connecting*the*dots

Music…

Each Sunday, I’m going to spotlight a Hip Hop artist who isn’t a product of the music industry and can’t be cornered into representing the stereotypes that are so convenient for American mainstream media to manipulate.

This week, it’s Dead Prez.

Let’s kick it off with an interview of M-1 by Tao Ruspoli of LAFCO, where M-1 breaks down both his inspirations and his very real decision to make revolutionary choices on a daily basis:

Now stic.man, the other half of DP, who shares an experience from childhood — and the American educational system — that put him squarely on the path of self-determination, self-expression, independence and freedom. Again, brought to you by the folks of LAFCO:

Every revolution needs to be documented, otherwise who would believe that it was ever happening in the first place? Atlanta based photographer, Shannon McCollum, is the man who does just that for DP:

Are you feeling what goes into their work yet? Now, the product itself:

Uh, uh, uh, 1-2, 1-2
Uh, uh, 1-2, 1-2, uh, uh
All my dogs…

[Hook]
It’s bigger than..hip..hop..hip..hop..hip..hop..hip..
It’s bigger than..hip..hop..hip..hop..hip..hop..hip-hop

[M1]
Uh, one thing ’bout music when it hit you feel no pain
White folks say it controls yo’ brain
I know better than that, that’s game
And we ready for that - two soldiers head of the pack
Matter of fact, who got the gat?
And where my army at? Rather attack and not react
Back to beats, it don’t reflect on how many records get sold
On sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll
Whether your project’s put on hold
In the real world; these just people with ideas
They just like me and you when the smoke and camera disappear
Against the real world *echos*
It’s bigger than all these fake-ass records
When po’ folks got the millions and my woman’s disrespected
If you check 1-2, my word of advice to you is just relax
Just do what you got to do; if that don’t work, then kick the facts
If you a fighter, rider, biter, flame-ignitor, crowd-exciter
Or you wanna jus’ get high, then just say it
But then if you a liar-liar, pants on fire, wolf-crier, agent wit’ a wire
I’m gon’ know it when I play it

[Hook]

[stic.man]
Uh, who shot Biggie Smalls?
If we don’t get them, they gon’ get us all
I’m down for runnin’ up on them crackers in they city hall
We ride for y’all - all my dogs stay real
Nigga, don’t think these record deals gon’ feed your seeds
And pay your bills, because they not
MCs get a little bit of love and think they hot
Talkin’ ’bout how much money they got; all y’all records sound the same
I’m sick of that fake thug, R&B-rap scenario, all day on the radio
Same scenes in the video, monotonous material
Y’all don’t here me though
These record labels slang our tapes like dope
You can be next in line and signed; and still be writing rhymes and broke
You would rather have a Lexus? or justice? a dream? or some substance?
A Beamer? a necklace? or freedom?
Still a nigga like me don’t playa-hate, I just stay awake
This real hip-hop; and it don’t stop ’til we get the po-po off the block
They call it…

[Hook 2x]

[Repeat 6x]
D.P.’s got that crazy shit
We keep it crunked-up, John Blazed and shit

(*”They call it, call it, call it” -> stic.man*)
(*”Fake, fake, fake records” -> M1*)

More Dead Prez:

• I Believe
• They School
• These Are The Times
• Radio Freq
• Mind Sex
• Hell Yeah

I’m on the North side of Greensboro, watching Bill Moyers Journal: Buying the War with 15 other engaged citizens. House parties like this were set up all across the nation by Free Press.

How simple was it? I received an email from my brother after he was made aware of the showing through their local action alert email newsletter.

In any event, it’s great to see so many concerned and engaged citizens — mostly strangers before tonight — coming together to ask tough questions. Actually, it’s much more hemming and hawing at the incompetence of our Fourth Estate than dialog between each other, but I’m sure that’ll come in a few minutes.

I’m furious watching this broadcast, but it’s nothing new in terms of knowledge. I’ve been blogging about this fucking mess before we invaded, while we invaded and throughout the occupation and opined about most of the concepts and players covered in this brilliant narrative by Moyers.

If you saw this documentary — or plan to catch it in the future — don’t waste your time getting mad with politicians making decisions based on self-interest and power plays. Instead, think about your personal relationship with the media, journalism and reporting and how it shapes your world view.

Kent Bye has been working on a project since the run up to war called, The Echo Chamber Project. Paraphrasing his thesis: he’s attempting to present a large number of perspectives about both the media coverage in the run up to war and interviews with professionals from a large variety of industries in a manner that can be contextualized, remixed and redistributed to the live web by world citizens.

Why is that important?

Because the current journalistic methodology of reporting and “coverage” from centralized business domains is responsible for pimping this war into fruition.

