So, the day Apple stages its fall event to announce
the release of the new iPhone, U2 makes a promotional appearance. Afterwards, Tim Cook announces that U2’s new
album will be available for free to all iTunes customers.
While I’ve been an iTunes user since buying my first
160 GB iPod more than a few years back, I’ve never used the iTunes store. This goes ways back, to Apple’s initial
practice of only selling DRM-protected files, which I shunned like the plague
and never got over. But that night, I
logged into the iTunes store and saw that the U2 album was noted as already-purchased,
so all I had to do was download the files, free of charge.
What a nice promotional gesture, I thought. Even if U2 albums over the past two decades
haven’t done all that much for me, usually a few tracks are keepers. I downloaded them into my iTunes library,
copied them to my laptop’s Desktop, then deleted the files from my
library. I’m this thorough since I have
around 30,000 tracks in my library and have my own filing/tagging system to
keep things in order.
As the week goes along, I become aware that there is
a “massive outcry” over what Apple did, that some iTunes users immediately got
onto Twitter and other social media, complaining about Apple violating their
privacy and trust by forcing free music into their library. I didn’t immediately understand, but later
learned that some users have iTunes set-up so that purchased files drop
straight into their iTunes library, and by extension their “cloud” and devices. These people had about a dozen tracks dropped
into their Apple devices from a band they either didn’t know or like. But the only way to state that properly in
the wonderfully literate syntax of internetese is to say they “hate U2.”
The “massive outcry” was the usual thing: overgrown
babies turning a non-issue into their version of walking five miles in the snow
to borrow a library book. This is the
kind of thing they will look back on as symbolic of the tribulations they
suffered in the halcyon days of their youth, while lecturing grandchildren who
have silicon chips that stream music and virtual-reality video embedded in
their fucking skulls. The grandkids will
roll their eyes: “Man, grandpa’s going off again about the time Apple
downloaded MP3 files onto his iPhone without his permission. What’s an MP3 file? What’s iTunes? What’s an iPhone?” They’ll vaguely remember Apple the same way I
remember IBM Selectric typewriters.
Never mind that a vast majority of iTunes customers,
hundreds of millions of them, either quietly downloaded or ignored the free
tracks. Massive outcry? More like what happens these days: a few thousand
people on Facebook and Twitter riling each other up about the same non-issue,
and the media then picking up on this and turning it into a firestorm of
bullshit.
Some of the utter nonsense I’ve been reading the
past week has been unreal. An internet
buddy linked to a story on Salon calling U2 “America’s Most Hated Band” – not
necessarily because of this recent situation with Apple, but that and a lot of
issues concerning Bono’s pomposity over the years and the sort of myth-building
that any massively successful rock band or artist cultivates. (The article didn’t even mention one of their
more glaring episodes, when U2’s record label sued the band Negativland for not
getting permission to parody “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” in
their song "The Letter U And The Numeral 2.”)
“Hate” is one of those internet words that has lost
its meaning. Hate much? How many times have I seen some catty
millennial mutter that passive aggressive bon mot when disagreeing with someone
venting? Like “epic.” Like “awesome.” Like “like.”
Words that have lost their meaning and only underline inferior language
skills, where a Youtube video of a dog making friends with a billy goat becomes
“awesome.”
It’s not awesome.
It’s not epic. It’s not even, like, epic. Most people using the word “hate” don’t have enough
heart and soul to hate. You only develop
that sort of emotional depth by being engaged in the real world, not spending
all day in the world of devices and the internet. “Hate” has come to mean that you think
something is bullshit. It bothers
you. Real hatred is a profoundly
negative and violent emotion that goes far beyond feeling irritated. It’s
something that burns in your soul and may very well destroy you.
I know we’re all being facetious when we use the
word “hate” to describe bands, or types of music, or movies, or any form of art
that elicits an opinion. Most bands,
music or movies that I don’t like don’t inspire the emotional effort required
for genuine hatred. I don’t like them,
don’t have time to waste on them, don’t even have time to give the right amount
of attention to things I love. I don’t
like hiphop in general, but, dude, I really should take the time to listen to
the cool underground stuff to really get it, man? No, thank you. No time.
Would I listen to it if it was dropped in my iTunes library for
free? Sure, why not, but I would delete
it immediately if there was nothing there for me. It’s fine not to like U2, or any band, or any
type of music. So while I see through
the faux hatred, I’m slightly befuddled by legitimate publications calling a
band like U2 “the most hated band in America.”
That was the surface issue. The real issue? I’m going to go out on a limb here … the complainers
could have taken two minutes to click open their iTunes library and delete the
files. Notice that a few thousand people
instead took that two minutes to vent on Twitter, which tells you everything
about their priorities. Oh, but my trust
has been violated! How dare Apple and U2
pull this fascist bullshit on me, man! On
us! They did it to us, man!
(Sidenote: I’ve never read those long-winded user
terms of agreements that appear every time I download a piece of software, but
I suspect Apple addresses this issue in the agreement for use of iTunes
products. If not, there would surely be
a case here for a class-action lawsuit, right?)
Here’s an idea.
If you’re that genuinely offended by what Apple (not U2) did, boycott
Apple products. Trade in your iPhone for
an Android. Stop using Apple
products. If I was that offended, I
would dump Apple from my life. (As it
is, new iPhones are selling like hot cakes, and U2’s back catalog sales on iTunes have picked up considerably since this whole “crisis” … no such thing as bad
publicity.)
