POP legend Sir Elton John thinks the internet is destroying good music?

[The Straight Story]

POP legend Sir Elton John wants the internet CLOSED DOWN.

Never one to keep his opinions to himself, the Rocket Man has waded into cyberspace with all guns blazing.

He claims it is destroying good music, saying: “The internet has stopped people from going out and being with each other, creating stuff.

“Instead they sit at home and make their own records, which is sometimes OK but it doesn’t bode well for long-term artistic vision.

“It’s just a means to an end.

“We’re talking about things that are going to change the world and change the way people listen to music and that’s not going to happen with people blogging on the internet.

“I mean, get out there — communicate.

http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2007350453,00.html

[SteppingRazor]

1. Well, I'll say this much...

the Internet certainly is responsible for the spread of tons and tons and tons of really, breathtakingly crappy music. So, there is that.

[The Straight Story]

5. Yeah, and the record companies are responsible for spreading crap music too :)

Now we just have more of both readily available - crap and good music. But my good is probably someone else's crap...

The internet is the real melting pot.

[nosmokes]

2. How would *He* know? n/t

[Ron Green]

3. It's not destroying good music, but I can't see that it'll encourage it

very much. He's right that people ought to go out and be with each other and create stuff. Virtual reality will never replace the thing itself.

[AndyTiedye]

6. It's Happening. It's Just that Elton John Doesn't Get Invited to Those Parties

[ncteechur]

4. The problem is that the internet has cut out gazillions of dollars

from the music industry. It also has made more diverse music available to more people because the record companies wouldn't produce anything that wouln't turn a buck. Some is crappy but to each their own.

[LTR]

7. I always thought Elton John destroyed good music

Especially during the past 20 years or so. Sir Elton wastes too much time shopping rather than actually stirring his creative juices.

And true, there may be a lot of bad music out there, but the good music can be heard outside the recording industry and radio. There's just more music nowadays.

[The Vinyl Ripper]

8. Ninjam.... Novel Intervallic Network Jamming Architecture for Music ..

Because of what I do I kind of keep up with the music software scene.

This one is really interesting.

http://ninjam.com/


NINJAM is a program to allow people to make real music together via the Internet. Every participant can hear every other participant. Each user can also tweak their personal mix to his or her liking. NINJAM is cross-platform, with clients available for Mac OS X and Windows.

NINJAM uses compressed audio which allows it to work with any instrument or combination of instruments. You can sing, play a real piano, play a real saxophone, play a real guitar with whatever effects and guitar amplifier you want, anything. If your computer can record it, then you can jam with it (as opposed to MIDI-only systems that automatically preclude any kind of natural audio collaboration1).

Since the inherent latency of the Internet prevents true realtime synchronization of the jam2, and playing with latency is weird (and often uncomfortable), NINJAM provides a solution by making latency (and the weirdness) much longer.

Latency in NINJAM is measured in measures, and that's what makes it interesting.

The NINJAM client records and streams synchronized intervals of music between participants. Just as the interval finishes recording, it begins playing on everyone else's client. So when you play through an interval, you're playing along with the previous interval of everybody else, and they're playing along with your previous interval. If this sounds pretty bizarre, it sort of is, until you get used to it, then it becomes pretty natural. In many ways, it can be more forgiving than a normal jam, because mistakes propagate differently.