No not a list post as I’ve railed against before; just a review of the year. You can add random numbers to it if you want, especially if you want it to make less sense. Feel free to then argue the results bitterly in the comments, across twitter and thus the national press who now think if it isn’t on Facebook or Twitter it doesn’t exist, and conversely if it is it must be news. And thus bump up my Google ranking and provide this blog with loads of free advertising…;-)

2009 was the year that:

It sounded BIG and LOUD in a Wall of Sound that probably surrounds Phil Spector in jail – not sure if it was in honour of the jailed frizzy haired freak or just that Glavegas was on sale, but it seemed that claps, Ronnettes style beats and distorted wall of sound a la Jesus and Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine et al was completely in vogue – from The Big Pink to Pains of Being Pure at Heart and many many more. And others made it their business to sound like they had swallowed either that C86 shoegaze comp (School of Seven Bells, M83, to some extent Pains too even Fuck Buttons),  or the entire Factory catalogue with some Sonics via The Fall for dessert (Horrors). It never sounded so 1988.

Joy made a comeback - it’s usually a dirty word, with looking mopey and clinically depressed being the indie/rock star norm -  but that star-struck and wide-eyed joyous sound you’d usually associate with hippies or strung out folkies (more of that in a minute) became the most appropriate response to the darkness in the world…from Noah and the Whale to Girls, The Very Best to Leisure Society to that damn Florence and the Machine and Flaming Lips and many many more…happy (or at least sounding it) was the new black. Even in dance or more experimental quarters, from M83 to Fuck Buttons to *spit* Animal Collective that big building joyous almost spiritual sound was in. Also sounding like it was from a  long lost John Hughes (RIP) movie soundtrack was a good thing (Phoenix, Passion Pit, many others).

Folk was not a four letter word – with the New Joy (ooh call the IPC sub eds I came up with a new genre!) it seemed the country/folk sound kept going by the likes of Bonnie Prince Billy, Richard Hawley et al was everywhere…from The Low Anthem to Noah and the Whale (of about 5 million Laura Marling offshoots like the Waterboys-molesting and yawnsome Mumford and Sons) and rather belatedly King Blues (well I missed their LP at the end of 08 so it’s a 2009 discovery to me!) and Fleet Foxes who were still around, probably foraging in the bins.

Ukeleles were cool – well they’ve always been cool, but Leisure Society and Noah & the Whale using them to Florence brandishing one on stage and the Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain’s massive Uke-a-thon at the Proms and millions of Uke videos it did seem like 2009 Year of the Uke to me.

Dubstep went overground – sniffed around a bit, ate a few nuts, went to a rave, then went back underground and changed again. Probably hibernating now, either that or collaborating with The Wombles.

Bloc Party split. No-one really noticed. Ditto Oasis, although sub-eds must fear for their jobs having to look for better quotes in future.

As sure as Kilimanjaro rises like Olympus above the Serengeti, African music was a big influence – from Buraka Son Sistema to The Very Best via Vampire Weekend, Damon’s faves Amadou and Miriam,  and Vamps inspired bands (The Drums is one I can think of on the top of my head, many more out there) – those beats and chiming guitars and vocals were legion.

Beards were big, I blame Fleet Foxes and Bonnie Prince Billy for this…in a nice way! Yay beards!

Someone called Michael Jackson died. Nope. I’m a blank…

Lily Allen did one great song, opened her mouth and put her foot in it again then stormed off. For a change.

Moz was in a coma, I know, I know, it wasn’t that serious. He did pull a few strops though, getting fans chucked out, generally acting the queeny diva he really is.

Steven Wells died. FUCKSTICKS.

Blur and The Specials played again and it was great – no Jerry Dammers, natch, but I got to shake the hand of Don Letts. I iz a happy man.

Peter Mandelson became the most hated man in Britain. Or should be.

