I'm sitting in Logan Airport killing some time (should I say the word "killing" in an airport?), waiting for an 8:50 PM Jet Blue flight to JFK, which I'm way early for. I met up with my friend Karen Dyer, a Miami socialite who by day doubles as a State Department employee, earlier this afternoon at the American Air terminal to catch up on old times. We were both in New England for the holidays and took advantage of similar travel schedules to catch up on three years in an hour and a half.
Whazzzzzzzzup!
Netmix: 10 Years Later
If you were to search the Network Solutions WHOIS records database, you would learn the domain name this blog falls under, Netmix.com, was registered 10-years ago today. Scroll half-way down the page and the text simply says, “Record created on 13-Dec-1995."
10-years forward, an eternity measure in Internet time. Netmix is, for all intensive purposes, still alive and kicking. Sitting back in my chair, I ponder the time passed and am simply amazed that 10-years has gone by and throughout, I’ve tried my best to support dance music and DJ culture form a place, not of greed, but of love and commitment to the craft and industry I knew I wanted to work in since I was 12-years-old.
Pacha: A Whirlwind, Sexy Opening
Sexy...that's the word I'm going to use to describe the new Pacha in New York. No...strike that. Super Sexy is more like it.
Tony Z. Lands at StarStyle.com: To Develop Company's Music Video Product
Just wanted to announce my new position as the Product Manager, Music at Entertainment Media Works on the web site, StarStyle.com.
StarStyle brings you backstage and behind the scenes with the set dressers, make-up artists, fashion stylists and the stars themselves while giving you an opportunity to find out where to get the clothes, furniture and accessories featured on your favorite tv shows, movies and music videos!
Random Thoughts…
Since this is a blog, and I can write just about anything I damn well please, I'll take a little break from the DJ world for a minute and just write about what's been going on lately. I gotta fill this space with something...it's getting a little stale.
It's been quite a whirlwind past few weeks for me. After the last posting about Armand Van Helden at Avalon, I took a little break from writing and producing the mix shows to finish up some school work for my classes at NYU just before the Thanksgiving break.
Roger Sanchez & Armand Van Helden: Two Nights, Two Legends
New York City has been hopping lately. With the arrival of the Eric Morillo's new Pacha in a few weeks, Crobar continuing a pretty good run, Cielo still packing them in and all kinds of new venues opening up, including SOL and this new spot, Duvet (the old Centro Fly), there are plenty of parties kicking off to hear house music in New York nowadays.
Sony DRM Forces Recall of CD's
Last week, in my posting about the Grokster case, I mentioned at the bottom my disdain for DRM, a necessary but controversial copyright protection method that is used in digital media files and copy-protected CD's to prevent unauthorized duplication of digital assets. As the music industry continues to transform itself from reliance on a physical product to digital distribution, it has enlisted the help of various companies developing copy protection schemes to fight piracy, which affects anyone dependent on the music industry supply chain. From labels who lose millions in sales to artists who gain exposure but lose control of where their music is sold. Eventually it affects you, the consumer, who risks purchasing low-quality product with poor fidelity from vendors on Canal Street in New York City to download sites based in Russia.
Pacha New York
New York nightlife will be getting another shot in the arm with the arrival of Pacha, a European-style venue swinging open its doors soon after a top down renovation of the old Sound Factory space on West 46th, between 11th and 12th.
Grokster Ceases Operations
You may have heard today that file-sharing service, Grokster, who recently lost a Supreme Court ruling finding the company infringed on copyrights for allowing the sharing of movies via its p2p software, shuttered its web site today. More news on the story can be found at Yahoo: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051107/music_nm/media_grokster_dc
and an intersting comment about the effects of this decision on software developers can be found at the Ohio Free Culture blog.