What are the Boundaries of my Physical Parts?
Okay, so I’ve got my guts, and my bones, and my connective tissues – like most people, that’s what I refer to as my physical “self,” the physical Me.

But… then I’ve got a few fillings and a few non-biological implants. Are those things any less Me? Are they just add-ons? What about the various bacteria and teeny-tiny bugs that at all times live in/on my body? Are those Me, too? As part of a whole bacterial culture, individual components pass and new are born – and at a molecular and sub-molecular level, nearly every cell in my body does essentially the same thing.

So my physical body, my Me, seems to be a bizarre combo platter of the co-dependent fauna, the implants (cyborg?), my body’s dead-cell accumulations of hair & finger/toenails, and transient molecules following a recursive pattern that results in my distinctly human biological structure, i.e., all my bones and squishy parts. In sum, these components make up my essential physicality, my manifestation, my both internalized and projected physical reference point for the world around me.

Well, I guess the thing is this: every living human is in a symbiotic relationship with the millions of other organisms contained by our bodies, and by definition many of us are already cyborgs (Dick Cheney, Stephen Hawking, Me). As such, what we routinely conceptualize as our discrete physical “self” isn’t nearly as cut and dried as we might think. Or quite necessarily, not think. Too much thinking about this would result in psychosis and/or a PhD in biological philosophy or losing one’s religion or something.

Technology’s helping us further explore and understand these ideas, but the catch is that it’s also totally complicating the issue.

Because What about the Boundaries of my Personhood?
Where is my Personality, or Soul, or Whatever?
Cyborg Anthropologist Amber Case, famous among technodorks, argued in 2010:
“Hey! Yeah you – got a smartphone? Yeah, you’re already a cyborg, yo.”
I’m paraphrasing – unfortunately she probably doesn’t talk like me. And yeah, in a sense it’s stating the obvious, but her angle is the revelatory cyborg thingy. It’s a good point that seems obvious when you think about it – but who ever stops to think about it?

As I look down at this machine of aluminum and plastic and exotic metals and chemicals, I know a good deal of my very own mental self is either ported to or backed up on this personal laptop computer. And then there’s also the expression of me manifested by my personal mobile telecommunications device. As with the physical self, the non-corporeal mental self seems to have some blurry boundaries and cyborg implications as well.

Makes one wonder – my Gmail account, for example – what percentage of my Me is that? What about the “Pictures” or “Movies” folder on my computer? Otherwise stated, how much of my Me is non-biological data?

Me. What is Me?
We’ve got both the physical and the mental here to consider – simultaneously separate and not. And at some point down the road (probably not too far), a human being will either physically or mentally become less than 50% biological, and we’re going to have to figure out how to deal with that.

These are of course age-old questions of self and mind, but these days human life is changing faster than ever – like, seriously – and it’s difficult to overstate the profundity of experiencing more fundamental change as a species in the last 500 years than we did in the 200,000 previous. And even if you don’t dig on Kurzweil’s exponential twist, anyone who’s paying attention can clearly see that technological advancement, including the ever-shrinking delineation between human and machine, continues to accelerate.

The Dilemma of Being a Cyborg Again
So yeah, read the story. Have a think. It seems to be a bit on the technologically conservative side of things (I don’t like the term “Luddite”). There’s an air of something being tragically lost, rather than transferred, to the digital storage of our increasingly cyborg selves. But hey, cave paintings became ritual dances became oral histories became written and recorded histories which then necessarily became digital, compact, and readily accesible in our complicated modern lives. Just saying, it’s rather one-sided and a bit myopic to imply we’ve lost something of value without considering that value might just be moving to a new medium.

I’ve been struggling with brevity of late, so I’ll stop here. But check out the NYT piece and Case’s site. I know it kinda hurts the brain, but start thinking about this. You really, really need to.

[AMBER CASE - CYBORG ANTHROPOLOGY.COM]
[INTERESTING, YET AMBIGUOUSLY AMBIVALENT ARTICLE VIA NYT]

Because as a nation, what do we really have to unite and inspire us right now? If you have an answer for that question, well you’re totally DELUDED and WRONG! Or at least mostly. Sorry.

Want an example? Well, it’s been argued, quite convincingly I might add,* that last year’s dorktarded iPhone 5 anticipation was really just Americans having nothing else, you know, going on. Nothing big to drive their hopes and dreams, nothing to encourage the study of science & technology & maths, nothing to demonstrate on a grand scale the value and payoff of hard work on big projects.
*Oh, that was me.

