creativity – Matt's Feed Fodder

GOOD.IS: Instead of Snacks, This Vending Machine Spits Out Short Stories

The vending machine—what better symbol is there of Western civilization’s culture of convenience and unhealthy snacks? But what if one could instead feast on words, stories, and ideas?

This is an amazing idea. Grab a short-story or haiku print out while walking around town, maybe between meetings or your daily commute. Pick a 1, 3, or 5 minute read from some of the best modern literature.

My only suggestion would be that after it picks up steam I’d hope that they could suggest or require a payment of some sort. This could be applied in a couple ways

A small portion would go directly to the author
A small portion to the maintenance of the machines
Everything else could be donated to literacy programs or charities that focus on the advancement of literature in general.

Check out the coverage on Reuters about it too:

Source: Instead of Snacks, This Vending Machine Spits Out Short Stories

Engadget: Spotify pledges to fix the music industry’s royalty problems

Streaming services can’t fix artist salaries. Musicians should go straight to market IMHO

Paying artists for streams isn’t just Spotify’s problem — the whole industry is stuck with a royalty model that’s better suited for physical sales than streaming. Spotify is the one that’s pledging to fix that

As a musician I’m always excited for any and all ways in which musical artists can be more adequately compensated for all the hours of music they provide.

I also love streaming music, but it’s been a problem for a lot of artists. Have you read this piece? “My song was played 168 million times on Pandora. I Received $4,000…” It’s a really damning piece on the inherent problems with copyright, record labels, and streaming services.

So if Spotify is saying it’s going to remedy that issue, then I’d go out an by stock in Spotify today. But based on this article, so far all that they are saying is that Spotify is committed to solving the problem at some point.

What Spotify (or Pandora) currently pays in royalties to me is not as important as making sure money from song plays gets into musicians pockets. I personally don’t think that’s a problem a streaming service can fix. It’s a record label issue. The more musicians are enabled to go direct to market the better.

Similarly to WordPress plugin shops, musicians should start considering running their own online shops where end users can purchase mp3’s and streaming services can purchase licenses.

http://www.engadget.com/2015/12/25/spotify-pledges-to-fix-the-music-industrys-royalty-problems/