Pitchfork Media’s President/Founder Ryan Schreiber
…laughing at the level of his own influence perhaps

In what may prove to be one of the douchiest public relation moves ever made by two self-important websites comes news that Pitchfork Media and Tumblr stole the subdomain of a Tumblr blogger, which had been established more than a year ago.

From HIPSTERRUNOFF.com:
“Pitchfork Media.com, the world’s largest music reviews site started a Tumblr version of their blog. Tumblr is a micro-blogging community which has a loyal, growing user base, filling a niche somewhere between livejournal and twitter. Websites often start tumblr version of their websites in order to reach content creators who are looking to share their high level content on a daily basis. This was probably a ‘good idea’ to reach out to the tumblr community, but the acquisition of their URL has started a ‘huge’ backlash by tumblr and pitchfork fans + users.

“The URL pitchfork.tumblr.com had been squatted upon by the tumblogger Tumbledore. Unfortunately, he woke up one morning to see that his tumblr URL had been taken from him and given to pitchfork. At this point, we can only speculate that Pitchfork purchased the URL from tumblr. Other conspiracy theories say Tumblr and Pitchfork were looking to combine their user bases in order to get a lethal amount of mad internet page views.

“From Tumbledore’s rant against the Tumblr corporation:

‘Recently, one of my friends who is subscribed to my pitchfork tumblr was surprised to see a sudden change in the content I was posting. That’s because Tumblr stole my subdomain and gave (sold?) it to Pitchfork Media Inc. Keep in mind that the word “pitchfork” is not a proprietary name, it is a noun dating back to the year 1364, so they had no legal right to the word or the subdomain. It clearly wasn’t a case of impersonation as none of my posts had anything to do with music. If there was some kind of content quality threshold that failed to be met which led to my blog’s demise, then 98% of Tumblr should now be blank. Is it possible there’s a certain amount of time that can pass between posts before Tumblr deletes your blog? If so, they should probably make that information public just in case someone accidentally makes the mistake of going on vacation.’”

Read Tumbledore’s account of what happened here
Read Hipster Runoff’s article in full here
Read Pitchfork President Ryan Scriberer’s defense here
Read Tumblr’s defense here

For even more Pitchfork drama read The Daily Swarm’s article about the site here

posted by: Harold Johns III

via Them Thangs

posted by: Brent Carter

From the site:
“Every Monday, Bad Panda Records distributes one song by a different artist freely, legally and digitally only.

“Bad Panda Records has been made possible by the cooperation of friends, who share a great passion for music and an interest in the future of music industry. The number of contributors to Bad Panda Records have been growing thanks to a common desire to voluntarily and freely help the cause by taking part in the project.

“Inspired by the illuminating Wired article written by David Byrne in 2007, and by the pioneering Free Music Movement aiming for music ‘liberalization’ since the early 90s, and finally by Lawrence Lessig that laid the foundations of a free music culture, Bad Panda Records believes that Creative Commons (CC) has articulated a radical view of what this might look like by advocating the freedom of creative work, which can be altered, used, shared and even commercially used by others. Artists can choose to publish their work among six different main licenses, that allows their music to be shared and used freely for other projects as long as the artist is given attribution as the original creator. CC licenses work alongside copyright, allowing artists to legally share their work while maintaining all of their rights and the licenses given to the author, instead of losing them to lawyers or publishers. Many musicians are already making use of these licenses to disseminate their music and build creative dialogues with fans and other artists. Consider the file-sharing debacle that continues to plague the music industry. Artists are already finding their music shared for free online, outside of their control. Rather than wasting many precious resources attempting to kill music piracy, it seems more practical to embrace sharing and develop something appropriate for the post-napster world.”

The amount of music available on Bad Panda is limited since it started in December of 2009, but those who run it seem to have the proper commitment and inspiration to keep it going strong for many Mondays to come.

Also check out our posts on RIP! A Remix Manifesto and the Free Music Archive, both of which also deal with Creative Commons.

posted by: Harold Johns III

From Histoire de Perlette by illustrator Béatrice Appia

Books aren’t usually the first medium that comes to mind when art is concerned – but take a look at BibliOdyssey and be prepared to be blown away.  Every entry features a piece of book art and (usually) an explanation about the art, the book it was originally published in, and other deliciously nerdy facts. Warning – between the pictures and the accompanying blurbs, you’ll be in BibliOdyssey land for hours and hours. It’s a day-killer, and it’s massive with tons of archives.  Also included are links to source material where available, which when clicked can open up a whole other treasure trove of rare, beautiful, and incredible images.   A must for anybody who loves books for more than the words,  is looking for a new place to find some amazing book art created from thousands of years ago to yesterday.

From Galvanizing Albini: Among the inspirations for Mary Shelley’s gothic classic ‘Frankenstein’ from 1818 were the (in)famous experiments carried out in public by the physicist Giovanni Aldini (1762-1834) at the Royal College of Surgeons in 1803.

From Nuclear Reactor Wall Charts: Snupps (Standardized Nuclear Unit Power Plant System): Kansas City Power & Light Co., Burlington, Kansas. Wall chart insert, Nuclear Engineering International, November 1975

See more here

posted by: Meghan Bainum

From Brandon Cox (Deerhunter/Atlas Sound’s blog):
“Responding to several requests I have dug up an old copy of this 2005 Deerhunter CD-R. It features only me and Moses and is very experimental in nature. This was during our ‘tape phase’ when we would often play shows as a duo (or as a trio with Colin) playing only tape machines and vocal loops.

Tracklist:
1. Bright and Early (8:30)
2. Cicadas (3:56)
3. Rotation (8:03)
4. But I’m A Boy (6:54)
5. Three Dolphins Melting into Orange Wax (4:20)
6. Snow Dogs (2:12)
7. Dogs are Cool (3:41)
8. Homorobotic (3:54)
9. Cordless (2:05)
10. When I Taste Blood (2:53)

“Recorded live to 2-track cassette machine at Moses’ old house on North Ave & Ponce. ‘Mastered’ at the Old Notown building on my dad’s ancient PC using Soundforge. Scans of all orignal artwork from the Notown Xerox Machine included.”

Download “Crave Your Initials…” here

posted by: Harold Johns III

Sometimes while researching a blog post you’ll find another site has already beat you to it. In this case, while gathering information on the most offensive architectural projects on hold due to the economic recession I came across Flavorwire’s list of  “Architectural Projects That Seemed Like a Great Idea at the Time.” Their list conveys many of my ideas in much simpler terms, so I’ve decided to abandon my effort and simply pass along the information from Flavorwire.

Included in the list are six projects, like the under water hotel known as Hydropolis (pictured above) in Dubai, that are so absurd in scope and cost you’ll wonder how anyone, even an international banker, could be convinced to build them.

Read the full list here

posted by: Brent Carter