AllupInyourBiz

This month, a writer from Details Magazine was the latest victim of having to listen to Kanye bleed from the mouth about how awesome he is, before publishing it in the magazine. During the course of the interview, Kanye discusses his attempts at video game design (as a youth), admits to completely re-inventing himself, orders flower arrangements, and reiterates his opinion that he is the “voice of this generation.”

Kanye discusses when he first became interested in making beats. He claims that is was when he was in 7th grade, doing beats for a video game he was designing, saying:  “I got into doing beats for the video games I used to try to make. My game was very sexual. The main character was, like, a giant penis.” Skipping ahead to the end of the article:

This isn’t the first reset, of course, that West has engineered. “My story is so written, like God has a plan for me-an exact parallel, like I’ve seen this before, I’m back in Groundhog Day again,” he says. “Like the Glow in the Dark tour-that was like going back and finally finishing up that video game. Except now it was me in the video game.”

Ok, so, wait. Kanye, you are now that huge dick from the video game? Got it.

Moving along… Some of my favorite quotes from the article include:

Oh my God, I’m one of the greatest rappers in the world… I’ll get on a track and completely ee-nihilate that track, I’ll eat it and rip it in half. I wouldn’t have to think of it.

and;

I am the voice of this generation… If not me, then who? … Someone could be a better rapper, dance better. But culturally impacting? When you look back at these four and a half years, who’s the icon at the end of the day? Who broke down color barriers? What other black guy would a white person use as a fashion reference?

Totally. I seriously can’t think of one other person who has had a larger cultural impact than Kanye. I mean, the guy practically paved the way for Obama to get in the white house. There were all of these sartorially challenged, slightly racist white-guy voters out there, who were able to get past their prejudices by taking style tips from Kanye, because he is one of the greatest rappers in the world.

But seriously, the best part of the article (besides the fact that an author finally gave credit where it’s due, citing Cher for popularizing the voice modulator), is when Kanye tries to flip the colloquial derogatory connotation of  the word “gay.” Read Kanye’s analysis carefully:

Take the word gay-like, in hip-hop, that’s a negative thing, right? But in the past two, three years, all the gay people I’ve encountered have been, like, really, really, extremely dope. Y’know, I haven’t, like, gone to a gay bar, nor do I ever plan to. But where I would talk to a gay person-the conversation would be mostly around, like, art or design-it’d be really dope. From a design standpoint, kids’ll say, ‘Dude, those pants are gay.’ But if it’s, like, good, good, good fashion-level, design-level stuff, where it’s on a higher level than the average commercial design stuff, it’s, like, gay people that do that. I think that should be said as a compliment. Like, ‘Dude, that’s so good it’s almost . . . gay.

Ok, it was fairly well thought out. But dude, I’m sorry, it’s just not going to fly. Or maybe Kanye really is a genius, and the whole blurb above is just one of those “joke’s on you” plots, like R. Kelly’s whole “in the closet” bit.  Kanye says the “kids’ll” say it, then he laughs when the kids start saying it. Hmmmmmmmm. Nope, on second thought, a complex ploy like that is clearly outside of the scope of Kanye’s mental ability.

[Photo by NY Magazine]

Shepard Fairey is back at it, producing artwork for a “good cause.” The image to the left, is for a World Wildlife Foundation campaign to get everyone to turn out their lights for an hour on March 28th. Lets hope that Shep doesn’t get in any trouble for this one. He has been going through some rough times lately, including being arrested last Sunday. In addition, he is being sued by the Associated Press, for infringing copyright.

The iconic “Hope” image that was created and distributed by Fairey, during the Obama campaign, was tracked back to an Associated Press photo taken by Mannie Garcia, on assignment  by AP. The AP is now suing Fairey, claiming copyright infringement. Can you image the can of worms that is liable to open? Anyone who has done a stencil, can now owe royalties to the photographer who produced the picture it was taken from? Is the guy who took the Andre the Giant photo that Fairey modeled his “Obey” campaign on, now going to come out of the woodwork demanding cash?

Fairey’s lawyers argue that there is no infringement, under the “fair use” doctrine. I feel kind of bad for the guy. I hope that he doesn’t lose this one. Can you imagine the kind of damages that he would have to pay? That “Hope” piece was EVERYWHERE. I hope that if he does lose, that the court at least takes into account the fact that the profit generated from the piece, was primarily used to print and distribute more copies.

Here is the AP photo and the Fairey piece, side by side. You be the judge.

Being a person who has accidentally and otherwise started over with the Itunes library, on multiple occasions, I could not be happier about Apple’s decision to drop the DRM. If you have ever synced an Ipod to a new computer or library, you have probably seen the prompt, asking you if you would like to transfer your purchased songs. If you indicate the affirmative, then you have to put in your user information, hope that you haven’t already put the music on more than the allowed number of computers, etc. This is all because of the Digital Rights Management (DRM) that Apple has been so Nazi-like about embedding into Itunes purchases. Apple announced Tuesday that they will no longer be using DRM to control the use of millions of titles available on Itunes. Apple announced that by the end of the year, the entire Itunes catalogue should be free of DRM.

Gossip Girl is back on the air for another season. NYC’s own “ Poster Boy” has expressed his sentiments about the show, in this lovely piece. Poster Boy, we are with you 100% on this one, buddy.

Tats crew painted this “Stop Snitchin’” mural under permission from the owner of the building at the time. According to Animalnewyork, Tats crew now plans to sue the city, who issued a summons to the building owner, causing the mural to be buffed, because the City deemed it to be graffiti. As Animalnewyork points out, the cru doesn’t really have a case, since the city had permission from the new building owner to buff out the art. I have to say that I can’t really blame the City in this instance. The whole “stop snitchin’” campaign is ridiculous. It is just another example of organized crime trying to instill fear in those who aid law enforcement. How about, stop breakin’ the law. Then there would be nothing to snitch about.

If you were wondering why there were people camped out in front of Barnes and Noble all weekend, with a line wrapping around the block, it is because Warren Buffet’s official biography hits the shelves today. All of the “Breaking Dawn” fans were exhausted to have to camp out twice in such a short period of time. But ultimately I’m sure it was worth it to them, so that they could ensure timely access to such life changing literary works.

The Village Voice posted the winners from its tortilla debate. The entrants submitted which of corn or flour tortillas are better, in 25 words or less. Although the submissions are fairly witty and mildly entertaining, the real attention grabber is the question posed by the Voice, to those who didn’t enter. The intro asks: “Don’t like the winner? Then why didn’t you enter, you lazy Mexican?”Oof! Way to shamelessly promulgate social stereotypes.

No, I’m actually a lazy Danish-American. But my pedigree did directly influence my decision not to participate in the contest. I can only guess that since Gustavo Arellano, the author of the tortilla article, is actually Mexican, he feels like it is ok to write phrases like the one he wrote, above. Kind of like, if you are black, it’s ok to use the N word. Or something. I guess. A long those same lines of logic, I suppose that I could say stuff like, “you freakishly tall scandinavian!” and get away with it.

The Telegraph published the results of it’s photo editing contest today. The theme was “Genetic mutations: Imagining nature’s errors.” Those Brits sure do have an imagination. It is too bad that there had to be some “photo editing” as a part of the contest. I’m pretty sure that any dentist over there could have won the contest just by submitting some completely unedited shots of his/her client’s teeth.