That’s why a shiny new mobile computer gets us all hot and bothered.
Weak.

We Gotta Do Better.
With all due respect to NASA and other space agencies around the world, the international space station is really awesome, and I love the technology, but we’ve had interconnected solar-powered tubes in orbit now for a long, long time. And the Space Shuttle was a revelation – in 1985. Its merciful euthanasia was long overdue.

Debris?

We know well the budgetary constraints NASA and its overseas counterparts have faced throughout their history – all while doing the amazing. We know it, but we’ve done nothing for it. Why haven’t we pushed for more and through our representatives demanded that necessary resources be provided for doing a bunch more supercool space stuff?

Doesn’t anyone other than Richard Branson (British) & Elon Musk (South African) have the juice to get this ball rolling? (by the way, those two make a pretty goddamn good argument for immigration reform)

What if someone could play all the necessary political games?
Who could muster the full power of the U.S. behind a bold new space endeavor?

The Moon, Y'ALL.

Have You Heard this One?
Newt Gingrich Walks into a Press Conference…
…and drops the best idea I’ve heard come out of a politician’s mouth in decades (simultaneously realized that I’m now old enough to remember decades of politicians – unsettling). Anyway, while not entirely unexpected in Florida, it was still… just the strangest breath of fresh air. An immensely powerful political figure was saying “Hey, let’s do something big. In space. On the moon. It’s going to be awesome. By 2020 we’ll have lunar golf and low-gravity Olympics and stuff.”
Yes. Please.

Now here’s the clear air: I am giving some props here, but Newt Gingrich is just as scandalous and seedy and filthy as any given politician. I’d also be remiss not to mention that, in the video below, Gingrich bitches about what if, over all these decades, NASA’s budget had been given to private companies – because that would have somehow magically made space all kinds of accessible and developed and awesome because government is bad and private companies would have done so much better.

Here’s the thing: I know Newt already knows this.
So for those who buy what he’s selling, ask yourself this:
“Who manufactured the Space Shuttle?”

Was it the USPS? FDA? DHS? NASA?
No, stupid – it was Boeing and Lockheed and Rockwell.
I have a strong feeling those are not government agencies.
Apollo was a government-led cooperation with the private sector.
And it worked beautifully for the benefit of all humanity.
And NASA has done exactly that ever since.
On a relatively tiny budget.

See, what I’m saying here is that – Newt’s full of shit, man.

Getting off point – suffice it to say, not a Newt Gingrich fan, nor of politics and its practitioners in general. But when the tubby man said what he said, I think any honest technology dork out there has to admit that they felt, if but momentarily, a sincere tingle of hope.

And the Commentary
Now, Neil deGrasse Tyson, a top contender for becoming the 21st century Carl Sagan (though a bit too pessimistic to really nail it), says the 2020 timeline might be overly optimistic, but a moon base is not outside the realm of relatively immediate possibility. Here’s a brief interview from MSNBC:

[YouTube Here for Apple Mobile Products]
So it’s expensive. So what? Hundreds of billions? Big deal.
How much did the invasion and occupation of Iraq cost? Definitely more than a trillion dollars – and what did that do for us? JACK SHIT, that’s what.

Guess what NASA’s budget has been for it’s in entire history – about $790 billion. Over fifty goddamn years! What did that get for us? MASSIVE GAME-CHANGING ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT, HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF JOBS, AND THE RESPECT OF ALL HUMANITY. Here, have a look at the long-term returns on the Apollo program.

Not only can we do this, it’s almost immoral not to.
Newt is full of it, to be sure, but his idea is absolutely wonderful.
So let’s go ahead and send robots first to get the ball rolling, and we go later.
Yep, robots – which this more optimistic space expert guy has the sense to mention:

Okay? Just… Come on. Let’s do this.
We’ll lead – we’ve got the experience.
But let’s work with China.
And Japan.
Even Mexico has a space program.
¡Vamos a espacio conmigo!
Oh, and the European Union, too (though we may have to spot them some cash).

Here’s Where I Get All Misty-Eyed and Invalidate My Misanthropy
To be sure, we’ve got a million problems on the ground in the U.S. that also need attention, but a grand project of planetary proportion – another bold leap for mankind – could pull everything and everyone up.

