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October 28, 2004

I Just Don't Believe It

I was a true-believer in the Curse of the Bambino, despite its dubious origins. The Red Sox had to lose, because, as John Scalzi wrote a year ago, America needed its losers. Not just losers like the Seattle Mariners, who no one worries to much about, but big apocalyptic losers. America needs a team that would break their fans' hearts year after year, not because they were a bad team, but because they were a good team that would inevitably choke as the fans watched their hopes and dreams dribble through Bill Bucker's legs. Granted, I'm biased-- I'm a Yankees fan -- but who wasn't moved by that Nike commercial depicting decades of heartbreak since 1919?

That said, last night, I headed to The Kirkland Cafe with friends to watch Game 4 of the world series in the wake of a lunar eclipse (how did I not see this coming?). Sure, I wanted the Red Sox to win-- after all, they deserve a turn, don't they? At the same time, I really felt that they just had to disappoint their fans. After all, that was their job.

Continue reading "I Just Don't Believe It"

Posted by Dean at 2:17 PM | Comments (0)

October 11, 2004

Takes a Licking and Stops Ticking

Lately, I have been involved in an experiment run by fellow Media Lab gradutate student Nathan Eagle. As part of this experiment, I get to use a Nokia 6600 cell phone. I have to admit, it's pretty cool. It has a color display, a camera, polyphonic ring-tones, and bluetooth.

It is not, however, indestructible... Last Thursday, I was running some errands in Boston, and my cell phone fell onto the street. Unfortunately, I did not realize this until I reached the curb. Rushing back in a failed attempt to retrieve my cell phone, I could only stand back and watch as my phone was run over by a bus. Yes, the phone was perfectly lined up with the wheels of the bus and was run over three times.

Now, it would be unreasonable to expect the phone to continue working, and it certainly didn't. The phone did, however, manage to stay in one piece, which was pretty impressive. The SIM card and the flash memory card were still intact, and Nathan was gracious enough to give me a new phone so that I could continue participating in the experiment. All I had to do was swap the SIM cards and flash memory cards, and I was good to go.

I did, however, lose a few photos of Howard Dean that I had taken with the phone earlier that week during a Democracy for America fundraiser.

Pictures of the damaged phone after the jump...

Continue reading "Takes a Licking and Stops Ticking"

Posted by Dean at 11:36 PM

October 6, 2004

Howard Stern falls into the FCC's Trap

Ok, not exactly, but with the announcement that Howard Stern is leaving broadcast radio for Sirius satellite radio, the landscape of radio is going to change in a big way. In a sense, I think that this is what Michael Powell and the FCC have been trying to encourage with their policies of encouraging radio consolidation, opposing any calls for commercial low-power FM broadcasting, and levying massive fines against broadcasters that run afoul of decency regulations. I've complained about the depredations of the FCC before, when it came to their efforts to get rid of locally owned radio stations, but I think there is method to their madness.

All of this has the effect of getting "small players" out of the radio business, and I've begun to think that this is on purpose. In most industries, the product cycle eventually shakes out the small players, leaving a few successful industries after a wave of consolidation. Earlier examples of this include the auto industry, now dominated by a few major players, and the entertainment industry, in which a multitude of movie studios were gobbled up by media companies and independent cable channels became part of larger entertainment conglomerates.

Under Michael Powell's leadership, local phone companies such as Verizon were allowed to skirt regulations that required them to share their lines with other DSL providers since those lines were originally built with the aid of public money and legally sanctioned monopolies. What was the underlying reason for Powell's opposition to competition within DSL? He was hoping that giving local phone companies a monopoly over DSL-based broadband would encourage more competition for broadband via wireless, satellite, and cable.

FCC regulations adopted during the dawn of radio were meant to keep radio a local format (given its short broadcast range) and encouraging local indepdnent programming. Many parts of the FM broadcast spectrum were set aside for universities and community programming while commercial broadcasters were prevented from owning a large number of stations that would monopolize programming. As a consequence, a diversity of voices and formats were available, even though a specific broadcaster available on one side of the country might not be available on the other.

What I believe happened is the the FCC, led by Michael Powell, decided that this diversity of radio programming was impeding progress in other formats like satellite radio and internet radio. The solution? Like the push to prevent competition within DSL, the FCC decided to push aside the independent, competing voices on the FM spectrum by allowing a few large players to dominate, forcing those other, smaller voices to find new sources through which they could be heard.

Howard Stern was getting hurt by having his radio affiliates suffer larger and larger fines from the FCC, providing a huge disincentive to having him carried over broadcast radio. By going over to satellite radio, he gives a huge boost to the format, which is ultimately what the FCC wants.

Posted by Dean at 4:22 PM