The Digital Past

Thinking about the information that computers/search engines have on us is kinda disturbing to me. The example with the Safeway grocery store brings light to how outside sources have so much information on us and what we like. They know what our preferences are and use that to suggest new items and therefore are able to make more money. On their part, it’s a good way to keep consumers coming back, and potentially gain new consumers because their current consumers recommend the store to their friends/family. However, I’m not too concerned about how a company knows what groceries I buy. It’s the fact that databases have information on us that date way back.  How much information is too much? I don’t know if it’s just me, but I think it’s a little alarming that the internet can just predict things about us based on our previous actions. We’re always being watched and the information is always being recorded. Google uses our location when we are browsing. This may be convenient for finding a store or service place, but how do we know that Google isn’t using our location for something else. Or if someone else is tracking/stalking us through this. All of this might sound like paranoia, but it’s just something to think about. Granted, there are settings that can be used to prevent our location from being actively shared, but the majority of search engines keep our preferences on file. I like the idea of easier access to the things I like, but it makes us more predictable and less diverse.

Censorship is definitely something our society needs to have. However, the extent to what something is censored can get messy because of the basic rights we have in place. Such as freedom of speech. How far can someone go before their words are censored?  The government should censor content if it has the potential to harm someone else, but many people will claim they have the right to say whatever they please. Do we really have total freedom of speech? I believe the answer is no.

Nowadays everyone tries to be politically correct and for that, I think our society is overly sensitive. Someone is going to be offended no matter how hard you try to keep an individual’s feelings in mind. Our society is always looking for something to exploit another person, no matter if it is true or not. Personally, I think false information should be the number one thing that is censored because it has the potential to cause the most harm to someone. If the people are fed false information and believe it the whole country could go crazy. Technology and social media just fuel the fire, making false information more believable and fabricating material. Anyone can photoshop a picture, or take multiple recordings of someone’s voice in order to make it seem like they are saying something inappropriate/offensive, deceiving their viewers. Therefore, we as educated individuals in our society have to question everything we come in contact with and think four ourselves.

I was very intrigued by all of the versions of “Watermelon Man”. It is pretty cool to think about how an individual can manipulate a piece of music/a sound to use it in their art. If used well, sampling can enhance a song, adding historical and political meaning to it. As long as the music flows well and sounds interesting I believe sampling can be very effective. Especially after listening to multiple examples in this class. I can now pick up on sampling in the music I listen to today. A lot of artists pull from songs in the past and reuse it to fit their style, it definitely draws the attention of the listener.  I would like to incorporate this into my final project in order to have a good sounding track.

I agree with the use of sampling, however, I do not agree with the minstrel shows. Sampling differs from the minstrel shows because it doesn’t necessarily “steal” someone else’s style, and it isn’t used to portray a culture as something they are not. Sampling pulls just pieces of a song and is added to another piece of work, or manipulated to have a slightly different sound. While minstrel shows attempted to mock/copy the sound of the blacks in the South. The way that white people would paint their face, dress, and attempt to mimic black southerners through strange mannerisms poorly reflected the culture of the south and was very insulting.

Stephen Witt’s book, “How Music Got Free”, brought to light how easy it was for people to steal music using technology. “…the Internet was made of people…Piracy was a social phenomenon…” (Witt p.3). It was the norm for people to steal music and everyone was involved from engineers to criminals according to Witt. Even Witt himself admitted to this when he was in college and owned an mp3 player, which was packed with “bootlegged songs.” The amount of evidence that was found wasn’t as surprising to me as it was to Witt. This is probably because my generation is constantly looking for a way to get things for free and take short-cuts to benefit ourselves. I could argue this is only fair since we are required to pay more compared to older generations for college, concert tickets, living, technology, etc. Work smarter not harder right? Witt refers to this generation as the “pirate generation”, but a lot of people pay for their music through Apple or Spotify. I myself have Spotify premium which I pay for monthly in order to have access to countless songs. It is a great app that allows me to organize my music and discover new artists/songs that are appealing to me. Some may argue that artists do not make enough through this. However, the prices of their concert tickets and the opportunities they have, like being sponsored by large companies through their music makes up for this.