Point is this:
The United States of America, with competent, motivated, and educated leadership combined with vision, a sense of adventure, and little bit of foolish optimism, could once again manifest the strength of its collective – once again demonstrate to the world, and remind ourselves, that a nation comprised of all human cultures and nationalities wields the immutable force of idealism, a pure sense of hope, and a power far more than the sum of its parts. Nearly half a century after Apollo, we could once again with powerful technology unite our citizens, revitalize our economy, reach the hearts and minds of billions, and inspire generations.

And get some sweet lunar real estate.

Newt Gingrich can’t be the only politician who sees this…

[ARTICLE VIA KURZWEIL AI]
[VIDEOS 1 & 2 & ANOTHER ARTICLE VIA MSNBC]

BOOKS RELATED TO THIS POST:
“Destination Moon,” by Rod Pyle
“Escaping the Bonds of Earth: The Fifties and the Sixties,” by Ben Evans

Support the site – buy at Anthrobotic’s Amazon Affiliate store!

The Dumbest of the Species

While what hippies and religious zealots stand for is dumb as hell, and they’ve done exactly nothing positive for the world they live in, mentioning them does make for a fabulous segue into today’s Anthrobotic Book Recommendation!

Not a Wrathful Deity nor Good Vibes, Man – Human Technology!
X-Prize Foundation co-founder and chairman of Singularity University guy Peter Diamandis and science writer guy Steven Kotler have written what is basically a manifesto for exponentially advancing technology’s role in fixing pretty much everything we have to worry about. Abundance: The Future is Better than You Think (to be released February 21) lays out the state of things to come and paints a rather rosy picture of humanity’s future. Because technology.

This Optimism is Absolutely Fabulous.
Perhaps my technological utopianism leanings are just as foolish as the proclivities of vegan white people with dreadlocks or those with a super-spooky, vengeful, punishing father figure in the sky. But I kinda really seriously doubt it.

Since arriving at the industrialized/civilized age of our species, religion and technological conservatism (i.e., hippies) have remedied/solved/fixed the sum total of not-a-goddamn-thing. It’s more than obvious that human technology and the science behind it is what will heal the damage we’ve done to the earth and allow us to repent for the atrocities we’ve committed against our own species.

So have a read – there is good news out there.

[ARTICLE VIA KURZWEIL AI]
[ABUNDANCE THE BOOK WEBSITE]

BOOKS MENTIONED IN THIS POST:
“Abundance”
by Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler
Support the site – buy at Anthrobotic’s Amazon Affiliate store!

Instead, 340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456!

How Long Until More?
My personal rule when purchasing electronics is to never get just enough to meet my needs. Instead, it behooves me to purchase about 120-130% of my intended usage capacity.  Do I necessarily need a MacBook Pro when an Amateur would fill my immediate needs? Negative. But chances are I will come to need it.  I WILL.

That’s why I bought a 6 GB MP3 player in the summer of 2000.

There was no way I could possibly really seriously practically use all that storage.
Knowhattamean?

So yeah, IPv6 is a great leap forward. But something tells me that even a 39-digit number might eventually seem as quaint as 4.3 billion does now. I mean come on, let’s be realistic – nanobots are going to need IP addresses, too.

So Yeah, June 6th
I do a lot of blah blah blah here about theoretical technology and the big bright future, so I think my 6 regular readers will appreciate some news about a technological advance in something tangible, extant, really real and happening now!

[ARTICLE VIA ENGADGET]
[IMAGE: THE OPTE PROJECT]

TODAY’S CANDIDATE: The Textbook Industry
VERDICT: Endangered Now; Obviation Likely Inevitable

Apple is making an education-related announcement on Thursday – and it’s already assumed to be related to building better digital books. So yeah, deeply embedded & entrenched and nearly irrelevant textbook industry, it’s been a good run. But the worlds’s most valuable company and their little iPads & stuff (somewhat popular) are preparing a hostile takeover. And most of your customers will be elated. So yeah, you’re done.

It’s going to sound a little something like this:

“All your contents and customers are belong to us.”

Geeks, hippies, and normals can all agree. Unless you’re over 50 and working for a paper publishing dinosaur, it’s basically impossible to argue that this isn’t a fabulous idea. If you don’t understand the horror that is the textbook industry, then you probably haven’t been to college.

Go Apple, go.
Oh yeah, and on a related anachronistic note, someone also please tell those phonebook people about this new internet thing.

[ARTICLE VIA WIRED]

Economics, Yo.
With various technologies, humans have built vast networks of trade and currency and opportunity. For better or worse or neutral, as a globally connected species we’ve decided a capitalist economic system is what works best. I’m not saying there was a vote or conscious choice per se, what I mean is that capitalism is what we’re all doing, and things for the human animal are better than they’ve ever been, and no one’s proposed anything better (OWS, at best you’re a poo-flinging baboon).