Favourite Album of 2009:

Well I’ve gone through most of the best ofs recently, especially the NME and Rough Trade ones – some good ones, but strangely not this album. Maybe cos it’s a remix of a 19 year old album, maybe cos it’s only available at Rough Trade and mostly the Net on limited release, but Saint Etienne’s Fox Base Beta is most definitely my album of 2009. With Richard X at the remix controls, it was back to 1990 in the black cab time-machine to update a rather patchy but important classic with a 2009 sound – and yes his mix of ‘OnlyLove Can Break Your Heart’ is as good as Weatherall’s, yet he rather wisely leaves Nothing Can Stop Us Now alone – if it aint broke, don’t fix it?

Nothing comes close. Well actually few did. Sub Focus’s eponymous debut was the front runner for most of the year, like Chase & Status last year bringing drum and bass, dubstep and even Axwell-style piano rave and wobble basslines to the pop charts and Radio 1…Could This Be Real is not only a great pop tune, it’s a club classic. Way too short though.

The Very Best dominated the end of the year for me…album was a little disappointing but their Mixtape (which is the album’s bonus CD at Rough Trade before people moan it was 2008 or something!) was a brilliantly eclectic and East/West soundclash affair mixing classical music, Architecture in Helsinki, MIA and Vampire Weekend – all of which went on to colloborate with them funnily enough – and Michael Jackson who went and uncollaborated by dying.

Fever Ray took the warmth and energy of The Knife, what little of it was left after Silent Shout, and put it into the cold-hearted glacier that would make the world in ‘Let The Right One In’ proud…moody minimal dancehall if done by someone who’d never been to Jamaica nor heard any and didn’t really dance…with a haunting vocal and minimal synths. No-one sounds quite like Karin Dreijer Andersson and this album is timeless and also sounds completely alone and genreless and thus like nothing else. And thus sound like complete bollocks if you try and describe it.

Peter Bjorn and John – Living Thing - sadly ignored in most lists but compared to the (admittedly good yet overplayed) fluff of Young Folks the darkness and quirkiness of  “It Don’t Move Me” and that video drew me in – and surprised me. This is the sort of electronic dark sound Air or Royskopp should be making, not shamed by those that wrote the whistley annoying one from a few years back.

Passion Pit are a late entry, it seemed to be rather quiet on the indie-dance crossover front this year so they along with Gossip were some of the few holding the side up – loved their Irish folk bothering Sleepyhead (I thought it was Chris De Burgh!) and best use of children since D.A.N.C.E.

Fuck Buttons – Tarot Sport another late arrival but love the electronic shoegaze MBV / post-rock Mogwai feel, it is basically drone rock ala Godspeed You Black Emperor! plus electronics so not everyone’s cup of tea, but real ambient bliss. And the electronic/glitch production is a development over the fairly obvious Street Horrrsing.

Mr B’s album is pure genius, mixing the ukelele with hiphop via ChapHop. It’s 2008 though so doesn’t count. As doesn’t Ladyhawke’s LP. DOH!

And another late contender I forgot to add was Leisure Society’s ‘The Sleeper’ – brilliant album, makes folk joyous and wonderful, even if the subject of the song is sometimes surprisingly dark.

Best Track of 2009

Has to be this – nothing cheered me up and wanted to make me dance like The Very Best’s ‘Warm Heart of Africa’, and more importantly delve into Victor Uwaifo’s back catalogue and do my first remix – like this track. Pure happy African/London/American hybrid mashup genius!

Other tracks: well Charlie Darwin by the Low Anthem was a definite earworm, as was The Drums ‘I Felt Stupid’, the live version of Franz Ferdinand’s ‘What She Came For’ which reclaims the small-gig energy of early Franz which seems a little missing on the album, Hyph Mngo by Joy Orbison displaying where dubstep can go next (ie ditching the rain samples, it doesn’t have to be so dark, etc), The Pains of Being Pure at Heart’s ‘Come Saturday’ bringing fun Ash-style power pop back, Fever Ray’s ‘Keep the Streets Empty’, Sub Focus ‘Could it be real’ proving that pianos and bassline doesn’t always equal cheese, Lily Allen ‘The Fear’ proving not everything she does is either shit or just for attention, Royskopp feat Robyn ‘The Girl and the Robot’ - shame about the album though, “It Don’t Move Me” by Peter Bjorn and John – dark and odd MJ-inspired video that probably gave him the heart attack, Prodigy – Omen and Warrior’s Dance showing how this rave bizniz is done…and French Navy by Camera Obscura is pure loveliness. Ladyhawke – I loved ‘Magic’ and ‘Dusk til Dawn’.

