1754 days ago, I made a comment on here about how my music of the past seemed a lot more popular. And how each new track got fewer and fewer listeners. kleinbl00 responded by saying this: Today, after 3 years of sending tracks across, I got the go ahead for an LP from a label I have great respect for. Needless to say, I am thrilled. I remembered the above comment many times during those periods where I doubted myself. So thank you for that, kb.
Congrats, bro! Well deserved. Can you give any details on the negotiation process? I'm sure it widely varies between labels, mostly as a function of prestige/audience size, but any details are appreciated.
Thank you! We haven't done any contract talks yet. We're currently each choosing a list of 10 tracks to make up the LP then comparing. Most contracts I've signed before have been pretty standard. The label takes 100% until they recuperate their costs, then a 50/50 split. Though this is a bit more of a serious thing, so maybe they'll be some differences. Once we get there, I will let you know if there's anything interesting.
Just make sure you retain ownership of the music itself, as well as your 50/50 split. Also, define ahead of time what you are getting 50% of... net? profit? It's easy for the label to pay their own staff to do a bunch of marketing for you, and claim they have spent all the profits, so your 50% of profits is $0.00.
For sure, I always made sure of the ownership thing in previous contracts. It's only a small label curated by an artist who's been in the scene since its inception. So there's not like there's a load of staff or anything. It's more that they just that they are well respected and know everybody! I believe that they do A+R for a bigger label too. Most of the cost I think will go into the physical releases as they produce vinyls and CDs for the LP projects they release. It's not a label that churns out loads of releases. Instead, they tend to focus on fostering emerging talent with original takes on the genre. So whilst I always be on the look, I don't expect them to do anything to screw me over.
Well, the heat has put a cramp in the roofers. They're about half done and haven't shown up yet today. :( I haven't fared any better with any of my house projects. On the plus side, I got to go into the office yesterday for the first time in two months! I really miss the separation of home and work that the office provides, but I don't miss the hour commute each way. I have taken the family's old Mac Mini and beaten it into submission. I installed Proxmox on it and have been setting up various containers to selfhost a bunch of services. Currently trying to get HAProxy to shuttle requests to the various containers so that I can eventually access them outside home. My oldest child still remains employed although his girlfriend was furloughed for COVID. Luckily his meager income covers their big bills, although he still needs our help each month so they don't starve. Middle child ran off and eloped. This makes my wife super duper sad, but I understand why she did it. I am sad that she posted it to facebook before telling us, but again I understand why she did it. Her husband seems like a good dude and I wish the two of them great joy and success in their marriage. The youngest has been given the choice by the school to home-school, distance learn, or attend in person classes for the fall. She is eager to get back to school; my wife and I are conflicted. She learns best in school, but COVID. Overall, life is good. We have our health, our jobs, our home, and the bills are getting paid. What more do we need?
I’m reading a very good book called “Trick Mirror” by Jia Tolentino. It’s a collection of essays that essentially swirl around both internet culture and feminism. It’s very smart. I wanted to recommend it to the hub. Packing for my big move has begun. I’ve warned my closest circle that I anticipate panic to kick in around Aug 1 — that will be two weeks out from the move date. My sister appears to finally have found a roommate to replace me in the apartment — her third try. The flakiness of my sister’s friends is a fact. My brother asked me on the phone today if I think either the new roomie or my sister will clean the place. Scoffing, I said no. I started running again this week. I am easing back into it. I’ve been waking up at 5 am to get outside before the heat gets too awful. It is an extremely valuable endeavor for my well being and my soul. My resting heart rate is trending high and has all year. I suspect my blood pressure too. I hope I can bring it down/manage it through exercise and good eating. There’s a family history though. All any of us can do is our best. I have hope for all if you, hubski. Be safe. Be well.
Hey. Thanks for asking! As for the knee, I've been easing back in very slowly -- 1 mile on day 1, 1.5 on day 2, a break, then 2 miles. Another break. Sometimes I can feel a funny tension - left side of the kneecap, maybe a tendon? - I think that must be what I hurt. I don't feel this often though. So far the runs have not aggravated it, although I admit my mile time's been in the 14:00s. Trying to take it slow and ease back in. I wasn't sure if 6 weeks would be long enough -- often times it's not. It makes such a difference in my day-to-day direction, goals, and self management though. A regular running routine really helps me orient my whole day during this extended coronavirus-wfh-lockdown. I am trying to be more deliberate and conscious about stretching/adding yoga in as well. I know I am not flexible; not sure if that played a part here, but it will only help me to put the work in to help counteract how running tightens the muscles. And it would only help me to stretch and yoga even further -- move past mitigate and into actual improvement with flexibility. We shall see!
