Random Music News for Friday, August 18, 2017
The CNE opens in Toronto today, which as everyone in Southern Ontario knows is the official start of the end of summer. Dammit. Meanwhile, here’s some music news for August 18.
- Tim Cook wrote this powerful memo to Apple staff about Charlottesville.
- Spotify culled all the white supremacist music it could find in their system. Good. But this leads into a trickier discussion.
- Regardless, Spotify will dominate streaming like Google dominates search. Discuss.
- Are you a Millennial? Does this study of media consumption habits ring any bells with you?
- Bonnie Tyler is going to play a total eclipse concert. Of course she is…
- Following her wins in the groping trial, Taylor Swift has made a big donation to a foundation that helps survivors of sexual assault.
- This Newfoundland artist has seen his Chance the Rapper Kit Kat ad go viral.
- Boy George has signed his first major label record deal in 30 years.
- “Why Elvis ate his emotions.” You read that right.
- Could hackers use your smart speakers to hack into you? Apparently so.
- So everything about the reboot of American Idol seems to be a big mess.
- Someone’s gonna have to tell this kid that Michael Jackson is gone.
- Kids. They don’t know how rough things used to be.
- New Samsung smart TVs will soon come with Shazam built in. That sounds handy.
- London’s Big Ben is being silenced for four years for repairs. Could this be an interim solution?
- They’re a bit late to the party, but Japan is getting back into vinyl thanks to…streaming?
“Now that Spotify has laid out criteria for what music is offensive enough to be removed, will it apply the same standards to all songs in the future?”
So…will all comedy deemed offensive be removed? I will look for George Carlin’s 1972 bit “7 Words You Can’t Say on Television” in the future, and see if Spotify is just being knee-jerk hypocritical or not.