And who can forget probably the biggest get up and dance hits of the year – Dizzee Rascal’s Bonkers and Black Eye Peas – I Got a Feeling, this year’s ‘Low’, whatever you feel about the cheesiness of the track, you cannot deny the joyful reaction. Classic pop.

Best mashups

This is hard for me since I don’t regularly listen to as many mashups as I used to, unless I’m involved in making videos or compilations with them, but Dunproofin was probably the man of the year for quality mashups (again) - bit naughty plugging one of my productions but the reason I made the video for Pjanoo Dance is it’s one of my favourites, if not the favourite of this year. Others that produced stone-cold classics were 10000 Spoons especially his Astley Gone to Heaven, Celebrity Murder Party, Phil Retrospector, djbc’s and DJ Fox’s Fleetwood Mix tracks and Menorah Mashups.

New discoveries were Pogo, CjR, Pomdeter (producing the world’s second Disco Accordion track with Pinky Ring Disco Polka!), okiokinl, DMF for their Bootrospective compilation and Marc Johnce whose Lily Allen 22 vs Lime is still one of my fave Lily mashes.

Favourite video mashes

Well again it’s more people that specific tracks but ThriftshopXL suddenly came back to life this year and was a video mashup machine and I loved his Lily Allen, Cure (even if it did include that annoying Bat For Lashes woman) and Phil n’ Dog bootlegs.

Other video mashers I rated were Pogo, Ricardo Autobahn, rx, Cassetteboy, BorisB, DJ Le Clown, dascottjr with his literal version of Total Eclipse of the Heart, Philretrospector and Reborn Identity who produced a whole DVD of the Mashed in Plastic David Lynch compilation. Good stuff.

I’ll Be There in Twin Peaks from Mashed in Plastic on Vimeo.

And come in at the last moment is Earworm’s United States of Pop 2009. I really didn’t like the last one, but this is a real development, has some really nice touches and is slick, slick, slick, using the cutup techniques that are more Ricardo Autobahn to create a song than yer usual A vs B. Even though I hate some of the terrible source material…but that’s what you get if you challenge yourself to mash the top 25 tracks! Like the Taylor Swift vs Kanye bit

But in retrospect it probably was all about The Bloody, Bloody, Bloody Apprentice. Cassetteboy pwns!

Biggest disappointments

Jarvis’s second LP. How could you? The incomprehensible and 6th-form poetry of Angela didn’t bode well, and the album was crushingly yawnsome and rather desperate rock attempt which left that acoustic/country Richard Hawley produced sound just as it began to get fashionable. Doh!

Bat for Lashes. If I wanted sub Kate Bush/Peter Gabriel Guardian-reader dross, I’d kill myself, not listen to this. What was it and 2009 and awful 80’s MIDI sound Casio-keyboard production? BFL, Little Boots and La Roux, I’m looking at you.

X-Factor like Scientology is still massive and about as good for you.

3 strikes law annoyed everyone; G20 violence and police hitting people randomly, world is still terrified of it’s shadow and the ridiculous Pantsbomber terrorists hiding in it, of course.

Not getting to Glastonbury and Bestival AGAIN this year for the 100th year running, Gah. I would like to go at least ONCE before I die…

It’s all a bit meh, really

The Horrors LP. Best LP of 2009 according to NME. The Most Obviously Derivative But Not Even That Good according to me. It’s not terrible – like the Krautrock meets acidy bleeps of Sea Within a Sea, but really it does sound like they swallowed the whole Factory/Manchester back catalogue, from A Certain Ratio attempting Krautrock to baggy to The Fall copying The Sonics. So far so good if not exactly original influences – but with one-flaw sub-Wedding Present/sub-Ride songwriting abilities. Nice producer, shame about the band.