Of course! Good to read you are taking it slow enough to still get your routine going. Exercises that focus on strengthening the muscles around the knee are worth a go once the funny tension subsides. My issue at the time felt similar to the knee cap being loose. The flexibility and strength training play equal parts towards prevention. (Took care of my early back ache issues.) Pairing yoga and stretching is a great plan of attack. Appreciate the update!
Thank you kantos for posting this. I am in NC. I moved here a month ago with my family. We are renting a house while we search for one to buy. Well, I already found one. We close on the 10th. That means we need to get out of this lease. So now I’m working with the owner of the rental to try and help him sell it. Crypto is up, which is nice. Like everyone, I am ready to have this quarantine be over. I’ll not stop being steadfast, but I’m getting bored. Work is chugging along. We have some exciting news re a patent we filed. A group is licensing it from us and we get 75% of all of their sales. It’s got a tremendous amount of potential. I went for a bike ride yesterday. I’m sore in a way only older people understand. I’m ready to start reintroducing my stem cells. My friends sister is a history professor in Portland. She took her 18 year old daughter to see our freedoms in action. They joined the BLM protests. They were singing songs peacefully when the federal cop shot the mom in the head with a rubber bullet. Blood pouring down her face, she was rushed to the ER. She had a concussion. She was shot, while singing a protest song by her own country. I don’t care if you don’t like Biden. Donate. Register to vote. Get this monster out of office.
Hello! It's been a while. My second year of university starts at the end of August, but I'll move down in the middle of the month to be a part of the introduction of the new students ( Nolle-p). Everyone is trying to make it as pandemic-proof as possible so I'm curious about how that will end up working out. This time last year I really didn't think I was going to enjoy nolle-p and I really did. And I really did not think I was going to sacrifice 2 weeks of my summer to help out with it. I've started sewing! I've made 3 skirts and 3 tops so far. Each one better than the last. Next challange is t-shirts and then dresses. The dream would be to sew all my clothes myself, but that doesn't seem completely realistic. It sure isn't cheaper to sew things yourself though, I've spent quite a bit of money on fabric and other supplies so far. I'm telling myself that it is reasonable because I am learning as well. I saw my grandma last weekend, and the weekend before that. It is quite hard to speak with someone who doesn't quite hear you when you are sitting next to them - let alone 2 meters away. But it was nice. She's 89, so you can imagine how worried we all are about corona. I'm going to miss summer vacation but it will also be nice to be back in my apartment again, and maybe acually meet another person who isn't a relative. That would be nice.
my boyfriend has been here since friday and it's been really nice, m happy - i was worried that after anticipating seeing him so much that it would be a letdown but it hasn't been I've been off my antidepressants cold turkey for a week now and other than some dizziness and headachey pulses i feel fine - feeling more emotional but in a good way - SSRIs have been nasty for me sexually like it does for a lot of people so if i can be rid of them i want to be both letters of recommendations i need for nut surgery are in so ideally sometime before christmas i can be living testicle free and hopefully only have to take 1 medication every day instead of 3 kinds this weekend will be grocery shopping and lease-signing and i should probably look for a job too - i really should be financially independent at this point and it bothers me that I'm not my life right now is "keep an eye on things and see how it works out in the end" which is exciting and boring at the same time
It's been humbling to learn that "chronic illness" means that you try again and again but unlike anything normal, you do not get stronger, you do not get better, you do not improve incrementally. What it means is that you fail, every time, sometimes more, sometimes less, but that every single effort you make at improving things just leaves you exhausted and defeated. But you have to do it. It's either that, or spiral downward. It feels like treading water as the ceiling closes in. I'm stuck in the dichotomy of being healthy enough to run not-quite-two-miles at a time but not so healthy that running not-quite-two-miles won't wipe me out for the next 48 hours. Is it a good day? Is it a bad day? Why the fuck isn't my endurance back? Actually took my temperature during yoga today to see if maybe I had COVID again. Nope. 95 degrees. Why the fuck am I still coughing. Because I'm still coughing. And my endurance is still shit. And you give it your all and your all is so much less than it used to be and no matter how many times you reach for the goal it just gets further away. Fukkit I'm starting baicalin again. It's abundantly clear that every medical professional out there is just looking for an excuse to tell you why you should never leave your house again and equally clear that the COVID consensus is the tower of goddamn Babel. This. This is how we end up with tooth powder to protect us from Halley's Comet.
