Links and Thoughts 4: 11 May 2014
Elvis Presley – I’m Movin On
Good Morning.
Music: More Elvis in my usual Sunday music round-up — but it’s not all Elvis. The topic is actually American Music Studios and their house band, The Memphis Boys.
Books: The Night Library -
“Noticing that Shibuya lacked an accessible library that stayed open late enough for people who work full-time to be able to enjoy, book-loving Mori resolved to build his dream library it as close to the sprawling station as possible and invite like-minded souls to share it. With a unit already purchased and currently being fitting out with shelves, counters, and the facilities required to provide drinks to customers, Mori realised that he’d need a little extra help if he was to fill his shelves with enough titles to make it worth visiting.”
Books meet beer – Man achieves dream of opening ‘night library’ with help from crowdfunding site : Rocketnews24
Business: Books are always cheaper online – but it’s not about the books.
“This means book markdowns are extremely visible. Sellers can tout their low prices compared to what’s on the back of book covers, the price publishers want to sell it for. And that can be a convenient psychological device — especially if you’re a big retailer with lots of other stuff to sell. ‘When the customer sees a book at 40, 50 percent off,’ Teicher says, ‘the presumption is that everything else that that retailer is selling is also equally inexpensive.’ And books bring in some pretty attractive consumers. ‘Book buyers are good customers,’ Teicher adds. ‘They tend to be slightly more affluent, they tend to be consumers who shop and therefore are always in the marketplace for other products.’”
Why books always seem to have a discounted price : Marketplace [audio at link]
Tech: The deal is still just a rumor, though, right?
“Bona fide Beats are sold at a huge mark-up, making them immensely profitable but also irresistible to counterfeiters. The headphones—beloved by image-conscious teenagers but scorned by audiophiles—are easy to copy because the headphones’ appeal is largely based on brand rather than function.”
Why millions of counterfeit Beats won’t bother Apple : Quartz
The number-one factor that determines how earbuds sound is the fit — so even Sennheisers that run a couple hundred bucks are going to sound bad if the fit is too tight, or falling-out-loose, or just ‘off’ somehow—for you. It’s a very personal and subjective thing (which makes reviews of earbuds worthless, in my opinion). For over-the-ear cans, the actual driver (the speaker part) is more important than with earbuds, but build quality matters at least as much (I’d argue more) — padding with that thin, fake-leather crap that flakes away gets itchyscratchy fast, and foam that is too airy or too thin to matter means your cans are leaking sound (or letting the outside sounds leak in).
I live in my headphones (not, as some Beats owners do it, wearing them around my neck — but 14 hours a day and then all night while I’m sleeping ) so yes, I am picky about what I buy, but I don’t think I’ve spent more than $30 on a pair of headphones ever.
My current faves cost about $22 bucks and when I found out the style was going to be discontinued I bought 5 spare pairs and also used some heat-shrink tubing to reinforce the cord at the mini-jack (a stress point and most common point of failure in my experience) — I really like this model of earbud and as noted above, they’re so comfortable (in my ear, anyway) that I can even wear them while I sleep. Don’t even bother to ask me which brand they are though; there are still a few out there (even after being discontinued) and you never know, I might want to buy what’s left. (maybe I’ll buy myself another 5 spares for my birthday)
So anyway, short lecture aside, I never saw Beats as anything more than marketing (savvy marketing, but still snake oil) and given the many other options out there, I’d never shell out for a pair. However, Beats comes with a built-in, mostly young fan base (and that super-savvy marketing team) and maybe that is worth $3.2 billion to Apple.
See also:
What Apple is really buying with Beats : The Verge
Beat By Dre: The Exclusive Inside Story of How Monster Lost the World : Gizmodo
##
I’m throwing today’s Book Recommendation into the diary entry — keep reading.
##
Diary entry for 11 May:
The earbud-thing above is, I think, indicative of being a curmudgeon. By ‘earbud-thing’, I mean both my pickiness and my overuse/over-reliance on the unspoken social cue that’s communicated by wearing them in public. And by ‘being a curmudgeon’, I mean of course *me* being a curmudgeon. I’m getting older, and starting to sound like it: “New Things? Why should I try the new thing, I like my old thing… nothing wrong with something just because it’s old. You damn kids. Get off my lawn.”
Actually I’ve been a curmudgeon since I was seventeen. Or maybe sixteen. Or maybe ten. I’ve always been grumpy/standoffish — at first because I was shy, and throwing up a thorny exterior was (ironically) how I coped — and then later even after developing some social skills, because I found my own company preferable to needy, stupid people.
Over time, preferences become habit, and feedback structures develop that slowly turn a lonely life into an isolated one. I bring my laptop with me to the pub so I don’t even have to interact with other people in a social space. I wear earbuds in the coffee shop, while walking the neighborhood, even while shopping for groceries, because the earbuds are a visual cue to others that I want to be left alone (if not an actual deterrent) and also help me build my isolated personal space.
Working retail made the situation superficially better — but also much, much worse. Yes, as a bookseller I was out there, every day: dozens of interactions with the shopping public, and actual conversations — about books! Fantastic, right? No. Oh gods no. The shopping public (even in a bookstore) is an unremitting parade of stupid. The two or three moments of connection, the small rush you get when you have actually helped a fellow human being, quickly get subsumed and overwhelmed by all the other retail crap and one bad customer ruins not just your whole day, but often also the past week.
It’s not that I’ve become afraid to go out (enochlophobia would be a more accurate term than agoraphobia, but is also incorrect) — it’s that I now find I actively dislike people. All of you.
Oh sure, you are fine and in the proper context and a stress free environment – you will find I’m a pleasant conversationalist with a dry wit wrapped around an occasionally biting sense of humor and a near-encyclopedic trove of trivia. I can even be charming. But all those other people, the strangers, the masses? I hate people. I hate your kids even more. Damn kids.
I started out as an introvert. *Not that introversion is a problem or something that needs to be fixed.* Introverts get shit done. But now instead of merely being unsure and uncomfortable in social situations, I’m sure. I’m very sure. I’m sure I don’t want to be there and I don’t want to talk, and no I don’t want to talk about it, and no, just ‘opening up a little’ and being more ‘active’ isn’t going to help anything. I’m active: I’m actively introverted, almost violently so.
And one could argue that my choices — my grumpy, thorny outside and self-imposed isolation — are still just a coping mechanism and inside I’m still that same scared, nervous 12-year-old. Sure. But there’s internet access in here and I can suffer fools long enough to buy the occasional six-pack and when everything is said and done: I like it in here.
I’ll skip the Susan Cain recommendation; sure, Quiet is a fine book and a bestseller and all that, but is geared more toward making society as a whole more comfortable with the introverts among us. Today’s Book Recommendation is an older book, one written ten years ago, and a book not about introverts-in-the-world but rather about introverts feeling comfortable in their own skin : Party of One: The Loners’ Manifesto by Anneli Rufus
And now, as it’s shaping up to a beautiful Sunday afternoon, I think I’ll pop down to the pub for a late brunch and a Guinness or five — alone, with my laptop, at the bar. ‘Cause that’s how I roll. —M.
[subscribe: rss – twitter]
[bookmark these: http://www.rocketbomber.com/category/links-and-thoughts/]