Yeah Yeah Yeah’s idolatry. Yup ‘Zero’ is good, brilliant bassline, rest of the LP is fairly boring, the acoustic versions actually sound better than the produced tracks…definitely didn’t follow the brilliance of ‘Zero’

Dirty Projectors – Bitte Orca. One word: Terrible…maybe Noah’s Whale should eat them up.

Air’s LP, and Royskopp’s LP. Just mehness incarnate.

Future of the Left. Sorry At the Drive In was nearly 10 years ago now. Rage was nearly 20. We don’t need a unpoliticised version babbling what you think are, like,  ‘Gang of Four’ but are actually inanities that make Wire seem positively on point…Arming Eritrea? WTF? We do need a politicised and on-point band in said mold, though.

Right I’m frankly surprised at some of the responses to the whole Rage Against The Machine for Xmas #1 campaign (803,000 members and counting!) – they seem to be unaware of the current state of the music industry and why stuff like this matters.

1) “It’s Simon Cowell’s record company” - not strictly true. Syco is a subsidiary of Sony Music UK, but RATM’s label is another subsidiary in the states. Doubtful Simon will profit from RATM, possible if he’s got shares, but he could have shares in all companies for all we know. It will profit Sony but also Rage who are one of the most politically active groups. I’m happy to give them money, cos it’ll probably go to some good use. EDIT: they’ve announced that some of the proceeds are going to UK charity Youth Music and Shelter. I knew RATM would do that; great charities also.

Also may I remind you there are only 4 main record companies now, at least ones that have infrastructure to get a Xmas #1 or mass recognition. So you only have 1/4 chance of hitting a Sony product anyways. Sure you have some hits and novelty hits from the few smaller companies but they are rare – you’d think this might have changed in the digital age, but it hasn’t. Even the likes of XL had to band together with other labels to negotiate with iTunes et al and STILL got stiffed. Also many of the smaller hits when they rise up the charts get distribution deals with those big 4, so back to them again.

Also Sony is one of the less evil corporations – EMI and Warners give people hell over remixes and mashups, UMG via Interscope just got my videos pulled on YouTube and Myspace. Sony BMG I know encourage people to remix their stuff, at least in the R’n'B arena, and they’ve been like that since disco days I think. Certainly never got a DMCA or C&D from them. They see whitelabels and DJ remixes quite rightly as free promotion of their acts, although I’m sure if you start selling CDs in mass quantities like all record companies they would be down on you like a ton of bricked iPhones.

2) “It’s silly” or “It won’t change anything” – This is a funny one, especially as people tend to decry apathy in this day and age. You don’t get to choose what people power is used for, I’d prefer (and would fight) for it not to be used to lynch immigrants, but usually it’s for good purposes. What’s good in this? you might think.

Well it’s a symptom of an interesting shift where Facebook and Twitter are being used for real and not so real political action from MP expenses to Trafigura and Iran and yes Xmas single campaigns. The good is that people are actively doing something and being passionate, those groundswells could be used for great good (and evil) but if the original motivator is something other than self-interest and oil – from music lovers hating X-Factor’s damaging hold on their chart to climate change and making sure MPs are not hypocritical. It’s all part of the same movement.

So no, it’s not ’silly’ – it’s a bit of fun. As Eric Kleptone said about this in Facebook:

“Anyone that thinks it’s about the cash is really missing the point, in my opinion. Ever bought anything from a joke shop? Something from a pound shop you really didn’t really want but looked daft? It’s a fun thing to do, a wheeze! a jape! it’s like sticking drawing pins on your teacher’s chair and then sitting in the back of the class sniggering, waiting for him to come in. It won’t *do* anything other than cock a snook at someone that has more power and influence than you’ll ever have, but if there are cocks to be snooked, my god, I’ll be right there helping out.”

The other response he had that maybe people should think about where they spend money always rather than just this time was also totally on the money, too.

