I love my iTunes channel.
Why do I love the underground arts so much in the 2000s? Here's why I love the underground arts so much in the 2000s...
I just posted a new episode of the CCLaP Podcast today, over at the arts organization I own, the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography, and so while logged into iTunes earlier went over and checked out my official channel over there, just on a lark. And I love just to begin with that it looks so sharp over there, that Apple adds that little faded mirror image to my logo, that there's a nice clickable contextual menu above my listing, etc. But see, now compare this for example to the channel for NPR's book podcast...
You see my point? They look exactly the same. NPR has a budget of millions, while I have a budget of exactly four dollars per episode (for the six-pack of beer I drink while cutting it all together, pretty much the only "payment" I get for doing the podcast), yet our official listings at iTunes look exactly and utterly alike. And in fact, I also know the following for a fact, because I once met a staff member of Wait Wait Don't Tell Me! (recorded here in Chicago) and asked her -- turns out that I even use the same recorder (a Zoom H4) as many field reporters at NPR, meaning that my podcast is even outputted with the exact same technical quality as any public radio report.
This is what the real power of the underground arts is in the 2000s; not just that one has the means to make projects, which even my friends and I had the power to do back in high school in the 1980s, with our little zines and our little punk cassettes, but that the finished product is exactly and utterly the same as even the most mainstream media corporation out there, from a technical and distribution and promotional standpoint. When both your shows are recorded with the same equipment, cut with the same software, released in the same format, distributed through the same network, and with listings there that are virtually identical, the only things separating an underground artist's project from a multinational corporation are things the underground artist can actually win at -- intelligence, knowledge of the subject, passion for the subject, a pleasant personality, sex appeal, etc etc. An underground artist can win against a soulless corporation in all these things; and when everything else has been leveled to create an even playing field, that's when you suddenly start talking about real power being put directly into the hands of artists and small groups.
I've said it before and I'll say it again; it's a great time to be an independent artist or small artistic organization, maybe in fact the very best time in all of history. My little experience at iTunes today just reminded me of that all over again.
This is what the real power of the underground arts is in the 2000s; not just that one has the means to make projects, which even my friends and I had the power to do back in high school in the 1980s, with our little zines and our little punk cassettes, but that the finished product is exactly and utterly the same as even the most mainstream media corporation out there, from a technical and distribution and promotional standpoint. When both your shows are recorded with the same equipment, cut with the same software, released in the same format, distributed through the same network, and with listings there that are virtually identical, the only things separating an underground artist's project from a multinational corporation are things the underground artist can actually win at -- intelligence, knowledge of the subject, passion for the subject, a pleasant personality, sex appeal, etc etc. An underground artist can win against a soulless corporation in all these things; and when everything else has been leveled to create an even playing field, that's when you suddenly start talking about real power being put directly into the hands of artists and small groups.
I've said it before and I'll say it again; it's a great time to be an independent artist or small artistic organization, maybe in fact the very best time in all of history. My little experience at iTunes today just reminded me of that all over again.