I want so badly to try to help people like you, but the feds have told me to fuck off (not really, more correctly, they told me, "Sure you can do that...if you can first do these studies we recommend that will cost $5M and 3 years." Studies which, mind you, have nothing to do with safety or efficacy, but rather goddam shelf life and batch-to-batch variability. Neither here nor there.) You and others like you have kicked the virus for weeks or months, but your alveoli have likely been invaded by inflammatory cells that refuse to fuck off. Have they tried giving you steroids or some other potent anti-inflammatory? Antiviral treatments won't help, but something that chills out your immune system might. May even try fasting. If you can get through it, it at least couldn't hurt.
I have zero talent, knowledge, or skills to offer any input here, but I've seen some amazing health turnarounds with people who have done the Keto form of eating. At its core, the idea is to convert the body from running on carbs, to running on fats. People with a wide range of chronic issues - like diabetes - have completely reversed their condition due to (un)expected knock-on effects of that way of eating. In essence, lower your carbohydrate intake to less than 20 grams per day, eat a lot of fatty meats, leafy greens, eggs, cheese, etc., for 1-2 months, and shit changes real fast in your biology. The unintended consequence is you basically wind up removing sugars from your diet almost entirely, as well. And my uneducated brain feels like that is more important that most of the rest of the Keto plan, because there's just so much in our diets today. I dunno. I wonder if KB has/should tried/try Keto; if for no other reason than evidence gathering...
I'm personally skeptical of keto for anything other than a specified medical reason, such as diabetes, for whom I understand that there is some evidence of lowering blood sugar. My main gripe with it is that your brain runs almost exclusively on carbs, and it requires a lot (like 120-150g depending on the person). A rule of thumb is that the average adult's brain is 2% of their mass and uses 25% of their daily calories. This is mainly due to how energy intensive it is to keep building up severe ion gradients across all the neuronal membranes, and some other cells too. An ion gradient is potential energy, so it requires work to maintain the potential. The idea behind keto, if I'm not mistaken, is that it forces fat out of storage, because the backbone of a triglyceride is half a sugar molecule, so if you put two of them together you get a whole sugar, which then can be used as brain food. But then what happens to the 3 fatty chains that are cast off the triglyceride? I guess they're floating around your liver and blood until they're metabolized to a ketone body that can be excreted??? Also, basically every single large study that's ever tried to correlate diet to overall health or mortality comes up with the same conclusion, which is that the more plant protein you eat, the longer you live, whereas meat/dairy and especially egg protein kills you faster (lots of caveats in there). Overall, keto seems dangerously unhealthy to me, although I don't have evidence to support that beyond the epidemiology and a few anecdotes about people going nuts on keto. I think the only nutritional advice anyone really needs is: eat more plants.
Thanks for the biology! It's a thing that never really caught my interest in school, and probably my weakest area of understanding. The core thing about Keto that you kinda got wrong is that it is primarily leafy greens - like, 70% of your diet - and the rest is fats and proteins in various forms. Like the Adkins Diet, you eat a "palm-sized" bit of protein with a big ole salad that dwarfs the protein. So it is basically a heavy-plants diet, but fortifies that with specific proteins, and no carbs. The interesting part about the low carbs, is that plants store their energy as sugars (carbs) in their roots. So in Keto the shorthand is to eat "above-ground vegetables; mostly the leaves". It's a little weird to get used to, but, in essence, you have a steak salad as much as possible: a bed of fresh spinach with crunchies like celery and cucumber and onions, with slices of really nice flank steak on top, and a light vinaigrette dressing. (Which, to me, is pretty much a meal I would eat every day, for every meal, as often as I could! :-) Over the years I have been doing it, I have tweaked and adjusted it according to my body's particular needs, and I would no longer call food intake "Keto", the health benefits I have seen from eating this way have been too numerous to count. Which is, honestly, like DUUUH... of COURSE eating more veggies, fewer sugars, and zero "processed foods" is going to make you healthier. But the way that worked for me to get to that kind of diet was via the phenomenal weight loss I encountered the first year. 40 pounds lost, and have been kept off for close to 3 years now. Better sleep. Sharper brain and thinking. No afternoon crash. Zero reliance on coffee to get at it, in the morning. Keto for me was just the path to the healthy diet we all know we should eat. The early rewards kept me diligent, and the long-term effects have kept me thinking the "Keto way" ever since.