Maybe if we all have the ability to participate in a methodology that allows for easily stitching together unbundled clips of perspective, reporting, coverage, etc. and contextualize it with our own knowledge and narrative, we can make a real dent in the mainstream business as usual.

Maybe we can even replace TV as we know it today.

Kent and I rapped about a bunch of the possibilities last year. If you have some time, check out the interview.

Andy is going to post an audio file of the conversation we just had post-viewing (which was really interesting). I’ll link to it as soon as he posts it himself.

UPDATE: Andy just posted the post-viewing conversation.

(direct link to the first pod of the seven part series)

From 2000 to 2003, I lived just down the road from Williamsburg, Brooklyn, first in Park Slope and then Gowanis.

As consistently penetrating as the New York City media is, not once did I even hear a whisper about the toxic issues my former neighbors in Williamsburg have been dealing with for decades now.

Instead, I reveled in the culture. Now I’m thinking, at what cost?

Gotta love that “self-interest” angle of capitalism, eh?

UPDATE: I’m currently watching part 6 of this 7 part series. Be sure to watch it all. It’s beyond disturbing. Greensboro residents are worried about strip clubs? Try living next to Radiac Research Corporation — a nuclear storage facility, where the radiation level can be pick up from a geiger counter flipped on at the front door.

It also resides across the street from an elementary school.

Scary stuff and great reporting.

(originally uploaded by Richard Liriano)

Russel Simmons responding to criticism of Hip hop lyrics on 4/16/2007:

“My response to Sen. Obama is that you have to talk about the poverty and ignorance that creates such a climate that the poets can talk like that. People who are angry, uneducated and come from tremendous struggle, they have poetic license and they say things that offend you,” Simmons told ABC News. “You have to talk about the conditions that create those kinds of lyrics. When you are talking about a privileged man who has a mainstream vehicle and mainstream support and is on a radio station like that you have to deal with them differently.”

Russel Simmons responding to criticism of Hip hop lyrics on 4/23/07:

“We recommend that the recording and broadcast industries voluntarily remove/bleep/delete the misogynistic words ‘bitch’ and ‘ho’ and the racially offensive word ‘nigger’,” Simmons and Benjamin Chavis, co-chairmen of the advocacy group Hip-Hop Summit Action Network, said in a statement.

“These three words should be considered with the same objections to obscenity as ‘extreme curse words’ “

Russell Simmons spotlighted in BusinessWeek on 10/27/03:

“Any company that wants to tap into the youth market today has to pay attention to Russell,” says Frank Cooper, the head of multicultural market development at Pepsi. “He is one of the principal architects of hip-hop culture. It’s a market that is massive and that is global.”

Enough with the corporate perspective; let’s hear from a Hip hop head:

Not all Hip hop artists play the industry to make their dough, so an all out ban on particular language is senseless — it truly is all about context.

So maybe a good place to start would be applying pressure in the signing process of record industry itself, where A&R people tend look for the next hotness explicitly in terms of whether it’ll sell or not.

If these folks were actually held to a standard beyond simply bringing in artists that will sell in the current market, we wouldn’t have this problem — misogynous and degrading rap would fall back to indie distribution models… at best.

But it’s not like Hip hop culture hasn’t been aware of this problem for a long time now:

[…] My optic presentation sizzles the retina.
How far must I go to gain respect? Um.
Well, it’s kind of simple, just remain your own
Or you’ll be crazy sad and alone.
Industry rule number four thousand and eighty,
record company people are shady.
So kids watch your back ’cause I think they smoke crack,
I don’t doubt it. Look at how they act.
Off to better things like a hip-hop forum. […]

Chris Anderson and Will Hearst talking shop in May of 2006:

Publisher, Will Hearst, on the evolution of journalism:

[..] In the era of 20 years ago, there was a notion of a professional journalist — I’m not saying let’s race back to that era — what I’m saying is that notion is utterly gone. And what we are seeing as so-called professional journalism is really freelance material, shot in Baghdad, shipped to New York, somebody voice-overs it and that’s supposed to be “live news.”

And we’re covering Israel out of London and we’re covering Nairobi out of Tokyo, you know, we’re kidding ourselves. So in a way, I think the cure is not to go backwards, but to go forwards and to label that stuff and get more of that material and do away with this pseudo-professional news, which it really isn’t.

I mean if we’re gonna have “citizen journalism,” then let’s have it. […]

I completely appreciate the sentiment, but Will Hearst knows better than anybody that isn’t going to occur through the existing mainstream channels.

Mainstream news outlets — television and newspaper alike — are busy attempting to figure out how to keep the best parts of their old revenue model in place while leveraging the independent voices of the information age.

