F-Spot, Cooler Than I Thought

Posted on May 17, 2007 by Michael Koby

Last night I discovered that I can upload photos to my image gallery via F-Spot.  F-Spot is a photo management program for Linux.  I think that the interface is based heavily on Google’s Picasa program.  It’s written in C# and runs under Mono.

It’s simple to use and lightweight.  Simple tagging interface allows you to organize your photos with ease.  But the fact that I can upload directly to my image gallery just helps it to win all kinds of points.  No more using Gallery’s interface to upload new images, from now on I’ll use F-Spot.

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Songs & Such: “Handbook for the Sellout” by Five Iron Frenzy

Posted on May 17, 2007 by Michael Koby

This week we are continuing our look at the lyrics of Reese Roper of the bands Five Iron Frenzy, Roper, and Brave Saint Saturn. This week we are looking at the first song off of Five Iron’s second release. The song is “Handbook for the Sellout” and the album is “Our Newest Album Ever” and with this album, both Reese and the rest of the band found their mark in the Christian music scene. Widely regarded as one of their best albums, the lyrics on this album probably shine through the most. Reese Roper takes time to talk about a lot of topics on this album, everything from selling out to Canada is touched on.

The reason I want to focus on “Handbook for the Sellout” is because it was probably one of the best ways to start off a record. We have to look at the context in time though. This was during a period of time when the Christian punk band MxPx had just signed to A&M records and had released their first album on that label. The Christian punk rockers made it a point to cry “sellouts” because the band signed onto a major label. Much like Green Day had caused the ruckus in the secular punk scene around 5 years earlier, MxPx caused the same stir in the emerging Christian rock market.

Mr. Roper, never left out of the opinion tossing put his in a song. The song “Handbook for the Sellout” basically points the finger at every person that cried “sellout” at MxPx, many of whom were probably Five Iron fans. That is not to say that the lyricist does not make his point. When Reese sings the lyrics “You’re the ones who made them popular, all their songs are still the same” he makes sure to let everyone know that nothing about the band accused has changed. The finger is doubly pointed when the chorus comes in with “Do you remember where we all came from? Do you remember what it was all about?” Making sure to really solidify the point that MxPx was doing exactly what everyone paying attention to the then (largely) underground Christian rock movement wanted to see happen: Christian artists getting a secular following. MxPx started a chain reaction at the major record labels, those suits suddenly realized that there was a whole market they could pull artists from.

The thing that makes “Handbook for the Sellout” so cool lyrically is the same reason I like Ben Folds a lot. They both basically attack the listener, but they do it in such a way that it is not threating so it causes self introspection on the that listeners behalf. Songs are sometimes meant to make the listener think about something and when a song can make the listener look at themselves, wishing they could be a better person in some way, that is always a plus.

Lyrics after the jump…

Continue reading →

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Songs & Such: "Handbook for the Sellout" by Five Iron Frenzy

Posted on May 17, 2007 by Michael Koby

This week we are continuing our look at the lyrics of Reese Roper of the bands Five Iron Frenzy, Roper, and Brave Saint Saturn. This week we are looking at the first song off of Five Iron’s second release. The song is “Handbook for the Sellout” and the album is “Our Newest Album Ever” and with this album, both Reese and the rest of the band found their mark in the Christian music scene. Widely regarded as one of their best albums, the lyrics on this album probably shine through the most. Reese Roper takes time to talk about a lot of topics on this album, everything from selling out to Canada is touched on.

The reason I want to focus on “Handbook for the Sellout” is because it was probably one of the best ways to start off a record. We have to look at the context in time though. This was during a period of time when the Christian punk band MxPx had just signed to A&M records and had released their first album on that label. The Christian punk rockers made it a point to cry “sellouts” because the band signed onto a major label. Much like Green Day had caused the ruckus in the secular punk scene around 5 years earlier, MxPx caused the same stir in the emerging Christian rock market.

Mr. Roper, never left out of the opinion tossing put his in a song. The song “Handbook for the Sellout” basically points the finger at every person that cried “sellout” at MxPx, many of whom were probably Five Iron fans. That is not to say that the lyricist does not make his point. When Reese sings the lyrics “You’re the ones who made them popular, all their songs are still the same” he makes sure to let everyone know that nothing about the band accused has changed. The finger is doubly pointed when the chorus comes in with “Do you remember where we all came from? Do you remember what it was all about?” Making sure to really solidify the point that MxPx was doing exactly what everyone paying attention to the then (largely) underground Christian rock movement wanted to see happen: Christian artists getting a secular following. MxPx started a chain reaction at the major record labels, those suits suddenly realized that there was a whole market they could pull artists from.

