Among other things, the widely talked about independent and variably priced Radiohead release of “In Rainbows” seems to have cracked people’s heads open just a bit more with regards to what is really possible with digital distribution. Moreover, two other developments, though smaller in scale, have also caught my attention: Tunecore and B.R.T.C. Tunecore is a remarkably simple iTunes publishing site; so that even without a label, truly independent musicians can get their work up on iTunes, get their own royalties, and keep their copyrights. This is for musicians what Lulu is for writers; that is to say: DIY. B.R.T.C. (Bum Rush the Charts) is a grassroots movement that is attempting to influence iTunes charts by getting mass numbers of people to buy some particular song. But a neat sidenote (that wasn’t even mentioned in the article I first read) is that the band is giving some of the profits away to charity. Predictably, when asked about the movement:

Don Hogarth, a spokesman for the Canadian Recording Industry Association, points out that MP3 sales only make up about 10 per cent of overall music sales. As such, he says, the “digital market is still a secondary concern” to record labels.

Hey, Mr. Hogarth, here’s a few line from Spoon’s “The Underdog” that you should think about: “You got no time for the messenger / got no regard for the thing that you don’t understand / you got no fear of the underdog / that’s why you will not survive!”

Moveon.org has once again asked folks to participate in an online petition. Generally speaking, I’m behind what they do, and I especially like it because it is a grass roots movement among the digirati. But I’m afraid I can’t get behind their most recent petition to stop oil companies from price-gouging. It’s not that I think the oil companies aren’t price-gouging—there’s no doubt about that. My problem is that a law of the kind moveon wants will set up the wrong kind of economic incentives that we need for energy independence. It’s not all that often that I’m on the same side as George Will, who has argued that [the government already takes more in taxes than oil companies take in mark-up](](http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,660221223,00.html). But to his point, a more productive law would not punish “price-gougers,” but rather force these companies to invest a percentage of their profits into more green alternatives. ((A law against price gouging is indicative of bad laws like laws against pornography in that they are notoriously hard to define. What is price gouging? Should Apple have to face laws against its $500 iphone? No? Because gasoline is a necesstity? After all, it was an inattentive public that allowed gasoline to become a necessity through poor urban and suburban design.)) Punish the oil companies and you’ll see supply reduced as gasoline moves to other faster growing economies. If the supply is reduced the price goes up. In the long run, punitive economic measures like penalizing price-gougers cannot hold.

That’s to say that there are an awful lot of opinions out in the blogosphere about the new Apple iPhone, and that I intend to be one of them. However, in the interest of trying not to be a total clone, I will restrict my opinion to just one facet of the iPhone, and that is the hubbub about 3rd party applications. There are quite a few people who seemed to be worried about whether the iPhone will support 3rd party software. I’ve read several opinions that the iPhone really doesn’t even constitute a smart phone without “real” office applications. There are also some people who think that the lack of a keyboard will be a problem. These people have really missed the boat, in my opinion, because what the iPhone does more than any other “smart” phone can is make the network the computer.

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