Now, economic systems are essentially governments, and there are many theories on and examples of their practical application. Here in realityland the practice of market capitalism seems to be the most universally feasible, generally beneficial, and least horrifically exploitative. And if you don’t like that, well, consider that at times we have indeed embraced hardline socialism, communism, fascism, theocracy, monarchy, feudalism, etc., and those experiences all suck(ed) pretty hard (nihilism & anarchy don’t get a voice here because they’re dumber than dumb). Like democracy or the iPhone, M-Cap expresses an ideal, some do it better than others and it’s far from perfect, but for now it’s the best we’ve got.

Made in China by Humans.  For Now.
AS SUCH, the world wants/needs stuff – we need product – this is the system’s lifeblood. As consumers, to get stuff we exchange something of value ($/¥/€, etc.), and that something is in turn exchanged, and so on.

As this exchange system has progressed and globalized over the past several decades, China has in ways become the world’s factory – our stuff comes from there – they make SO MUCH of it, and they do it on the cheap and easy. So of course China then gets loads and loads of $/¥/€, etc., and with a literally global consumer base, Chinese manufacturing has become essential and inseparable from the economic circuit. An absolute prerequisite for this system has been China’s vast, cheap, malleable, and easily replaceable wage slaves. Oops I mean labor force.

But then technology. And… uh-oh.

See, the highly attractive price/performance of robotic manufacturing is approaching a tipping point where it becomes both feasible and preferable (see: Foxconn). While a large initial investment, the robots will quickly pay for themselves (and won’t complain, get hurt, commit suicide, take breaks, and all that other stuff soft and sensitive mammals do).

Then – what about the factory owners? As they’re stabbing forward with fiery Chinese capitalism, will they realize that they’re going to severely and fundamentally impact their own economy and disrupt the earning cycle for millions when they replace all those workers? I think they’ll probably charge ahead full-blast and not even touch the brakes. Reasons being on one hand, consumers aren’t going to stop consuming, and on the other, potential profits from a primarily robotic workforce will be irresistible. A huge swath of the human labor force, aside from robot tech support, could be easily and quickly phased out of the manufacturing sector.

So then the factory labor market dies, already crappy jobs are outsourced to the non-biological, and you’ve got the classic economic force of tax base erosion – or a contextually appropriate something like that. Probably tax base collapse. Rapid collapse. Think about the economic impact this had on the American middle class over several decades (e.g., big box stores and the American Consumer), and then imagine what it would do to a developing economy in just a few quarters.

This is where the shortcomings of capitalism come back around for China, and in this case, because robots – robots to the Chinese economy as China was to the rest of the world’s manufacturing base. But exponentially faster. For the immediate future, however, even after robot factories ramp up, China will still make a whole lot of the world’s product. Maybe not for long, though.

As my 6 regular readers know, I believe human technology on the whole drives us inexorably forward for the betterment of the species, but that process is not without speed bumps. Millions of suddenly unemployed Chinese, made up of both displaced factory workers and those employed in the industries built around supporting them (approximately 40% of GDP), would be a rather ferocious bump. And on top of that…

Designed in California – China’s Other Big Technology Problem
Related and in addition to lost labor jobs and resultantly eroded tax base, the other side of the blade is that the stuff China’s making is based on instructions given by the rest of the world. No one lines up for the latest homegrown Chinese-designed products, we clamor for that which China can make for us per our specs (Engadget’s KIRF section is full of things China makes that no one wants). The other huge economies of the world function primarily on consuming products almost invariably made in China, but designed domestically.

Point here is that, the United States, for example, could also buy those robotic factory workers and save big on shipping and handling. Because the cheap labor is all we really want from China. What makes an iPhone an iPhone comes from California, namsayen?

Is China Hosed?
It breaks down like this right here:
Punch #1: the move to robotic labor;
Punch #2: China has limited product-related intellectual capital;
Kick to the Junk: The developed world gets their own manufacture-bots.

And… China’s economy goes a big floppy one.

So apply the robotics invasion potential to other sectors of the Chinese economy, and there we’ve certainly got the recipe for a Bubble Economy, and bubbles always break – ask Japan (and Krugman). And Japan, don’t fret too hard – you might get that #2 spot back sooner than you think.