The thing that makes “Handbook for the Sellout” so cool lyrically is the same reason I like Ben Folds a lot. They both basically attack the listener, but they do it in such a way that it is not threating so it causes self introspection on the that listeners behalf. Songs are sometimes meant to make the listener think about something and when a song can make the listener look at themselves, wishing they could be a better person in some way, that is always a plus.

Lyrics after the jump…

Continue reading →

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The Problem with Linux Music Player/Organizers

Posted on May 16, 2007 by Michael Koby

For the past couple of days I have been working on getting my iPod working under Linux.  Sure, my iPod connects, is recognized, and mounted correctly in Linux but there are some major issues that need to be addressed before full iPod compatibility is achieved in Linux.

Let me say that the only reason I switched to iTunes in Windows from Winamp was because I hate using multiple programs to achieve my goals, when one will do the job just fine.  There was no need for Winamp with iTunes would sync with my iPod and play my music.  So lets move on wit that in mind.

My Linux music player/organizer of choice is Banshee.  I love this program for multiple reasons.  The first reason is it is written in C#, a programming language I work with on a daily basis.  So using something written in a language I already know allows me to actually submit bug reports and (hopefully/eventually) patches.  The other reason I like it is because it is  simple to use and the only thing its only interface is missing is a browser (being fixed in the latest development cycle).  Unfortunately it’s iPod features are severely lacking.  I have made a post on the Banshee Forums,  and hopefully it will get people thinking about creating better iPod handling into Banshee.

Another issue I’ve noticed is a lack of access to ID3v2 tags.  Things like BPM, Disc Number (Part in Set), and Album Artist are all missing from most of the Linux music players.  Album Artist is certainly a must for proper music organization so I am greatly surprised by its exclusion.  Also Disc Number falls into the same category.  I see that the Banshee developers have updated the taglib-sharp libraries in their subversion repositories, so hopefully this will lead to more tags and more columns to organize with in Banshee.  But these tag fields are also absent from Rhythembox and Amorak.  Also when setting up these players to keep your music folder organized, there is not an option to include the disc number so all the files end up out of order in the directory, not great organization if you ask me.  Besides who wants to have to go to two separate places in the player to listen to a multi-disc set?

The Linux based music players/organizers have a long way to come to really be ready for serious music listeners.  They work well for the casual listener but for someone who really cares about their music files and keeping them organized throughly, these players are just not quite there yet.

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links for 2007-05-15

Posted on May 14, 2007 by Michael Koby
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Digital Consumer Enablement

Posted on May 14, 2007 by Michael Koby

It seems that some of the movie industry folks are out to change the name of DRM (Digital Rights Management) to DCE or Digital Consumer Enablement. This specifically comes from the good folks at HBO, the cable movie network that has given us Sopranos, Carnivale, and Entourage.

This idea is not only silly but absolutely idiotic. The idea of naming something that directly disables a consumers use of a product as an “enablement” is absurd. Beside, changing the name is not going to accomplish anything. People are still going to hate it, they are going to speak against it, and they are going to find ways around it. The fact that someone would think that changing the name is going to make things any better is idealistic at best.

The problem with DRM is that it restricts a consumer’s use of a product. Right now if I purchase a movie off the iTunes Store I can only watch that movie on my computer or on an Apple TV. And I really can not do either of those because I’m running Linux.  Now on the subject of Linux and open source if anyone tries to hack the DRM, they are in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.  So not only can we not use the products that are wrapped in DRM but we can also not reverse engineer the DRM so that we can play the the movies and music so that we can play what we legally purchased on our own computers.

I know, cry you a river, that’s what I get for using Linux.  While I did know the consequences going in, the fact that they exist is a problem.  Changing the name is not going to solve the problem that is inherent in DRM technologies.  Certain people are still going to be left out in the cold and others are going to find that some of the things they buy can not play on the players they own.

You see, the problem with Digital Rights Management is not the name.  It is the idea itself that is wrong.  For one thing, it really is not guaranteeing the determent of any form of piracy, the exact problem that it was invented to prevent.  Let us stop worrying about the name and move on to exactly what purpose the technology is serving.

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