Guitar Sweatshops

via Another Line of Flight Musicians usually show up at rallies to protest labour rights but it is very rare for that protest to be at a guitar show! If you own a Cort, Fender, or Ibanez guitar you will want to read about labour relations at their Korean factory. Embarrassingly, I have never thought […]

Having a Ball

The Economist. What’s Working in Music – Having a Ball: In the supposedly benighted music business, a lot of things are making money The problem I have with articles like this is that they begin with the now axiomatic premise “The Internet has changed everything” and then largely go on to show how little if […]

Cory Doctorow – Digital Economy Act: This means war

Cory Doctorow’s latest. The entertainment industry’s willingness to use parliament to impose censorship and arbitrary punishment in the course of chasing a few extra quid is so depraved and terrible that it has me in fear for the very underpinnings of democracy and civil society. Indeed, the swiftness with which the DEA went through the […]

O Canada

The Harper government has suggested this week that it might take a look at revising the lyrics of “O Canada” in order to make them more gender neutral. Specifically, they are looking at replacing Robert Stanley Weir’s line “in all thy sons command” (to my recollection, this line is often rendered as “in all our […]

Michael Geist on the Canadian Copyright Reform Consultation

Michael Geist notes the rock and hard place situation in which Canadians who desire a sane copyright law find themselves. The strategies employed by powerful lobby groups in order to shut out the voices of educators and consumers of creative works are of particular interest. Those in support of strict copyright laws, including “three strikes” […]