Of course this is all speculative, and I hate to put out a piece with so many “maybes” and “could very wells” and “possiblys” and “looks likes,” but the evidence here is pretty strong that China should pay serious attention, because it looks like robots are coming to get you, man.

[ARTICLE - WASHINGTON POST]
[ARTICLE - NYT]

As I’ve said before, the technology that is the wheelchair has helped millions, but its time is finished – and the time of the wearable robot exoskeleton is approaching. Unless you build wheelchairs or access ramps or any other specialized wheelchair-centric equipment, you’ve gotta agree that a mobility revolution for the disabled is long overdue (and if you do build such equipment, it’s time to diversify, yo).

This post is really an update; this exact system came up here last May, then Berkeley Bionics (now renamed Ekso Bionics – a real lateral marketing move, I think) was just testing their prototype wheelchair killer. Now the device is moving through medical trials and appears to be fast-tracking to the market. These guys know what they’re doing – they’ve been at it since 2005, and their tech is also being used in Lockheed’s HULC exoskeleton.

The Physically Disabled as Transhuman Pioneers
There’s a delicious irony or macro-serendipity or poetic justice (or, you know, something like that) to all this. Whether through injury or disease, the physically disabled have long struggled through social inequality, mobility impairment, physical discomfort, etc., etc, on and on, are now they are in the driver’s seat of these novel human enhancement technologies – they are taking part in what I’d argue to be primitive steps toward practical transhumanism.

Assuredly, there’s a long way to go from this bulky, basic exoskeleton. But the technological shift at work here is profound. Pioneers like amputee celebrities Aimee Mullins and Oscar Pistorious, they are living examples of how technology is blurring the line between what is considered practical, necessary augmentation and what, someday soon, might be just a nice alternative to flesh – an entirely voluntary upgrade.

Get your learn more on here:
Ekso Bionics’ Ekso Suit.
Cyberdyne’s HAL suit.
Watch these companies.
Oh, and laugh a little when watching that second company – the one called “Cyberdyne,” who named their suit “HAL.” It’s a Japanese company, and trust me – irony does not span the language and cultural barrier here.

Oh – A Quick Rant:
Goddamn Avatar. Around the year 2148 or whatev, while humanity had made itself some interstellar travel, there was still some dude rolling around in a wheelchair designed in the 1990s. James Cameron deserves his props (Avatar has netted over a billion dollars), but come on – wheelchairs and metal bullets and helicopters and not a single autonomous robot in the future? I AM SO SURE. The film is pretty to look at, BUT COME ON! ANACHRONISM EVERYWHERE! Just sayin.

[ARTICLE VIA IEEE SPECTRUM - THERE'S A VIDEO HERE, TOO]

And I’ll offer this:
Stabbing forward and further into the human/machine civilization, it might be a good idea to let AI/NBI be, as we are, only vaguely moral. A self-aware & morally pure machine might not be so kind to human nature. Just saying.

[ARTICLE VIA NYT]

Announced within the past 24 hours, the U.S. military is going to seriously cut ground forces (Army & Marines, particularly). The monkey pony show of politics calls it budget cuts and responsible spending and such, but they neglect to point out that it’s also because of those machines in the image above and their like – grunts are being obviated by bots, man.

WarBots All Over the News:
There’s a lot out there right now – lots to take in. Of course these developments come with a whole laundry list of ethical and philosophical and practical questions I’ll not address here – so go read/watch and make up your own mind.
First: Robot Wars, Al-Jazeera Fault Lines Special Report (VIDEO)
Then: New WarBot Dexterity, Forbes (ARTICLE BY ALEX KNAPP)
And: Real-Life War Machines, Gizmodo (ARTICLE & VIDEO)
Wrapping it Up: X37B Spaceplane Maybe Kinda Spying on China, BBC (ARTICLE)

BOOKS MENTIONED IN THIS POST:
“Wired for War”
by P.W. Singer
Support the site – buy at Anthrobotic’s Amazon Affiliate store!

]]> http://anthrobotic.com/2012/01/06/warbot-update-warbots-in-the-news-warbots-here-there-everywhere/feed/ 0 http://anthrobotic.com/2011/12/31/adam-carolla-louis-c-k-new-heroes-of-entertainment-technology/ http://anthrobotic.com/2011/12/31/adam-carolla-louis-c-k-new-heroes-of-entertainment-technology/#comments Sat, 31 Dec 2011 06:02:56 +0000 Reno Tibke http://anthrobotic.com/?p=2568 Okay…
We’ve got The Adam Carolla Show.
This podcast is the new “radio.”