In class, it was argued that “Displacement is a major engine of cultural innovation and creativity.” I believe that this is very true, our music comes from so many different places and sampling is used more frequently than I would have thought. It is unbelievable how so many different artists pull from songs that already exist. Even artists that are known worldwide use sampling like Pitbull. However, after hearing my classmate from Bolivia talk about how their culture was getting ripped off by big-time artists made me realize that people don’t always give credit where it is due. If an artist is going to use anything from someone else’s song they should be given credit. Just how we have to cite our sources and give credit to authors when writing papers.

I find it very interesting how so many songs are based on songs in the past, or in other words use samples. I would have never known this was the case because I was never brought up listening to old music. Some may argue that using samples makes your song unoriginal, but I disagree. If you have the ability to take bits and pieces from a song and that really speaks to you then you should do it. Especially if it fits with your song and flows together. The context is so different from how the sample was used in the original version of the song, so I don’t believe it is “stealing” someone’s idea. However, I do believe that the artist who pulls from other songs should give credit to the original artist, or get a license. It seems fair that the original artist should be paid for others using it.

I don’t agree with the statement, “intellectual property is property- it does not matter who made it, it matters who owns it.” If you made something that was a piece of you, like a song which was your ideas that song should be recognized as yours forever. The argument with selling a house and then having to move out after a certain time doesn’t even make sense. That is physical or materialistic property while something like a song is purely intellectual. However, I do not believe if you sing someone else’s song you should be charged for it everytime you sing. I think it’s absurd that singing “Happy Birthday” in public is a copyright infringement. If you are singing a song you aren’t claiming it as your own property. No one is going to go to the ASCAP to get a license so that they can sing “Happy Birthday” in a public place. We have bigger problems to worry about than to make sure people don’t sing “Happy Birthday” without a license. Also, the majority of people pay for some type of music application in order to listen to music/learn the song in the first place. Overall, the details on copyright are quite confusing to me. I wouldn’t be able to defend or represent someone by any means. I guess that’s why they make people go to law school!

The travel of sound and how it is controlled is an interesting concept. Once again, the media is the message; how the message is interpreted depends on how it is delivered to an individual. Acoustic Tiles eliminated the problem of the echo in large rooms and controlled the travel of sound, in order to make it more direct. Personally, in some cases, I think an echo can enhance the message and has the ability to make it more dramatic. For example, when my coach is yelling at us and her voice echoes throughout the stadium it gets me pumped up and ready to play. However, in a performance or church setting, I can see how it can be very distracting.

In the early 20th century Jazz was greatly appreciated by many. In Jacobs’ Band Monthly, Volume 4, published in October of 1919, jazz was described as a type of music that was moving and had great energy. “It tickles up and down your spine, the violins and cellos whine, the cymbals clash, the big cornet mixed in with the flageolet in that syncopating, aggravating, animating, palpitating, fascinating, something that is…JAZZ.” According to the Ngram viewer, Jazz didn’t come about until around 1915. This is what I expected because when I think of jazz music I think of the roaring 20s, which is very flashy and extravagant.

I find Wikipedia a very useful and interesting tool. “Over the past 17 years, the community of Wikipedia editors has established a formal framework of policies, guidelines, and explanatory supplements to advance the goals of the project.” (Harrison). Wikipedia emphasizes the importance of being skeptical. Many Wikipedians edit pages and keep each other in check, which I believe makes it a valuable site. Also, Wikipedia is completely free and can be easily accessed by anyone who wishes to gain knowledge on a certain topic. Why should we have to pay to gain knowledge? Buying numerous books for college courses is infuriating to me for many reasons; they are expensive, heavy, and only used for that course. Why should we have to purchase so many books if we can just look information up online and instantly get multiple results? Some may argue that Wikipedia is not a reliable source, but textbooks can be wrong as well.

Harrison, Stephen. “The Debate Over ‘Devil’s Triangle’ Shows Wikipedia at Its Best.” Slate Magazine, Slate, 30 Sept. 2018, slate.com/technology/2018/09/kavanaugh-wikipedia-devils-triangle.html.