No Let's Yeah | irrelevantly irreverent

From MetaFilter

The balloon was launched at 5:37pm (PST) from Oxnard, CA and reached an altitude of 125,000 feet snapping photos and recording video along the way.

The balloon burst, the parachute deployed, and the payload floated down for 35 minutes, landing near an old olive orchard Northeast of Santa Paula.

Back To The Future II was my favorite movie in that trilogy. When I was younger, I loved how they depicted the future. It made me excited for how the world may look in 2015.

Now that it’s 2010, I have growing skepticism on many of the things I expected to see. However, one artist is getting the ball rolling with a replica of the Hoverboard. Check out the video:

I have a couple small bins that hold CD cases under my coffee table, and it’s where I keep all the new albums I purchase. Once or twice a year, I fill these trays up, and I have to weed through the “older” CDs and find a place to store them. In the meantime, I’ve already ripped them to my computer, and maybe only used the actual disc a handful of times. Sooner or later, the CDs find their way to these bins, and beyond that, into a larger, more unaccessible bin.

Each time, I wonder why I continue to buy CDs. It should come as no surprise to us that CDs are on the way out. Just look at the predecessors of the CD. Vinyl, 8-track, and cassettes all had their time in the sun, and although vinyl (and even cassettes to a degree) are seeing a resurgence, they are by no means the main form of distribution that they used to be. CDs soon will join these ranks. Everything will soon be digital.

Could digital be the last format in this evolution? It’s hard to imagine what may lie beyond that. Perhaps we’ll get the music injected directly–electronically–into our brains?

I love the ease, affordability, and immediate satisfaction of digital. But the music fan in me wants to continue to have a physical artifact associated with the music I love. Still the practical side of me knows that I will just rip the album to my computer, add it to my iPod, and listen to it digitally 95% of the time. Meanwhile, I’ll be adding another CD to my ever-growing pile.

Because of this, I started a policy two years ago. I would continue to buy CDs for my favorite artists and anticipated albums, while buying digital on impulse buys and newer bands I want to just check out. Going digital was an easy and affordable way to check out new music.

I officially changed this policy last month, based on a trip to the record store.

Easy Street Records was having a $1 sale on old vinyl. I picked up a lot of old favorites and took a chance on some random stuff. After all, they were only $1 a piece. I came home with a dozen LPs.

I had an LP player, but it was relegated to my chilly, windowless garage, where it was unlikely that I would hang out and listen to much music. I cleared some space upstairs in the living room and my LP player had newer, friendlier home. That’s when I saw my policy changing.

Many new artists are still putting out vinyl records, but they are also including digital downloads with your purchase. This entices to now buy vinyl from my favorite artists and for anticipated albums, allowing me the best of both worlds. A convenient digital copy, and a physical copy in a format that I’m more likely to appreciate and enjoy. Furthermore, I can now buy old records on their original format at a discounted price, rather than pay full price for a digital copy. If I do want a digital copy, I can rip the record from the LP player to my computer with one of many software programs available (or just find a free copy online). There was a time where kids would record a vinyl record to a cassette for their friends or for their cars.

If I want to make an impulse buy or check out something new, I’ll continue to buy digital. If I become a fan, I can support them down the line with my next purchase. I just hope they offer vinyl (with downloads).

The Internet changed my life.

Sure, it has changed other peoples’ lives too, but in the mid- to late-90s, when I was in high school, the Internet opened up a new universe of music for me.

I grew up in northeastern Montana, hours away from any mall or legitimate record store. The highlight of trips to “big” cities like Billings or Bismarck was going to the mall and getting some new CDs at Sam Goody. I learned about new music by watching MTV or listening to the one rock station, Power 95 (the other three stations played country). Power 95 was great for a couple years, but then got bought by a big radio company and the format turned to shitty adult contemporary. They had a policy of playing at least one Phil Collins song every hour.

Everything changed when I convinced my parents to get dial-up Internet in 1997. All of a sudden, I could find music and connect with other fans of the bands I liked (Foo Fighters being one of my favorites).

This is how I discovered Sunny Day Real Estate.

As I dove into Internet Foo fandom, I learned about their connection to a band called Sunny Day Real Estate. I had never heard of them, and thought they had a funny name. I looked them up and found their first album, Diary. There was no way to describe this music in relation to all the alt rock I was feasting on, and I absolutely loved it. I had to hear more.

Back then, I used a web site called CDNOW to purchase CDs online at a much better price than at Sam Goody. The web site was clean and simple (it’s now an Amazon subsidiary). The best part was that I didn’t have a credit card, so I would send them a check, and two weeks later, I’d get my CDs. Looking back, I find this to be hilarious.

Throughout the next few years, I picked up a few more SDRE albums, but none of them really hit me the way Diary did.

The band wasn’t doing much when I discovered them, and I never caught them when they reunited in the 2000s. Now they are reuniting again and playing at The Paramount theatre in Seattle. I just bought tickets and can’t wait to see them, 12 years later after finding them on the Internet.

If I were to show you a Venn diagram iPhone users and public radio listeners, I would bet many dollars that the intersection of those two demographics would encompass a large group of people.

That group would include me.

That’s why I was happy to discover the Public Radio Tuner iPhone application. This allows me to stream ANY public radio station in the country, including my favorites, KEXP, KUOW, and KCRW (and many many more).

Check it.