But being able to send that message, even a silly one, may or may not worry the likes of Simon Cowell (I think it might) but if it succeeds it will make a lot of people feel warm and fuzzy about campaigning online so maybe next time when it’s more serious, they’ll take part. And make certain people higher up nervous or aware of the power of such campaigns widening from being a bunch of geeks with too much time on their hands to mass democracy.That for me is what it’s about.

Oh and blowing a raspberry to Simon Cowell, that too

EDIT: 3) ‘It’s not appropriate’ ‘it has the word fuck in it’ – well unlike BBC Radio 5 Live who should have guessed they’d swear live on air, the band seem to have more grasp of the allure of the song, it’s central message ‘Fuck you I won’t do what you tell me’. In these sanitised photoshopped times, where bland yet hypocritically faintly shocking is king; there is a need to shake things up – not just for controversy but for wider reasons. The power of the media corporates which is now mostly the same as the record labels, the government clamping down on protest and even 3strikes, privacy online, CCTV and ‘terrorist’ monitoring (you can tell I’ve been reading Cory Doctorow’s ‘Little Brother’ can’t you?) is an undercurrent that is boiling under all this jovial seasonal ‘fun’ unrest. It’s a wider issue of censorship and taking back culture. ‘Take it back’, taking back ownership from the spoon-feeding media giants.

So remember to go buy RATM’s Killing in the Name Of before Saturday midnight; the X-Factor Joe Elderwotsit’s CD *boo hiss* goes on sale today.

New version of Dan Le Sac & Scroobius Pip’s Thou Shalt Always Kill – no not a remix, a new version via De La Soul’s Posdnous :

A brilliant new version – love the Kid Carpet reference, the Facebook and YouTube snarks and the styles bit. Out in January apparently!

OK this post has been brewing for a long while – so it’ll be a long one. Deal.

About a month ago I joined Twitter – people were quite surprised, 2 years ago I’d expressed my hatred of Twitter at Podcamp 06 (the audio is floating around somewhere) so me eventually joining Twitter was a surprise.

Why the turnaround? Well one of two things; I feel as part of my job I need to keep abreast of these technologies, and the other that I’d missed hearing about whole conferences because the podcasting community had pretty much decamped wholesale to Twitter, and thus most of the conversations don’t happen outside, or unless you are subscribed to 100s of shifting blogs. Unlike previous times, the only central point was…you guessed it – the ubiquitous Twitter.

So has my attitude changed? Yes and no.

Back in 2006 I decried the fact that Twitter and social media were sucking the life out of real life friendship – there wasn’t really a point to going to see mates to find out how they are when you can read it on a Facebook or Twitter update. I think the social effects of sites like Facebook since 2006 has partly proven me correct, people seem to be using technology to offset traditional contact with friends, and there seems to be a wider base of shallower friends, what I call acquaintances, but under an umbrella of frequent updates so connected as if they are close friends. It’s a sham; a bad reflection of a true friendship. Obviously it’s also a good, keeping people in touch who are the other side of the world and bringing people together, so it’s not all bad. But I find it ironic that through technology I’m more likely to see someone 100s or 1,000s of miles away, but then never see friends down the road in the flesh.

Crazy Half Life

Robert Scoble talked about half-life of a conversation recently; I think in James Gleick fashion it’s useful to try and measure the speed at which these conversations are moving, the stress vectors. It’s obvious that Twitter is a very different animal to Livejournal, despite not that different technology and only about 7 years difference in launchdate, but really in speed they are worlds apart.

Part of the attraction of Twitter is it’s Google-like simplicity, it does one thing, and does it well. Compared to blogging or email, the conversations seem fairly one-sided, like a blog (really most people there are talking about themselves, the amount of PR/marketing and new media evangelists is horrific); but without the depth you can maintain in a blog. The conversations are quicker – gone in 15 minutes or quicker, and very volatile – no not that people get angry but the posts disappear off-screen quickly, and are gone.

So like a more acceptable version of those kids on the bus txting continually, it’s blogging with hyper A.D.D. But this seems to be the way social media is moving – into the realm of fast immediate mobile-friendly short conversations, throwaway, shallow.

