Google+: a quick review

It may be just another step in Google’s bid to control the world, but Google+’s newest foray into the social networking world is here, albeit invite only for the moment. Looking like a cleaner version of facebook without all the blue, Plus looks like its developers just shuffled around facebook’s key features and gave them slightly different names (see: ‘like’ vs. ‘+1,’ ‘mutual friends’ vs. ‘friends in common,’ notifications being in the opposite corner, etc.) Coming into the world where facebook is so omnipresent that its vocabulary has entered the vernacular and its interface is fully integrated into our smartphones (read: lives), it was a smart decision for Google+ to closely resemble facebook in appearance. It is certainly smooth looking, and the prospects of its interconnectivity with other Google services like Documents, Reader, Picasa and gmail are enticing (Once activated, google+ becomes a button in the far right corner of the existing igoogle interface).

Yet, the new social network’s main departure of facebook is a big one. facebook’s dominant form of communication is the “wall,” a publicly visible but person specific area that other facebook users post on to prove how witty they are. Instead, Google+’s only way to interact is to broadcast a post akin to a tweet or a status update, directed at nobody in particular (although who you send it to is highly customizable, more on that later.) This not only reflects a worrying trend on the internet epitomized by twitter of people sharing pointless information that nobody gives a damn about, (ex. the app on facebook that shares where you are located at that moment,) but it clashes with the google plus mission statement of making internet communications more life-like. In the real world, we generally don’t just yell random observations from our life to our immediate area, we direct our conversation at individuals or small groups of individuals. While the ‘circles’ feature allows you to choose who receives your statement, it remains an awkward tweet-like item that seems shouted into cyberspace.

Circles is of course plus’s biggest idea, and there google finds their greatest success. It works like this: when encountering a new person on +, you immediately choose which circle to place the other user in. Default circles are: Friends, Acquaintances and Family, but you can create your own for whatever your needs. Then, whenever you share information, you choose which circles to share with. For example, if Juan is my boss and I learn that he has google+, I can add him to my “work” circle, and later when I share a picture of myself funneling a four loko, I will click the “friends” circle to share with, and my job will be safe. Meanwhile, on facebook, my grandfather is seeing pictures of me doing the Macarena in my underwear (the result of a dare, I swear.) The circle interface is a joy to use and exceedingly simple, with drop down menus and drag and drop fun to be had all over the place. Seriously about the drop down menus though, they are just everywhere; clearly the designers had some fun when they were making this thing.

Circles is the best of the Google+’s three main innovations, and it is by far the greatest contribution to the social network community. Sparks, which is weird and confusing, allows you to pick interests and then follow stories about them in a stream-like format. I haven’t really figured out how to use that yet, so I’m not going to talk about it. The third idea, “hangouts” is relatively straightforward. It allows you to “hangout,” which basically means you are available to video chat. Up to 10 other users can then hangout with you, making it sort of like a video conference, but with a chill name.

I should talk about the “stream,” which is like facebook’s news feed but with circles integrated into it. Not only is it nice and clean, and looks pretty much exactly like the newsfeed. By default it displays content uploaded by all the people you follow (everyone in all of your circles,) and on the left there is a menu allowing you to choose individual circles to display. Its pretty nifty and pretty smooth to use, which sort of sums up the google+ experience as far as I can tell. Its been reasonably easy to pick up, and has limited novelty appeal (making circles was fun for about 5 minutes,) but without the 700 million+ users, (not to mention all of their pictures) there is really no reason to choose it over facebook for the time being. The most promising thing about google+ is that it can at least provide facebook with its first serious creative competitor since it dethroned myspace.* With any luck this Zuckerberg and crew will find a way make it so that we can easily choose with whom we share our information, and we will all be saved a couple awkward conversations at family reunions.

*A quick google search notified me that myspace may in fact still be around, who knew? Next thing you’ll tell me is that Friendster is still up and running.

Mundsson

Music Criticism as Intellectualizing an Art Form

Toss out the word ‘pitchfork’ at a party and its unlikely one of your friends will jump to its defense when someone inevitably begins a rant extolling it for excessive douchebaggery, among other things. However, your v-necked friends’ silence on the matter belies the fact that some of them probably read the website…just for the year-end lists, of course.

What is it about pitchfork that galvanizes so much hatred that even its supporters hide behind the Internet's anonymity? Other music sites such as Blender, Spin  and Rolling Stone gain similar readership, yet these magazines are neither referenced nor hated on as much as the indie music magazine. While they are Pitchfork’s contemporary music reviewers, they each also print physical magazines, while P4k (as it is lovingly dubbed by its admirers) remains an “e-zine,” existing only in the hyperrealm. However, even Robert Christgau’s website is more often visited, and the self-proclaimed “Dean of American Rock Critics’” reviews are on average more pretentious and more harsh than even the worst of Pitchfork’s, which is saying something considering the latter once reviewed Jet’s Get Born by posting only a video of a chimpanzee urinating in its own mouth.