And, we got Louis C.K. Live at the Beacon Theater.
This is the new “comedy special/show/album thingy.”

Vulgar, offensive, painfully honest, and wildly hilarious – these two seemingly low-tech pasty white guys in their 40s are the unlikely heroes of contemporary entertainment technology. And to the comedy entertainment industry’s version of The Man, they are the harbingers of impending catastrophic doom.

When, How, and What – Direct to the People
Self-characterized as somewhat crusty and curmudgeonly, Carolla and C.K. aren’t your traditional tech pioneers. What makes them such is their execution; through skilled use of digital production technologies, they’ve begun a fundamental and profound change in the creation, funding, format, and delivery of their respective entertainment products.

In this new model, monolithic, myopic, and hopelessly entrenched studios, networks, and production companies who’ve spent the past decade-plus impotently tossing their wooden shoes into the machine – they’re completely shut out. There is no FCC regulation, no censorship, and profit moves directly from affiliates & sponsors in Carolla’s case, and direct from the consuming public in C.K.’s.

And what’s happening here is this: technology is amputating entertainment’s stifling broadcast regulations along with the overbearing, parasitic, and increasingly irrelevant middleman.

So What’s With Carolla?
In February of 2009, Adam Carolla and team released their first podcast. They’ve since collected a stable of advertisers (from the ManGrate to Nissan), a Guinness World Record for most downloaded podcast, a profitable Amazon affiliate relationship, and a highly effective promotion platform for Corolla’s traveling show, books, and the other podcasts produced under the umbrella of his Ace Broadcasting Network. In these few short years, Carolla has set an example, or business model as it were, for hundreds of other voices – comedians, experts, celebrities, or enthusiasts for whatever – anyone can create a podcast, and should it find an audience, sponsors can now step up and offer cash/promotions/whatever. Ridiculousness, refreshing irreverence, and the long-form interview – served anytime & anywhere listeners choose.

And What about C.K.?
Louis C.K. dropped his latest show just a few weeks ago, and it is the first-ever high-profile comedy special delivered directly from the creator, via the internets, to the people. Live at the Beacon Theater was financed and produced by C.K. without any influence or meddling from, well – anyone other than himself. He set up a slick and simple website for distribution (complete with the comedian’s trademark self-effacing tone), shunned DRM and region restrictions, and sent it out into the world for $5.00/copy. As of December 21st, 2011, he’s grossed over a million dollars – with about 75% being net profit. C.K.’s fans can drop their $5 and stream, download, or do whatever they want with the product. Fans know that they’ve purchased an artist’s unadulterated vision, and what they’ve spent is not lining the pockets of entertainment industry racketeers.

And Now the Word is Out
Clearly both Carolla (WP) and C.K. (WP) do not have the purposefully dorky presence of geek-chic comedic contemporary Chris Hardwick and his Nerdist network (ironically, Hardwick’s podcast is very much a product of Carolla’s lead). I think it’s safe to say that they themselves didn’t set out drop a tech bomb on the entertainment industry. And of course, both these guys already had name and traditional careers before the maturation of their current delivery technology. But whether they saw the opportunity themselves or were urged on by their respective teams & collaborators is irrelevant, what matters is the example these comedic veterans have set for both contemporaries and up-and-coming entertainers.

That is, you no longer need The Man.

It’s a Good Thing, Yo
A while back some entertainer of some sort, I don’t remember who, said they thought the reason people initially stole music online was simply because they could – it was novel. But the reason it continued was because most, not all, but most of the product is of such low quality that it poisoned the well, and no one could really justify to themselves a reason to actually pay for anything. It was all just crap, filler, hollow, safe, focus-grouped brain candy – so who cares?

With what is now ubiquitous technology, Carolla & C.K. have shown that if you produce a genuinely good product and make it reasonably accessible, your audience will support your sponsors or pay a fair price for what you produce. As consumers we no longer have to passively accept the filler in hopes of finding that little chunk we actually like – we can actively and loyally go directly to what we want.

So props to Adam Carolla & Louis C.K., 2011′s Technology Heroes.
Now go listen & watch – you’ll laugh.

Unless you’re uptight.
I think there’s a religion section in the iTunes podcast directory.

SO…
Point made.

[SEE ALSO: RADIOHEAD'S PAY-WHAT-YOU-WANT ALBUM EXPERIMENT]
[ARTICLE FROM WIRED ON THE C.K. SHOW]