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That ‘Orange Is the New Black’ Ransom Thing Was Never Going to Pay Off

Jason Tate

Brian Barrett, writing at Wired:

Although the hack offers a reminder that even the best security can be undone by the so-called “weakest link” — Netflix can’t do much if a vendor is compromised — it provides a bigger lesson in how the internet has largely shifted away from torrenting. If a show lands on The Pirate Bay and nobody watches, did it really stream?

Consider that in 2011, BitTorrent accounted for 23 percent of daily internet traffic in North America, according to network-equipment company Sandvine. By last year, that number sat at under 5 percent. “There’s always going to be the floor of people that are always going to be torrenting,” says Sandvine spokesperson Dan Deeth. That group will surely enjoy whatever Piper’s up to in season five. But the idea that so small a cohort might prompt Netflix to negotiate with hackers seems absurd.

I commented on this when New Found Glory’s new album leaked and there were a bunch of comments in the threads basically saying, “no reason to go hunt for the leak, it’ll be on Spotify soon enough anyway.” I always thought easy and convenient access to music would help curb piracy, but even I didn’t think it would have as big an impact as it has.

Matt Skiba Apologizes to Fans for the Fyre Festival

Jason Tate

TMZ caught up with Blink-182’s Matt Skiba and asked him about the Frye Festival. He apologized to fans for the disaster:

We were only pulling out because we were getting the feeling that it didn’t have enough of our stage that we needed to put on the show we have. We’re on tour right now and we have a production that we bring with us and they weren’t able to facilitate the show that we put on, so we were just like, ‘We can’t play the show.’

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In the Spotlight: 50 Bands You Need to Hear in 2017 (Part One)

In the Spotlight (Part 1)
Jason Tate

Back on AbsolutePunk.net we would run a feature each year called the “Absolute 100.” The basic idea was to put together a list of bands and artists that we thought needed to get a little more attention. This would range from unsigned, to under-the-radar, to underrated acts that we wanted to highlight. Over the years it ended up being one of my favorite features we compiled (I personally discovered quite a few new bands from it). And, I’ve heard from a lot for readers that you loved it as well.

Today I’m excited to bring this feature back under a new name. We’re calling it “In the Spotlight” and we’ve got the same goal: highlight a bunch of artists we think you should check out. This year we’ve got 50 for you. Over the past month our contributors have been putting together blurbs and pulling out song recommendations, and today we’ve got the first group of 25. We’ll be releasing the next set tomorrow.

Read More “In the Spotlight: 50 Bands You Need to Hear in 2017 (Part One)”

Review: New Found Glory – Makes Me Sick

NFG - Makes Me Sick
Drew Beringer

In 2006, New Found Glory took their biggest risk as a band by releasing Coming Home, an album that largely abandoned the band’s customary pop-punk/easycore stylings. Produced by Thon Panunzio, Coming Home introduced more straight-forward rock elements that included keys, pianos, and strings – not surprising considering Panunzio has worked with some of the biggest rock legends of all time (Ozzy, Bruce, Joan Jett, etc.). Perhaps unsurprisingly, the album fell flat commercially and was also the band’s last album to be released on a major label. But creatively and critically it was a success as Coming Home has been regarded as the band’s most daring effort of their career and let the pop-punk world know that New Found Glory would never make the same album twice. It also planted the seeds of what was to come ten years later.

Read More “New Found Glory – Makes Me Sick”

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