Perhaps, in an instance of hating the player in place of the game, Pitchfork has come to epitomize music reviewing in general, and it is at that nebulous idea that disdain is directed. While Rolling Stone reviews music (albeit in a much more accessible fashion,) their magazine also covers movies, politics, electronics, celebrity culture and more, while Pitchfork’s website is primarily music reviews, music news and dense, esoteric musical essays. Thus, people who bookmark pitchfork.com aren’t in it “for the articles,” they are there to read music reviews. Their condescending and inaccessible reviews have attracted contempt towards music criticism in general. Hence the question becomes: “Should Music be Reviewed?” I submit that it should.

Let’s get one thing out of the way; music reviews are inherently pretentious. It takes a pretty inflated sense of self to deem yourself a judge of quality (ignore the fact that that is essentially what I will be doing on this blog.) In addition, when reviewers get mean (pitchfork has given 12 “0.0s” to date), things change. Its one thing to say that because one likes an album, its good. But it is entirely presumptuous to assess the quality of a piece of art as negative, although it does generally result in the most entertaining reviews (see anything given a negative review by Robert Christgau.) I applaud pitchfork for recently deciding not to review music they don’t like, and even removing a number-rating-system from their track reviews entirely.

Music Reviews’ most important function is to signify to the consumer what music is worth listening to. Lets face the facts here; there is a crap load of music out there, and some people get paid to listen to it all day and tell other people what music is good. Why not at least listen to what they have to say? While obsessively reading music reviews may directly lead to an overestimation of the popularity/quality/godliness of a band like, say, Radiohead, to never read critical examinations of music could mean a much more limited access to varied genres. One reason I listen to basically every kind of music (except country, because let’s be honest that’s just unreasonable) is that a bunch of people I’ve never met who seem to know what they are talking about told me a bunch of it was great. We listen to economists about the economy, doctors about our health and political analysts’ about politics before making our own educated decisions, so why not listen to what critics have to say about art when making decisions about art?

Music Criticism provides another important function, and that is to intellectualize the listening of music. I’m sure I just lost a couple friends for that statement alone, but hear me out. If you can ignore the ratings, a review is essentially the literary analysis of the music by someone particularly qualified because of a musical/literary education. In a world where the general population often does not see contemporary music as Art, and the consumption of music-as-an-album has been killed by iTunes, Pitchfork is there to remind us that sometimes, there is more to music than a danceable beat and glittery production. Some people like to go deeper into their music than others, and if they can do it without being insufferable about it, they should be able to live in harmony with people only interested in the next Ke$ha single. As long as you’re not pubescent or already a prick, you should be able to read music reviews without them inflating your ego to the point that you think your music taste is better than others, or that certain artists are more important than others.

In the end, there are many different kinds of music, and it should all only be evaluated on its own terms. I’m in favor of continuing to pay Liberal Arts grads to do said evaluation. When its said and done, the final arbiter of quality is not Ryan Schreiber, or Robert Christgau, or Stephen Thomas Erlewine, and its certainly not the Grammys; that power lies in the hands of the consumer. If you can remember that, and never to drop the word ‘Pitchfork’ in conversation, feel free to indulge in music criticism.

Correction:

An earlier form of this article incorrectly stated that Pitchfork was rated the 94,213th most read site in the US by Alexa.  This rating was actually for pitchforkmedia.com.  The real pitchfork.com is rated 913th as of this moment.

Baldur Mundsson

Greetings, my name is Baldur Mundsson, and I am the greatest arguer you know. I spent my early childhood in the frigid lands of the north, debating with everyone I met on the most trivial of subjects, ranging from correct grammar to the length of the coastline of Great Britain (hint, its infinity.) After reading Atlas Shrugged, I realized my true calling in life was to travel the world, pushing the boundaries of everyday conversation by challenging just about everything anyone says. I embarked on my grand tour of Europe at the tender age of 15, spent a year in Amsterdam (where I found so much debate-worthy misinformation I was forced to set up residence,) before traveling to Japan where I infiltrated a Japanese family. My welcome quickly wore out after a particularly heated argument about the Japanese vs. American Showers (the former being mindboggling for a country that hovers around 98.5% humidity for 3 months out of the year.) I avoided a potential Samurai duel with my host-father and flew to California, where I began a one year cross-country trek. In a brief stint in prison, I met Bort, the first person worthy of my debate skills I have found to date. The rest is history; he suggested the creation of this blog with the intention of spreading truth to the world, while I'm just here to push your buttons.