The gist of what happened here: the device is much more important to these people than the music on it. Noticed this four years ago and is even more true now. The emphasis in this scenario was placed on
the importance of the device and unwarranted (i.e., free) files suddenly
appearing on it. The sanctity of the
device had been violated. “Sanctity” is
the perfect word here. The device is
sanctified in the lives of many of these people: holy. It’s not just a physical extension of who
they are, but a spiritual one, too. It’s
their best friend. Much more important
than music. More important than the
Facebook friends and Twitter followers. The
other week, I read about a 50-year-old woman in NYC getting crushed by a bus when she tried to rescue her dropped phone.
That’s what we’re talking about here … that level of devotion.
What’s really baffling to me about all this is that
the “controversy” was stirred up by Facebook and Twitter viral messages. Facebook and Twitter are far more intrusive
and in violation of their users’ personal privacy than Apple and/or U2 could ever
be. The way they track and catalog users’
personal preferences, likes/dislikes, types of friends, age group, gender, race,
geographical location … all for marketing purposes. And these people are worried about a company dumping
free music on their sacrosanct devices?
There are social-media companies using you, the personal details of your
life and your friends’ lives as financially valuable marketing data for
corporate entities that see all of us solely as dollar signs!
The last thing I saw this week was on Bob Lefsetz’s
website. Lefsetz is a shithead. Everyone knows this. He knows this, too, which is why I can
stomach his routine. He blurts out
stupid black/white takes on issues that he will usually reverse himself on in
another week or month. He believes in
absolutes in a world that’s a patchwork of all sort of compromises and different
ways to do things … but he feels he must dictate his extreme terms to an ailing
recording industry. And I’d gather most
of the idiots in the recording industry who follow him lap up his nonsense. If Bob Lefsetz says something is “dead” (like
MP3 files or CD’s), I can assure you, there are millions of dollars of revenue
generated weekly for these “corpses” that keep the recording industry alive,
and will do so for years to come.
But he linked to this site as a legitimate response
to the Apple/U2 situation, posting social-media responses by people who weren’t happy to get those U2 files. Leave it to
Lefsetz to use something this innocuous to, in his mind, damn U2 to cultural
irrelevancy, despite the fact that they’re one of the most popular bands in the
world. I gather this is not the whole
picture – I’ve seen some people take the sophomoric “Apple is Orwellian” route
of complaining, I gather because they’ve been to college. Most of the people responding on this site
seem like kids – if they’re older than teenagers, they missed a few boats. I’m probably being generous, as there are
surely people in the 30’s still acting like teenagers, and let’s not forget
that 50-year-old who gave her life for her phone.
But just read some of the responses: I have no idea who U2 is but I’m pretty sure I
hate them. Who is U2 and why are they on
my iPod? Like who even is U2. My dad know who U2 is … ok.
Shit like that.
Here’s an idea. If you don’t know
who U2 is … maybe you should keep it to yourself. (It’s all about the device, not the music on
the device.) I’m a fan of U2, not a
major fan, but nearly all of what they did in the 80’s and early 90’s still
rings true to me. I can see why people
don’t like them. The new album is marred
by the sort of windy self-seriousness that they’re notorious for.
We’re talking kids here, so they weren’t raised in
that era? OK. I wasn’t raised in the era of Frank
Sinatra. I knew who he was when I was a
kid. Yo, nigga, these kids, maybe they
aint white? (Sorry for the yo-yo-yo vernacular ... just mimicking some of the responses on the above link.) I knew who Louis Armstrong,
Duke Ellington, Chuck Berry, Nat King Cole, Ray Charles and a few dozen other non-white
recording artists were, too. I aint black. I knew
dozens of recording artists from previous generations and decades without
really knowing much or any of their music.
I wasn’t raised by musicologists – I was raised by a factory worker and
stay-at-home Mom. I didn’t own any Frank
Sinatra 45’s or albums. Our idea of
culture was that month’s copy of Readers Digest on the bathroom radiator. But kids today have so many other
distractions, etc.?
No. They
usually have one massive distraction: smartphone with its self-contained world
of social media outlets, or in other (teenage male) cases, online video
games. Everything else exists in a gray void
outside that world. It’s not this insane
barrage of media that clueless adults picture kids as being bombarded with
today: it’s usually one device with a few social-media facets attached that
take up massive amounts of kids’ time.
Kids are geniuses at wasting time, with the internet
being the colossal, be-all-to-end-all waste of time ever invented.
We’re talking about kids here. They’re either purposely lying to appear cool
to their friends … or what I suspect, they’re just idiots. I’d be real curious to know what’s on their
iPods that a highly-visible band like U2 is totally unknown to them. (Probably the current Top 40 suspects,
nothing more or less.) U2 just performed
live at an event heralding the newest version of the device they’re thumbing
their “who is U2” messages on … covered by thousands of media outlets … and
they don’t know who U2 is. U2 has
appeared in numerous TV commercials for Apple products. They had an iPod branded especially for them
by Steve Jobs. Again, they’re either
playing stupid to the rest of the world or are just plain stupid. The way kids are and always have been. The way we all could be at times as kids. I wasn’t as smart as I thought I was, nor as
dumb as adults thought I was.
I know … what’s cool to a 14-year-old will not be
cool to me. And vice-versa. But here’s what you learn about life as it
goes on: no one is cool. There is no
cultural center anymore at any age.
Everything is so sub-divided and micro-marketed that the few things we
can agree on in terms of popularity tend to have profoundly short shelf lives. The private worlds of Facebook and Twitter
create these cocoons for people to feel cool in with their friends, and I like
that about these entities, but that’s about all I like about them. I don’t need to tell those kids they’re cool or
dicks for not knowing or caring who U2 is.
It has nothing to do with U2.
These people are not cool, nor am I, but let them hold the illusion as
long as they need. For as a wise man
once said, change will come around real soon, make them women and men. Of course, by the time they’re adults, the
age of reason will probably be 48 years old.
