Kleptones rock!

"Thanks" alot to John Battelle for totally distracting me with this pointer to the Kelptone's A Night At The Hip-Hopera just when I'm trying to prep for his conference on Tuesday. I can't stop myself from playing this track over and over. And of course the fact that this is "illegal" is a compelling case in point for why we have to dramatically update our IP law in this country--and do so over the patronizing, self-important protestations of the music oligarchy (and the polticos that do their bidding.) You can't go to a movie now without the industry fronting some disheveled set designer suggesting absurdly that movie piracy has somehow cut into his probably unionized wages. And on a recent United flight I was treated to the unwelcome spectacle of the super-wealthy Sheryl Crow interspersing her in-flight performance with a complaint about music piracy. I think it’s a tactical mistake for the entertainment industry to mix lobbying into their content--and will diminish from both. There IS such a thing as IP theft, but IP laws are meant to strike a balance between incentives to create and freedom to create. This is an anecdote that there is an imbalance in the system.