...the body running on fats vs. the body running on carbs doesn't cause COVID. Cutting out sugar? Yeah that's effective against diabetes. We've known that one for a while. I had my health screwed up pretty mightily by one dietician already and no offense? Attempting to fix a lung problem through liberal applications of cholesterol makes slightly less sense than my neighbor recommending I watch "The Secret" again.At its core, the idea is to convert the body from running on carbs, to running on fats.
But your issues began pre-COVID, right? When you were still biking throughout LA and not losing weight, etc? I was thinking of whatever the undiagnosed underlying issue was, prior to COVID. Ya know... it's the only tool in my toolbox, and it worked on me, so I figured I'd hit you over the head with it and see if it worked for you, too. :-)
Oh, long since. Problem is, part of the "treatment" was a certified, bona fide nutritionist writing me a prescription for "eat lots of veggies, cut out nearly all carbs and increase your protein content by 3-4x" and I gained 15lbs in 4 weeks. When I went "WTF yo" she was firmly in the "that's a sign our plan is working!" camp. So we did it for another month and I gained 25 pounds. There's usually a moment during all this where they go "huh, I'll bet you have some sort of thyroid issue" and then they run blood tests and nope. No thyroid issues they can recognize. That's about the time they start mumbling into the EHR and fob me off on some specialist that refuses to see me. Has happened three times so far. But that's just the metabolism I grew up with. I'm used to it. I know what works there; not eating. Not eating for days weeks months or years. I'm good at not eating. The problem I ran into with biking is "not eating" means "you don't have enough energy to get to work" which put me in trying to triangulate "enough energy to bike 16 miles" with "and none left over such that I'm still hungry" and then some days it was so hot that it took three bottles of gatorade before I stopped seeing stars while sitting down. That shit I can deal with. This new "and eating lunch is going to make you feel like such shit that you need to take a nap" thing is the real drag.
The suggestion about fasting was solely based on data that show that it can help to reset inflammatory cells to a more stable state. Purely short term, either a couple weeks going like less than 1000 cals/day or like 3 days without food then back to normal. Personally, I've tried a 3 day fast one time, and I failed after 30 hours. It gave me a pounding headache, and I couldn't focus on anything other than food. It was horrible, but I wasn't sick, so I wasn't highly motivated.
Hey everyone! Haven't been here as often as I'd like lately. I don't read as much articles anymore on the web, I haven't read anything nonfiction in months because I just can't care for it so much these days. Which means I have much less to share and fewer reasons to venture here. I know it's not the sole reason for being here, far from it, but it is often the spark for me and there haven't been as many sparks as of late. Hm. I just got great news at work; I'm gonna be starting a secondment (if that's the correct word for working for another organization for my expertise) after my holiday. Means a big step forward; I like creating/designing and doing data analysis, but if I can delegate the data legwork I won't miss it. So this new thing is the first one where I'm not touching a single line of code or data, instead being asked to work together with others and create / set up pilot projects for others to then go and do. It also enables me to yeet a bunch of projects I don't want to do anymore because I will definitely not have time to be spread thinly anymore, thank you very much. Plus the organization I'm starting at has a phenomenal network of people in the field of sustainable / innovative transportation.
I'm not sure we have a similar concept here in the US. I remember when I lived in Europe it being common for friends to be "seconded-out" to another organization for a while, to work on a specific project, before returning to their primary employer. I can see where that might work in US academia, but I have a hard time visualizing how it could work here in America. The questions almost write themselves... 1. So we are going to keep paying you, but you will be working for a different company? 2. What about your job here? Who will do your work while you are gone? 3. What if the project is successful, or you enjoy working there? What if you leave us? (clutches at pearls) 4. But who is paying for your health insurance? Hm. Secondment. I'd never realized how this completely normal process in the rest of the world would be complete anathema to Corporate America... "...I'm gonna be starting a secondment (if that's the correct word for working for another organization for my expertise)..."