And with video – like 12seconds I can see it becoming wham-bam-thank-you-Mr because the time constraints of following 100 or 1,000+ people and the flood of audio and video media means the message has to survive the tl;dw or tl:dl (too long; didn’t watch or too long; didn’t listen) of mobile phones, iPods and online media. Will this affect the message? Of course it will. Or there will be two streams, one of the refuseniks producing niche longer programs, and a massive pool of really short shows with no content.

Living with Numbers

‘Social Gaming’ as I call it, attaining friends for sheer number volume and grooming/attracting/whoring yourself to get people to click that ‘Add friend’ or ‘Follow’ button is not new – Myspace and millions of teenagers have been playing that game for years. But the simplicity of the user interface coupled with the prominence of the Following / Follower stats (thank GODDESS they didn’t make the mistake of calling it “friend’ like Myspace and LJ, what a psychological drama minefield that has been) has led to an almost messianic obsession with collecting followers. It makes the obsessive ‘I wanna be your friend’ popularism from when you were in school seem somehow quaint. At least those teens weren’t pushing a ‘brand’ and a hidden business/marketing plan.

Also interesting is a new breed of people who seem to be trying to create a career being a Social Media Whore – consultants or new media professionals, it’s like the professional bloggers of yore (who interestingly have stormed this Social Media space in the same way traditional broadcasters invaded podcasting, using their ‘name’ status and existing readership and other channels to promote their Twitter/Friendfeed to trounce any ‘competition’) except with one difference – blending the prosaic and mundane with the insights and links of old, all in 140 characters, leading to a sort of silent film / talkie divide between those using all media – video, microblogs, maps, moblog photos, work AND play, and those just pinging their Twitter from their blog when they post.

But is it possible to eat off linklove? Can online respect alone pay the bills? Is it a new way of working (I know of people who have gotten work via Twitter and other social media), or just TwitFactor? Your 15 seconds are up, Mr McLuhan43553.

Top of the Class

Something that has always bothered me about social media – and new / rich media (interesting term there) as a whole is that it’s nerdy. white, usually male and most definitely middle class. I’m sure loads of people will now point to exceptions, but it bothers me that diversity isn’t there – when 2nd and some of the 3rd world can now have access to at least mobile networks there isn’t a desire or a knowledge to blog, vlog, podcast, communicate? Is this a purely leisure class pursuit? Is it because the barriers to entry are too high, these shiny toys are way too expensive, from computers to bandwidth to servers? I do feel personally there aren’t enough different voices, and a lot of existing voices ‘retweeting’ or reposting the same old.

Talking class, it’s interesting that sociologists are studying the online habits of teenagers of differing class strata and/or money / social groups. Danah Boyd is doing some interesting work in this area – Facebook vs Myspace was a contentious one from 2007, I can see similar tribal loyalties affecting who signs up for Bebo, LinkedIn, Twitter etc. I wonder if Twitter classes as mid-30s male IT geek in it’s demographic? Certainly to progress past the posts about software ‘mashups’ (grr) and Rails coding it needs to widen it’s appeal – the one sided nature of most conversations and marketing spiel as well will put people off – the ability to track conversations is hard, which as Mr Scoble would say at this point, is why Friendfeed wins in that regard.

Hierarchies in the Clouds

I find it interesting that there is already what is called a Twitterati. but no Facebookati or Bebo Mafia, and it’s already acquired a (jokingly?) negative connoitation. Every bunch of people online creates a clique, but not many have such a visible metric to affirm their status. So you get usually the same old names, with 1,000s of friends, beseiged by their success, so they talk to each other and themselves. Reciprocity failure, the gift that keeps on giving.

Rustle the Brand / Public good?

So the new model that people are building is one of branding yourself (I did say they were in marketing) – but corporate bloggers could tell you tales of drunkeness and cruelty and the problem of openness vs public image. Now multiply this to a whole life, where the personal, prosaic and professional are blended together, where people share drunken tagged photos and videos on YouTube and Facebook (better change your Privacy settings!) with a profile linked to your LinkedIn CV. Now you can develop nicknames and personas, but it does raise interesting issues on what employers expect to know and what employees share (or more interestingly get shared about them), and how those feeds interact and cross-relate. And how it could all go very, very wrong (see the whole Russell Brand debacle for a broadcast version of this).

