Jay-Z is on fire, and so is Lala.com

Nels — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 17:54:48 +0000

So, I just got The Blueprint 3. It’s $4.99 on Lala.com, but only $3.99 on Amazon. I got it from Lala to support the little guy. I decided it was worth $5 after only the first 7 songs – two of which I’d already got the “web version” of on Lala. It’s that good.

But, after buying the MP3s, I discovered that there’s a Beta section in Lala, which – among other things – lets you scrobble tracks to Last.fm.

I may never buy another MP3 again! Considering I can open a tab in Firefox, play songs on Lala.com using less RAM than iTunes (with much faster reaction time from the app), AND have them scrobbled to Last.fm… the only advantage that MP3s have is that I can put them on my iPhone… but I don’t really listen to music on my iPhone; I usually listen to audiobooks in the car or when I’m walking or whatever (and the audiobooks come from the Chicago Public Library via Overdrive download or imported Audio CD). Also, I could back up my 15 GB of music on my desktop computer (using Hamachi) and then have an extra 15 GB on my laptop hard drive (which I’m hoping would improve the read/write performance of my computer). And since it’s synced via the Lala Music Mover, I know that those backed up songs are going to be available on Lala.

So, that’s the interesting part of the tech stuff. I’m about to do one of those track-by-track album reviews right now (possibly my first ever, but certainly a copycheated idea; gotta keep up my copycheating cred to hold the belt).

What We Talkin’ Bout [feat Luke Steele]
Not the strongest start to the album, but it’s got a lot of good rhymes, and a kind of nice, relaxed chorus.

Thank You
Coincidence that the album came out on 9/11/09 and there’s a whole verse about how Jay-Z treats other emcees like the World Trade Center towers? Still too soon. But other than that verse, this is kind of a fun song.

D.O.A. [Death of Auto-Tune]
I find it ironic that Jay-Z has Kanye West on the very next song on the album (and on Hate later in the album), considering 808s & Heartbreaks could pretty much be called the Auto-Tune album. It even kind of sounds like Kanye sings the “chorus” part. I like the guitar a lot, though, and there’s some clever rhymes. And the message is certainly true. Kanye (and others) were good rappers, but so much with the singing part. Core competencies. Jay knows his.

Run This Town [feat Kanye West, Rihanna]
This is flat out one of my favorite songs right now – possibly ever. I’ve listened to it 29 times (according to Lala) since I bought the “web version” on August 19th. That’s 1.21 times per day and I don’t even listen to music that much (according to Last.fm, I’ve listened to 30 songs in the past 7 days, aside from this song and Wale’s Chillin).

Empire State of Mind [feat Alicia Keys]
I firmly believe this song was made to get LeBron James to come to the Nets or Knicks in 2010. He even name checks The King, as well as Dwyane Wade (evidently his second choice [ed note: Nooooo! Wade is going to Chicago!]).

Real As It Gets [feat Young Jeezy]
This sounds like it should be an uplifting get-off-the-streets type jam, but Jeezy kind of ruins all that. Too little Jay, too much Jeezy.

On To The Next One [feat Swizz Beatz]
Swizz Beatz is good at making the kind of beats he does. Plenty of Jay-Z with decent to above average rhymes.

Off That [feat Drake]
Fits well with the album as a change of pace song. Jay-Z shows versatility with the speed and nimbleness of his flow.

A Star Is Born [feat J. Cole]
Not a great song, but deserves some recognition as a tribute to the other hip-hop groups.

Venus vs. Mars
I think is supposed to be some kind of love jam or something, but coming that close to Jay-Z’s sex life kind of grosses me out.

Already Home [feat Kid Cudi]
Bragathon. Well done. Not the strongest song but better than a generic filler track on any other album.

Hate [feat Kanye West]
Kanye reaches for some rhymes on this one, but serves to make Jay look better by comparison.

Reminder
Getting back to gangster here. The chorus is pretty annoying, but the rest of the song is good.

