Music technology

The technology for music production has changed dramatically in the past 50 years, however the instruments and talent required to produce respectable music has not. An electric guitar, drums, bass, for example are the most popular instruments for consumers to purchase today, however the technology hasn't changed since the sixties. Zildjan cymbals have been around for hundreds of years!
The processing and equipment used in the recording of music, however, is extremely high tech and is very expensive. Im not really sure where I am going with this but perhaps someone might want to popularize a new instrument. The barrier to entry as you may guess is pretty high.

This is my last blog post and I will miss it dearly.

Sgnig out. Yours truly,

mike rudolph

What is the best way to advertise?

Free stuff? Possibly free food? Viral maketing? The interweb? Nude girls? Balloons? Spotlights? Steel drums? Cotton candy? Jousting? Carnival rides? Posters? Flash mobs? TV commercials? Blog posts? Catchy tunes? Famous people endorsement? National disasters? Photography?

The world may never know the most successful marketing strategy. Mainly because it's very cicumstantial.

Probably cotton candy, though....

To specialize or not?

I was with my girlfriend at a place in Charlottesville VA that specializes in the "Gus burger" which is basically a cheeseburger with a fried egg on top. As I drunkenly waited for my Gus Burger with bacon, I pondered whether it's better to specialize in one product and be really good and well known for it versus having a decent selection of products.

I am convinced that if you want to make MOanaeY, then you do one thing efficiently an just pump them out to the crowds. It's like canyon pizza or Ritas Italian ice. You can just concentrate one one thing, but it has to be done right. Keeping it sime is morey style, I think.

Autotyping

Data entry is still pretty difficult on mobile devices despite the current technology that exists. If there were a better interface that used something like voice recognition, then it would significantly increase the usability and safety of these devices. Things such as texting while driving and even while walking are dangerous. Although it reduces the privacy by requiring vocal input, we certainly wouldn't eliminate typing. I dis read an article recently that Apple just bought a company, Siri, that wrote an "assistant" software for the iPhone that uses voice recognition to do things like make reservations, find out what's going on around town, or type messages. Pretty cool.

Photography idea

If you could hire someone to follow you around for a night on the town and you could afford to pay them like $50, would you do it? I'll put random details here that may be difficult to follow - there's my disclaimer.

Sometimes I wish I could afford it, because this weekend, for example, was ridiculous. In one night I broke up a fight that random people were in and talked a group of about 20 people out of it while simultaneously telling people at another party that it was my friend Justin Wyne's 21st birthday (he's 22). The results of this legendary idea were unconscionable.
Iirst off I find myself in this random apartment with like 5 guys apologizing to everyone and then I say "alright then, have a good night" as I turn to leave someone says "wait, who are you?" we laughed and I went on my way back to the party Justin was at.

Justin was playing along with it quite nicely as well as the fact that all the girls at this party were pretty tipsy. Anyway, Justin got way more attention than I would have ever imagined from these girls and it was just awesome.

Saturday was Movin' On, and the band I play with was the winner of Battle of the Bands to play there so we played and then we decided on a whim to buy a lot of beer. ANYWAY...I wish someone was there to follow us around because I laughed so hard this whole weekend that I can't seem to remember why.

BLOGS

Well I guess it might be because of my crazy schedule, or lack of motivation at this point, but for some reason I find it difficult to remember that I even have this blog to write in. The notes I write to myself here and there are just glanced at when I open my notebook. I gaze into the distance and ponder what I should do and blogging doesn't seem to pop into my head. Maybe it's the fact that my secrets are so amazing that there's this intrinsic part of me that wants to protect the ideas.

Anyway, perhaps it's because we're not reminded in class so I just randomly remember I have to do this and then write about nonsense. There should be a search engine that filters out nonsense. It would check against this blog post and if an article or page is anything like it, it would just be hidden from the results. How on Earth is a stranger going to find this blog and then take the time to read this. All I know is that it will be stored in a database somewhere and cached into the system and will come up in someone's search one day and they will have wished there was some filter that hid crap like this from view.

That's all.

DRUNKNKKKK

I'm not drunk. BUT apparently there's an excessive drinking problem at Penn State?! I was thinking about it today after reading an article in the Daily Collegian (here), why might this be?

The culture that Penn State students have established for themselves seems to revolve around getting drunk. What can be done to curb this? Apparently passing laws to make people who have parties responsible for guest's bad behavior EVEN after they leave...This seems kind of ridiculous (and illegal?). Perhaps the we should promote more local events that involve art, music, and recreational activities that actually help the brain.

Businesses in the area that don't serve alcohol tend not to do well. I'm not saying to eliminate alcohol. Who cares if college students want to drink? Why can't we instead forget the drinking problems and rather than concentrate on increasing the penalties for drinking related infringements, we should concentrate on events that can bring money into the community and distract from the need to binge drink.

Free live music in the streets on First Thursday is a great example of this. Perhaps make a similar activity on the weekends where people could set up booths and vendors could sell food and arts and crafts in the street. This is wildly popular in Germany and even for Arts Fest during the summer. WHY NOT?

Let's do it. Well, I don't care anymore because I'm graduating, but someone else should do it.