Is there a public good in social media? Is the act of sharing seen as a public good, or is it just an act of vanity or self promotion? Will people share if it endangers their brand? Or just self-censor so the conversations and connections become banal?

Web 2.0 – Where’s My Money?

Free content isn’t free; someone has to spend time making it, someone has to spend money storing it; someone at YouTube or Twitter has to spend expensive nights awake trying to work out how to make money from it. People have made money from other people’s ‘free’ content though.

I’ll quote Bicyclemark and Richard Bluestein from a Citizen Reporter podcast:

“BicycleMark: But then again sometimes I look at conferences and I think ‘What have we done?’. I’ve seen some very expensive conferences taking place…but you look around and you go ‘Wow look all this money that’s been spent so these people can talk to each other’ and I guess make business deals.

Richard: You know what bothers me…It’s interesting though that the business people that schmoozed and squeezed the money out of VC’s – they are not having any sort of problems paying for their health insurance, they’re still flying first class, you know what I mean..That’s the case pretty much anywhere in Silicon Valley…the people that Twitter everything and talk about the trends and eat constantly…just constantly! They just fucking always have plenty of money…they’re relying, they’re sucking off people like us that produce content…If you have a business based on podcasting or video…or streaming, there wouldn’t be any website if there wasn’t people makiing stuff. Most of the time they aren’t paying anything for that content.”

What the quote displays is the widening digital and social divides is also reflected online – the differences between rich and poor, free creators and paid producers, those with VC money and those with not and different classes. The internet has been seen as the great Communicator, crossing boundaries of race, class and gender, yet people are getting rich reinforcing those differences. Rich media indeed.

And the book publishers (Mr O’Reilly invented the term to sell books remember) and people who created startups and got the sponsorships and VC funds (and even refuse offers from Facebook) are the ones who got rich off the podcast (failed) boom, or the recent online video goldrush. Only the fail whale of the economy will put a pinprick into this small bubble. Maybe Baron von Blubber should sue.

But the ethics of making money off someone else’s content – which might not be owned by them, well I think it’s dubious at best. Funny to hear people moan about 99% of the videos on YouTube not being ‘monetizable’ – what you want people to post videos for free that conveniently fit into your business model and sponsorship deals? Do you want gold-plated hundreds and thousands on that cake or are you gonna eat it as is? No I’m surprised the companies have been very lax in revenue sharing, apart from some laughable contracts – it’s the media that brings people in, support it. Or it dies…oops too late.

Summary

Maybe the economy will change all this – unemployed people become social media professionals, selling their network as much as their skills (why does that sound like some 21st century cyber Austen novel?) and have time to create amazing videos on YouTube. With no house, rent or need for food. And pigs tweet.

I think it’s more likely the freebie time other than kids at school or retired people is over; companies are going to have to attract people to create media for them, especially if it has to be short snappy and sweet. Yeah the conversational tweet/video microblogging will stay; but podcasting and online video are going to have a tougher time. When people are stressed about their rent, they aren’t going to make loads of Mentos videos…unless it’s of protests. Maybe like with the Obama campaign we’ll see a start of mass use of social media as a political tool, if so that does give me hope.

One of the things that seems to have faded away is the communication in the podcasting community, now that several of the forums have gone means despite being subscribed to a podcasting forum and another blog site, which I don’t think mentioned it, it means I only found out about SocialMediaCamp in London tomorrow now, by accident of someone on my Facebook. Alas it is sold out.

Sigh – I probably would’ve liked to have gone, and would have roped more podcasters in, but how could I have heard about this? Without that central space where everyone or a lot of people go for the UK scene (Podcastmatters is the only closest, maybe UKPA forum wherever that is now) it really means that stuff like this is really hard to hear about – unless you are on Twitter, probably. Something I refuse to join; it’s sad that to keep up with podcasting/social media you have to sign up with a few people’s not-easily-findable twitters and hope they keep you in the loop – progress eh?