You don't have to be local
Mon, 12/03/2012 - 11:33am
Interesting article here by Derek Sivers (original CD Baby Guy).
http://sivers.org/local
Thu, 12/06/2012 - 11:26am
#2
I understand what you're
I understand what you're saying here and to some degree I agree. But I'm not sure what a "fully gentrified neighborhood" vs. a non gentrified neighborhood is? I'd be curious to see what you think the percentage of artists would be in either.
I think a lot of artist live in depressed neighborhoods because they're cheap and when you're a struggling artist you don't make much money. The dysfunctional practices of capitalism and the real estate industry are bigger problems than I care to tackle at this juncture.
I think there is nothing inherently wrong with people taking pride in their neighborhood as long as it doesn't turn into ethnocentrism.
Fri, 12/07/2012 - 10:26am
#3
"You can focus your time locally or globally."
That's all I read of the article/essay--the first sentence.
The way I see it he is already wrong.
Fri, 12/07/2012 - 2:16pm
#4
Care to elaborate?
Care to elaborate?
Fri, 12/07/2012 - 2:46pm
#5
First off
let me admit that I am tempted to say "No", because for my entire life every time I have spoke my mind I have had to pay a worldly price and pain hurts me as much as anyone else.
Having gotten that out of the way I believe you are sincerely asking me if I'd care to elaborate, and as a peer that regularly engages in dialogue on here I see no reason not to.
After I read your question I read the entire article (and none of the replys below it).
A few things pop to mind.
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The first is where does he draw the line?
1 mile?, 10 miles?, 100 miles?
What's local?
Now, that's not a very big one--just a little thought.
One can easily say "local is how far he can travle on foot in a day". it strikes me that is roughly what he means by local.
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The second thing is that in my mind right this second what we are really talking about is:
A. Current Maximum Technology Enabled Local
&
B. Human Body Powered Local
(This is off the cuff, but probably good enough.)
We have temporarily fixed it (by doing irrevocable damage to our home base--Planet Earth) so that the whole planet can be considered local.
This will end, of course.
It's a fad.
It's a fad in which our endulgence in it means our species will die out long before it would have and our children will breathe dirtier air and drink more contaminated water than we did.
Except for us destroying our whole planet local means local--how far you can walk and get back home in time to go to sleep--basically.
So we have our temporary technology allowed local and our human powered local.
To carry on participating in the technology based local requires partaking in using, maintaining, and manufacturing toxic objects.
To participate in the human powered local (what I really would like to call the real local) one need do no more than hunt, and walk.
Of course, the technology fans have destroyed the habitat so now how do you really live a truly local life?
I am not going to go on.
Sometimes I consider writing books going into this stuff.
Just as no one buys my cdrs no one would buy my books, which takes us full circle to the beginning of this where I said I am tempted to just stay quiet, work at a grocery store and die like society advocates I do.
Take care, Matt--and I enjoyed reading the posts (though I did not watch the videos) about the technology enabled local tour.
Fri, 12/07/2012 - 6:50pm
#6
In other words
if you are going to use all the latest technology then the whole planet is local.
It just means destroying the planet so that you can have that be the case for a small amount of time.
Maybe not a good idea I say as I type on a laptop knowing a guy in Kansas is going to read it.
Sat, 12/08/2012 - 2:07pm
#7
I think you're on to
I think you're on to something here. I believe this article is somehow releated: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/innovations/post/the-mobile-bystande...
I feel the same hypocrisy as you do when it comes to so much digitial/global communication but I think it's okay as long as you try to balance it out with face time with people. I've been following the writer of the original article, Derek Sivers, for quite some time. When I think about it, he (CDBaby) was an early inspiration for me to start the OJ thing.
Sat, 12/08/2012 - 8:21pm
#8
Reply with Hendrix in the background.
"I feel the same hypocrisy as you do when it comes to so much digitial/global communication but I think it's okay as long as you try to balance it out with face time with people."
Quote by MMM
Well, that's how I currently live--some digital communicating and some face to face, but I don't agree it's okay.
As for balancing it out it's really just a justification that doesn't hold up--for me.
If something is wrong it needs to not be done at all--and environmentally speaking (as well as other ways if you ask me) digital communication - all of it and any of it - causes harm.
This isn't chopping down a tree to build something and planting another one.
This is toxifying the water and air so that our children get cancer faster than we did.
This is leading to extinction of the human species--and most all other species on this planet (if not all) right along side of it.
The hypocrite types on though. (I mean me.)
I'm not sure Sivers makes enough of a distinction between being devoted to a specific local scene and being devoted to the principles of maintaining a local scene. I know many people, myself included, that have moved a bit over the years, but wherever we land, we always find ways of contributing to the local community infrastructure.
On a side note, but a significant one, it's always interesting to note that artists tend to vote and lean Democrat/liberal/counter-culture, and put a huge emphasis on the federal government's role on helping, say, the working class. In reality, while many musicians in New York come here to network and subsequently reach fans on a global level, locally their most significant role may be that that of a gentrification lackey for real estate agents. Local residents are often, for years before we move into their neighborhoods, being denied basic services in an effort to move them out of their buildings so that artists can move in. Whenever anyone claims to be from "Bushwick" or blogs/talks/shares information about how their neighborhood is the new hip stop, they're basically playing into predictions that were made by real estate agents who were eyeing these neighborhoods years before the artists were.
I know it seems like I might be taking things off topic, but given that this artists' role is universal on a global scale (artist scenes, any any city, are connected with gentrification), and that ultimately it's global businesses that move into fully gentrified neighborhoods, a fully exploration of what the word "local" means in terms of a "scene" is important.