It's sort of like a marriage between freelancing and corporate work? Imagine you are a very specific field expert. There actual job offerings that require your specific expertise are few and far between. The kind of expertise you bring is useful in a lot of different organizations, however. You could work for yourself, but that would require an existing and broad network of people, which most people don't have. It also does not provide a stable income, or pensions, or colleagues. So instead of doing that, you can also go work for a consultancy firm that has access to a lot of clients, knows how to negotiate a good deal and terms for working, and has the resources to help you get gigs you'd never get on your own, e.g. in a team or with organizations that they have a history with. In my case, two other colleagues have worked for this organization I'm lent out to in the past, and that greatly helps my case. You don't see much back from the higher-than-usual rates, but you do have a much more solid income & a stack of benefits and it's in everyone's interest at your job that you have enough work. From the organization that needs the help it also makes sense. They get to have people on board for a temporary position, sometimes to fix things that are broken, without committing to a year contract and putting a lot of effort into aquisition. They can get someone for precisely the amount of hours it'll take to get something done. They don't pay anything beyond a flat rate per hour. They get more certainty that the person is vetted, because the secondment-ed person is part of a bigger organization with a track record. And they can post their temporary gig to big tender-websites, where they can easily get their position in front of a dozen potential, actually decent candidates. The "well fuck those guys I'm jumping SHIP" does happen sometimes, but less often than you think. It's much more often the case that, if there's a good match, your temporary contract will be extended. In my case, I now have a 5-month gig, but with optional 6-month extensions if all parties agree to it.
I guess the closest thing we have here in the US would be Consulting, like Ernst & Young, or something. But that is a VERY different corporate relationship/agreement than a secondment. It seems to me that a secondment is based sort of on a gentleman's agreement that both companies will benefit from this in the long term, and so - while the exact dollar value of the benefit is unknown - both companies agree the benefit is there. So they do the deal, and share the resource (person/skills). Competitors used to do this more often; they'd be honest about a common wall that both companies faced - like, say, better data compression would help both companies' products, but neither had the full resources to crack the problem - so they would combine forces to innovate a solution, and would both share in the results of the research. Xerox PARC was based on similar principles... smart people from all different companies and backgrounds coming together to jointly innovate... Hm. Secondment. It would take a VERY different kind of American business to embrace such a thing. They'd be too defensive to collaborate/share in any significant way.
A secondment for us here in NZ would be a new job but within the organization, like I could be seconded to a higher role within the University for a year, covering someone on maternity leave or something similar. After that year, I would go back to my previous job, or I could apply to take over the role permanently if it worked out. They're pretty common in large organizations here, good for dipping your toes in a different world with a bit of safety if things don't suit.
Because blocked, Heyo, Regarding your most recent post. I am in a similarly shaped boat. The only satisfaction that I get really is from making things. Maybe that's a direction to look in. I don't know. I only know my experience. Sorry shit sucks. Hopefully a day will come in the not so distant future where it can suck less. We are most likely to encounter that version of the future when we work towards it as best we can. Best, OB
Life in Bullet Points (It’s been busy in the best ways, even in the lows) - Tomorrow, I can put an M.S. after my name. - Packing life into my car once more to pit stop at the mothership before the next chapter. - Results back from COVID test tomorrow, too. Expecting negative, but getting it to be on safe side before crashing in a new place. - Had a love interest realized. It was nice. I learned more about what I’ve been doing wrong for the past few years. More hopeful about what I’m going to do right from here on in that department. (Oscillating on how I feel about moving now, but that’s for another time) - Networking through family/friends is a godsend compared to cold calls/e-mails. - Hope I can open pub next week, too. Happy to host rounds of liquor on me. 😏 Mid-July seems to be the annual #occupypubski tradition. - Looking forward to finishing Jeff Vandameer’s Annihilation and F.C. Yee’s The Shadow of Kyoshi once I’m settled back into non-school life. Good ol’ short fiction brain popcorn. - Could be published (as a co-author) on health geography research by next year.
unusual move indeed. shit, this makes me genuinely sad partly because those weekly music threads are a hubski staple - even if I don't post I lurk and listen to other people's posts - plus a certain hub bump from bfv if you do post.. partly because of the rest of his contributions here. if you are lurking - come back soon.
Cheeky little shits keep trying to escape quarantine here in NZ. Running the risk of ruining everything we've achieved so far, so they can visit a supermarket. No community transmission in like 60(?) days now. Senua's Sacrifice is still on my mind. Video games are often on my mind but this one has really stuck with me after completing it. Throughout 8 hours I genuinely felt horror, elation, hopelessness, determination and even a little bit of peace. It was an absolutely wild experience. The group of people I regularly game with have a very active Discord server, I talk to them more than my local group of friends sometimes. I caved a bought a webcam as they had never seen me in about 7 months of knowing me, and they all tend to use webcams when talking or doing their DnD campaign at least. Turned it on and they all had a beer/drink in hand and they clinked their cameras for me, it was really sweet. The absolute nerds. New Zealand is carrying on as best it can - job losses are starting to mount though, the next wave of covid-19 related crap is fast approaching.