pay attention. If you’re full of “hope,” you have no hope.
People are addicted to their favorite bands.
It might be hard to swallow but you’re not selling music, you’re selling dope for their ears.
Stop reading Rolling Stone and (re)watch the Wire.
Good food, good drinks, good people and spacey party music. Not There hits the stage at 4corners this Sat.
We’re excited to be celebrating our friends Renzo and Karens’ birthdays that night. Our warmest birthday wishes go out to both of you guys, thanks for your tireless support.
Not There @ 4 Corners
When: Saturday Oct.20th 22:00
Where: 4corners NO.27 Dashibei Hutong (near west end of Yandai Xiejie), Xicheng District
FREE
每个周末的晚上都是派对动物精神抖擞的时候！而这个周六晚上你不可错过的party就在位于鼓楼附近的烟袋斜街大石碑胡同27号的4corners！（肆角餐吧）
这一晚北京著名电音摇滚乐队Not There将带来动感的音乐，让你尽情跳舞！大杯的啤酒，欢快的舞蹈，释放压力，解放好心情，让你度过一个愉快的周末！
同时，这一天也是我们的好朋友Renzo和Karen的生日！加入我们的队伍，快来送上你的祝福吧~
时间：10月20日星期六晚22:00
地点：4corners 西城区烟袋斜街大石碑胡同27号（鼓楼前地安门大街）
Claiming that a writer needs to be a dissident in order to validate their work is just as idiotic as mandating the use of Socialist Realism.
Filed under China
A strange panic gripped me from the moment I got off the train. Here we were, the 4 of us, willingly subjecting ourselves to the brutal, freezer-burned logic of Harbin.
It was cold and the train was early. I’ve been riding trains in China since 2003 and I have never been early before. It was 7 am and I was scared.What hellish portent is this, what fresh hell has us getting here early? Nothing good could possibly be happening.
I was worried that Nick and Marco could see the fear in my eyes. With Edoardo, there was nothing to worry about. Edoardo lived here and knows all too well the spiky-ice tinged touch of the beast that insistently pulls you down. He was also very afraid.
I lived in Harbin from 2004 to 2005. Mostly I drank, studied Chinese and tried to avoid the beastial violence. I watched a bartender crack open a Canadian’s head with a bottle of vodka and a pack of Sino-Russian whores beat the piss out of a mildly deranged British girl.
So let’s get something straight. If you choose to live in Harbin and stay for longer then it takes to learn Chinese passably, there is something seriously wrong with you. Maybe you are running away from something terrible or maybe you love to sin, but living in Harbin is an exercise in letting the beast consume you. Hell, maybe that’s a good thing. Sometimes the beast’s claws are inviting enough and Christ knows I’ve felt his tickle.
Harbin is the only place in China that is growing downwards. Everywhere else in China you’re struck by the buildings reaching ever taller, ever higher. But in Harbin, the best way for the locals to engage in their favorite orgy–rent seeking and corruption–has been to build a “subway.” Well they’ve been building it for years and the only evidence of progress are giant craters in the Earth that are literally money pits. At night maybe they suck your soul down to someplace deeper and darker.
We went to Harbin to play a show and we did play a show. Sort of. The gig was held in this strange Russo-Chinese disco complex called Box Town, which is basically a Harbin version of Epcot Center, with SIN replacing culture as its Raison d’être. Box Town included a disco prosaically named Box, a fake Irish Pub called Dox and a concert venue called Rox. All that’s missing is a gay bar called Cox. I’m sure they’ll get to it.
Not There’s show went down at Rox, which was more like a big festering concrete bunker than a venue. It was strewn with all sorts of garbage and tables were set up akimbo. There were very few amplifiers. There were no working monitors. I have no idea what we sounded like and I don’t really care. It was beautiful playing unheard notes into the post-apocalyptic void. At least we weren’t torn to shreds by an angry mob, which is always a possibility in Harbin.
There were other bands on the bill, each of them featuring at least one foreigner. Each band represented a specific style that was popular whenever the resident foreign expert moved to Harbin. There was a jam band. There was a Good Charlotte Style Band. There was also a blues band where every solo was preempted by a band member yelling solo.
The music and people in Harbin are frozen, like DNA in Jurassic Park, in Amber. You are what you bring with you. There is no progression and nothing improves. There is only a continues reiteration of your past, echoing in a vast, cold-grey chamber. For the guy that looked like Good Charlotte, I’m sure Good Charlotte are still the coolest thing in the world.
In Harbin we drank soup with the beast. Where the beast lives, there is no culture, only fake Russian trifles and the crumbling remains of the state-sponsored economy. There is no higher ground, only the past dragging you further and further down.
I’m glad we brought a very long spoon.
nottherebeijing 