So Ambitious [feat Pharrell]
Had to get The Neptunes on there somewhere, right? How long ago was it when they jumped the shark? They were innovative when their first brought out their sound, but now it seems too easy to pick out a Neptunes song because they all sound so similar. Beat seems just a little to slow for Jay’s flow, as he has to double-time on the parts where he sounds good. And I suppose the irony is that the song is So Ambitious but it doesn’t seem that The Neptunes have much ambition at all since their sound essentially hasn’t changed in about 10 years.

Young Forever [feat Mr Hudson]
This is an awesome way to end things. Reminds me a lot of the way he ended Kingdom Come with Beach Chair with Chris Martin. I expect I’ll hear this one in an H&M in Paris the next time I’m there like I heard Beach Chair in one the last time I was there.

In Summary: I like that most of the album is definitely pop-rap, but not in a super-overly-commercialized way. It’s still rap and/or hip-hop, but for the most part, it’s not something that is going to offend people who aren’t the biggest rap fans.

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Further Proof that People Don’t Understand The Internet

Nels — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 22:49:31 +0000

Even though the Update to this post on TechCrunch about Last.fm and the RIAA says that Last.fm hasn’t handed over any user data to the RIAA, um, guess what? There’s at least 3 different websites (and those are just the ones I know of) (that are pretty easy to find with a simple Google search) that will allow the RIAA to put in your Last.fm username and find all your other social profiles. Do you have your real, full name in Twitter? Is your Twitter username the same as your Last.fm username? Are you listening to unreleased tracks that you illegally downloaded (like, say, the new U2 album)? Busted.

See, I’d rather have everyone in the world know that I have listened to Hillary Duff (*awful BTW*), Mandy Moore, and Leona Lewis than to have the RIAA be able to easily figure out that I’m listening to music that I obviously should not have access to.

To their credit, TechCrunch does say:

Incidents like this highlight how the social Web can sometimes bite back if you are not careful. It also raises the issue of who owns all of this data about you and what they can do with it. Unfortunately, it’s come down to this: you really shouldn’t share any data on the Web you wouldn’t feel comfortable seeing in a court of law.

Yeah, it’s sticky when it comes to things like photos you upload to Facebook. But, when you are uploading/scrobbling your music listening to Last.fm, I don’t think it’s sticky at all. To me, that is all public domain data. I know that anyone and their mother can look at my listening history. But it’s clear that some people don’t really think about that. Again, as TechCrunch puts it:

most probably never even considered it a possibility that individually identifiable information about their listening habits (legal, illegal, or otherwise) could be handed over to an organization known for taking consumers to court for file-sharing. What makes this even more egregious is that it appears to be absent any legal precedent (such as a pending lawsuit) for which Last.fm could at least hide behind as an excuse.

Really, though, the RIAA could probably hire a code monkey to create a script to pull all the usernames from Last.fm who have pre-release U2 songs scrobbled, then either pull their name from Last.fm (if available) or search for other publicly available profiles to find your full name, and the do a quick Zabasearch to find your home address and/or phone number.

Now, of course, I think the RIAA needs to take a chill pill with the whole lawsuit thing in the first place, but the point of this post (if you didn’t guess from the title) is that people don’t realize that something like Last.fm can make their illegal activity available for everyone in the world to see. The same concept is easily applied to people in networks on Facebook. You know how many people that I’m not friends with in the Chicago network have hundreds of pictures of themselves which I can see posted on Facebook? I don’t either, but it’s a lot. Granted, most of them aren’t doing illegal things, but I’m sure there are some pictures that they wouldn’t necessarily want a complete stranger who just happens to live (or say they live) in the same city to see. There’s a reason that bank robbers don’t usually just walk in and wave at the security cameras while pulling off their heist. Does that mean we all need to learn to think like bank robbers when using the internet? No, but you might want to think like that when you’re doing something you know is illegal.

Bonus Link: If you’re going to kill your wife and try to make it look like a mugging, don’t search for things like “Medical trauma gunshot chest”, “Immigrating to Brazil”, “acute blood loss”. At least, not on your home computer.

Nels Wadycki » Last.fm

Jay-Z is on fire, and so is Lala.com

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Further Proof that People Don’t Understand The Internet

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