While the conglomerates look for new ways to count the same beans, innovative distribution models with decentralized reporting have already taken hold.

This shouldn’t be the cornerstone of the conversation, though. Even without an organized effort to distribute decentralized reporting, there are already 30 million active blogs in play around the world.

The news is becoming hyper-local and hyper-topical without the steady hand of industry drivers to guide it; traditional journalism is going the way of the stock broker.

Now traditional ethics? Well, that’s another story entirely…

(originally uploaded by Akcelik)

sponsored by…

Ana in Honolulu forwarded me this after coming across it in a Google search. Anyone happen to know where the shot was taken?

UPDATE: It appears that Mantis dropped this stencil across the UK.

(originally uploaded by SOUTHEN)

My Mom has always worked the financial system to the best of her ability — from triple coupon shopping at ShopRite to becoming a landlord three states away as a retirement investment — so back in my freshman year at Syracuse, she co-signed an application for me to get an American Express Gold Card. She felt that by simply holding it, it would go a long way in establishing my credit rating.

It did.

Over the years, I’ve made large and small purchases alike, while making sure to be on-time with payments. As a result, my credit rating spiked and just recently, I was able to purchase a home at a decent rate — even though dotmatrix is in its first year as a business.

So, as much as I dislike paying $85 a year for a credit card, Amex has more than paid me back in return with customer service that has always been extremely helpful and courteous.

Until today, that is.

Can We Just Upsell You Instead?

In moving from freelance mode to building a design consultancy, I figured it was about time to completely separate my personal expenses from my business expenses. So a few weeks back I applied for an Amex Business Gold Card and tonight, with Christmas finally behind me, I called to activate my recently delivered card.

While activating, I asked the operator to transfer my points (close to 100,000 from 17 years of purchases) to the new card. Of course, that couldn’t be accomplished by the account opening specialist, so within a few minutes I was speaking to another CSR in the Membership Rewards department.

No problems there; the guy added the program to my new business card and proceeded to transfer my points over in one fell swoop.

Then I told him that I wanted to cancel my old Gold Card.

Wrong move.

Five minutes of hold time later, I was speaking to a guy in another department with a glossy title that, once decoded, equated with “card retainment specialist.”

I told the guy that I wanted to cancel my personal Gold Card, but before doing so, I needed to know that I would be receiving my End of Year Summary — essential documentation of my numerous business deductions over the past year.

The guy didn’t listen to one word I said.

Before I could say AOL nightmare, the guy began to upsell me about the benefits of the card. He said he could throw in a $40 credit due to my long-standing account status (for you non-math majors, that’s a benefit of $2.35 per year).

I repeated that I needed an answer to my question.

Instead of transferring me to customer service — who apparently held the knowledge as to when I was to receive my summary document — the specialist continued along the same line of reasoning.

Next, he tells me that it’s almost impossible to get an Amex Gold card and that I’d be missing out on a ton of great benefits. Getting a bit annoyed, I lost track of my request and challenged him to look at my account and tell me what exactly I’d be missing — especially now that just I opened a Business Gold Card.

Instead of doing what I asked, the guy took the opportunity to challenge me to name one of my Gold Card benefits — you know, ’cause I’m a dumb customer who doesn’t know what he needs.

Okay, now I’m starting to get pissed.

I returned to my original question about the summary and the guy just kept on going, telling me all about the great benefits of card membership, including more points with a second card. When I told him that I had that angle covered — for free with a non-Amex card — and that I didn’t need advice along those lines, he kept pushing, insisting that most people don’t know what they’re missing out on.

I tell him I’m an adult and don’t appreciate the continuous upsell.

He tells me that I’m not listening; everybody needs a Gold Card.

I hang up.

Next: Customer Service

So taking the only valuable info the retainment specialist gave me, I decided to call Customer Service to find out when I would receive my summary. The new guy must’ve checked his CRM tool (man, is this a call for VRM or what?!), as he was ready to deflect my question and continue to upsell Gold Card membership.

Only after I made it crystal clear to him that I just added another Gold Card to my account — keeping the beans coming in at a steady pace — did he stop his Lomanesque discourse long enough to put me on hold and find out for me exactly when I could cancel my card, yet still receive my summary.

After another five minutes, he comes back and tells me that I can’t cancel the account until March 9th — my anniversary date.

When I tell him that I receive my summary no later than early February, he pauses.

When I ask him on what date I was to be charged next year’s $85 fee, he meekly responds with “March 9th.”

Motherfuckers.

Learn Or Die

I ended up hanging up tonight, to wait until I receive my summary before I cancel prior to March 9th. I messed up: I never should have mentioned canceling the card before getting all the information I needed.

