Evan Roth's "Intellectual Property A$$hole Competition"

This is AWESOME! I just happened across this site and quite obviously, the title sucked me in. Evan Roth, self-proclaimed Bad Ass Mother Fucker is an American artist based out of Hong Kong. His bio states that he has interests in technology, tools of empowerment, open source and popular culture (definately someone I would like to have a beer with). Coolest of all, he is the number one result from a "bad ass mother fucker" google search. Impressive as I would have surely thought it would have been Samuel Jackson or this

So onto the competition. Evan has staged a competition to see who will deliver a cease and desist quicker... an artist who uses pop culture to become abundantly wealthy, or the Associated Press- who claims to own the copyright on the photo (of our president). To fuel the fire, Evan has painted canvas versions of BOTH the inFamous "Hope" poster and the actual picture and is now selling them on his site. I cannot wait to see what the outcome of this is...

Below is a link to the blog as well as the text from the "contest." http://evan-roth.com/

Intellectual Property Asshole Competition: OBEY vs AP

Who is the bigger intellectual property asshole? Is it the artist who has amassed a small fortune based on "appropriation" yet still sends cease and desist letters to other artists for appropriating his work?

Or is it the largest (and only) US based nationally-oriented news service which fails to recognize "fair use" even when it literally stares them in the face?



I have created hand painted canvases of Shepard Fairy's Obama Hope poster, and Mannie Garcia's Associated Press photograph and put them for sale on my website here and here.

The first person to send me a cease and desist notice wins!



..... stay tuned for updates on the winner.

(For those unfamiliar with the Shepard Fairy / Associated Press intellectual property battle over the Obama Hope poster, here is a good place to start.)



(via evan-roth.com)

Thanks go to Evan for stirring it up!! At the very least, one could say he is "ballsy."

Orchestral composition VS Band composition... what's a writer to do?

Ever wonder about how composers feel about band music??  Well, read this from John Mackey: "If you’re a composer who grew up wanting to write orchestra music, and you listened to Barber rather than Grainger, you probably start with the attitude that you should be writing orchestra music, and band somehow isn’t the goal. So, you marry Orchestra. Orchestra is hot. Okay, maybe not hot, but at least she’s the kind of hot that you know you should like. At the very least, she’s very pretty. And she’s really, really smart, and speaks, like, seven languages, and she knew everybody (but she only ever wants to talk about Beethoven). But you quickly realize that Orchestra thinks she’s better than you, and she acts like every minute she spends with you is come kind of charity work. You get her gifts, and shower her with attention, but you soon realize that she doesn’t appreciate you at all, and she’s neglectful, and at worst, abusive.

And then one day, you meet Band at a party.

“What do you do?” she asks. “Um, I’m a composer,” you reply, expecting little reaction, but Band lights up and exclaims, “oh my God, that’s HOT! Do you have any music I can play? The newer, the better! Let me get you a drink!”

Band is loud. She’s not quite as pretty as Orchestra, and she’s a bit, shall we say, bigger-boned, but she has that truly “hot” aspect to her that Orchestra never had. And most importantly, Band loves what you do. Whereas it was like pulling teeth to get Orchestra to look at your new music (and if she looked, she was generally not impressed, often comparing you unfavorably to one of her many ex’s — like Dvorak), Band thinks it’s awesome. Band tells you things like “you’re special and perfect and I’ll appreciate you and your music like Orchestra never has, and never will.”

What is Composer supposed to do?! Did I mention how loud and boisterous Band is? (Let’s say she’s a screamer. Totally your type.) You have a blast when you’re with her, and your friends agree that she’s a lot cooler than Orchestra, and they see how she treats you much, much better. How can Composer not be expected to stray?

Luckily for Composer, he figured this out around the age of 30, and not much, much later. He just feels bad for all of the other Composers who haven’t yet caught on and left their dysfuncional, abusive relationships."

John's great works can be heard on a number of my Naxos Wind Band Classics recordings...  He also has a great blog that you ought to visit...

Remix: the Movie...

Nashville Film Festival brought some very interesting films to the Music City...  Opening night brought about appearances from the likes of William Shatner, Vincent D'On0frio, Sheryl Crow,William Lee Golden from the Oakridge boys, Mayor Karl Dean, and many others.  Although many great films were involved, I must say that one film had a real impact on me.

RiP: a Remix Manifesto is the story of Girl Talk, Lawrence Lessig and the changing culture of shared music, copyright law, fair use and usage of music that benefits artists...  In short the gray copyright law is taken to task with this great cinematic piece... best of all IT IS AVAILABLE ONLINE FOR FREE VIEWING, REMIXING, ETC!

I urge anyone interested in this subjectmatter to take a look at this film... it is both entertaining and informative... I am so glad it is available for online viewing...

Viva la Girl Talk

How big is your social media footprint... how much is too much?

Greetings friends.  As I sit here writing this, I am juggling.  Not juggling chainsaws, knives, or anything else tangible--- but juggling my many faces in the "blogosphere" , "social networks", "inter-webs"... whathaveyou.    I am doing this because I feel that it is important for not only my social life, but for MY brand.  My brand is an identity based on my outide-looking-in image which is an amalgamation of Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, my blog, Delicious, Linked In and I am sure a few I have forgotten.  Of course we all know this is important... CNN and Fox both tell us so... but how do these resources become such a part of who we are? and How do they help us in the "real world?" In my case, I mention my own brand.  The truth is, everything today is about brand whether it's your own, your company's, or an alter-ego brand such as my friend's "fat kid at camp" moniker.  It is all about that image and everything that surrounds it.  This means in order to be truly engaged, you have to Twitter, be on Facebook, Myspace, blogs, etc.  Here is where it gets really fun/tricky though.  In order to truly be a part of the global conversation you have to be on these various networks, but your message must be original (not contrived).  Classic Marketing 1.0 techniques will not gain you traction in this world.  Marketing in social media is all about creating a conversation with your consumer.  It is about the human side of marketing.

While this works for our personal, corporate and alter-ego brands--- one of the venues this type of social marketing really applies itself is in the marketing of bands. The catalyst for this post happens to be the great post  I read this morning on "Hit Singularity" .  This is a great overview of free, easy social networking that can really make a difference.

10 Fast and Free Strategies To Market Your Band (Without Resorting To Spamming People On Myspace)

This is probably one of the most complete descriptions I have seen thus-far in the social-media-as-promotion movement.  Short of writing a book on it like Barack 2.0, this is short, sweet and to the point.  The fact remains that in order to succeed in the virtual world, you must have a strong footprint.  Following the points mentioned in the blog above will help you to create that footprint.