I guess I had too much faith that being a longtime card member should mean something — like not having to game my call to people who are supposed to be servicing me, the customer.

It blows me away that companies continue to develop CSR scripts along these lines, in an attempt to maximize profits. For 17 years, I considered Amex to be a great company — not based on the bills I received each month or the ridiculous $40 per year points program I’ve paid for since obtaining the card — but for their impeccable customer service.

Well, they’ve now joined the likes of Sprint as far as I’m concerned.

How much more money have they now lost through this piss poor brand experience? I don’t know, but I can tell you one thing for sure:

Momma didn’t raise no motherfucking plankton.

(self-portrait by dsearls)

Sorry, Doc — I couldn’t quote your Jupiter Research post without a Rageboy-like visual.

Turning funnels into megaphones
Doc Searls

[…]

Think for a minute about how much more useful (or obsolete) marketing would be if customers had actual relationships, or the means to initiate relationships — on the customers’ terms — when and where they wanted to initiate them?

Wouldn’t it be handy if customers could, at their discretion, by themselves or in whatever groups they feel like assembling (in the wild open and free marketplace, rather than in any vendor’s or intermediary’s silo), tell vendors what they are looking for, and under what conditions? Including what they are willing to pay?

We’re talking about a real marketplace here. Not eBay or any other walled garden.

We’re talking about relieving vendors of the need to do complex guesswork about what customers want.

We’re talking about efficient and easy ways to satisfy money-in-hand demand, rather than more ways of ‘creating’ or manipulating demand.

We’re talking about obsoleting advertising as we know it. Marketing too.

We’re talking about re-framing markets as real places where transactions, conversations and relationships happen between independent participants on terms and conditions that are work well for everybody.

We’re talking about creating the means for leveraging customer independence, choice and rights to obtain respect and authority independent of any private online marketplace, or any search engine.

We’re talking about VRM, for Vendor Relationship Management. Some have suggested RM for just Relationship Management. Others have suggested XRM, for managing relationships with anybody, including one’s own social networks — ranging from memberships in organizations to email white and black lists. Whatever we call it, the subject will be front & center at the Internet Identity Workshop coming up in December.

We’re talking about individuals managing the means by which their every gesture is recorded (or not) and put to use (or not).

We’re talking about giving research organizations and their clients reasons to stop looking at each of us as “consumers”, “audiences”, or cattle that can be “driven” to do anything.

We’re talking about flattening the power relationships between vendors and customers, for the good of both.

I could go on, but it’s Sunday morning, and I’m off to make breakfast, have some fun with the family, and buy stuff from vendors who don’t treat people like plankton.

As much as some people might like to believe, we don’t define ourselves as a nation of market silos, with various connecting retail channels and media mechanisms enabled to advertise new and retreaded products for mass consumption — either in the brick n’ mortar space or the new wild west of the internet.

We define at ourselves as people, first and foremost. And, God forbid, we like to be treated as such.

The problem that Doc has framed in the past, and is dealing with in this post, is that the majority of players who guard and influence the American system of capitalism can’t seem to roll with the idea of influence neutral and people-centric business practices.

Why you ask? (come on, ask)

Because systematically backing individualism comes at too high of a cost.

Consider the fact that:

• mass manufacturing and targeted advertising in the industrial age set the standard approach to maximizing short-term and long-term profitability; customization and new media conversations throws a huge monkey wrench into that methodology of perpetual product pimping and production.
• the more catering the individual receives — regardless of the depth of their pockets — the more that the levers of the traditional supply and demand model must change; this affects not only the politics of the market, but the politics of the nation, as citizen participation and influence flattens and widens the playing field.

To me, it sounds like Doc wants to live in a world where we have enough breathing room to get a handle on our own needs and wants — as opposed to our current state of constantly being poked, prodded and influenced into needing what marketers and advertisers want us to buy.

Don’t we all want to live in such a world?

By enabling smart social mechanisms that allow us to — for a lack of a better term — ping the ether when we desire, alerting other human beings to hit us back who own aligning attributes of proximity, supply, price, quality, etc., we can move towards a way of life that is free of the walled constructs that serve the bricklayers more than the bartering parties themselves.

We don’t quite have such a commons in place yet, and our new economy mechanisms are still somewhat crude, but we’re heading in the right direction.

In order to ensure our new world dreams don’t get trounced by the same people who clipped the wings of ham radio operators and the promise of public access television, we need to be vigilant in monitoring the old guard who won’t evolve — for as innovation creates opportunities for the masses, it also marginalizes old technology and the people who hold on for dear life.

These people will not go quietly into the night.