The Life and Death of the Alternative Press

IF it weren't for the '80s Village Voice, I probably would not be a journalist. (The world, I expect, would be a better place.)

This weekend I have a story in Al Jazeera America about good times and bad for alternative weeklies. I talk about the crystalline sense of mission these publications had during conservative times, and the troubles they've had more recently. And I try to shine a light on the good and important work they still do.

In the piece I get into my youthful infatuation with the alt-press -- I interned at the Voice, freelanced for the now-defunct Boston Phoenix soon after leaving college, later worked for New Times Los Angeles. As nasty as that company could be, we had a blast there, some of the time, and I'm still proud of the work my colleagues and I did there. (Even if New Times responded by killing the paper and destroying its online archive.) Where is the alt press now?

And I try to sketch out what various weeklies have meant to the city of Los Angeles, which remains the Misread City.

Happy holidays to all my readers.

Dave Allen on Rock Music and the Internet

RECENTLY I've been corresponding with Dave Allen, bassist for the British post-punk group Gang of Four. His ideas on digital culture -- mostly strongly opposed to those of David Lowery and David Byrne -- are as forceful as his bass playing on Entertainment!

I'll point out that I disagree with Mr. Allen on much of what he says; I'm less optimistic that the new system will work out for musicians (and I have seen from quite a close perspective how it works out for most journalists.) 

For example, he argues that there has been no golden age for musicians, that making a living has always been hard, and so on. Well, of course, that's all literally true, but just because a system was not perfect does not mean it has not gotten substantially worse.

I could argue to anyone who tells me, say, that Congress has run aground that we've always had conflicts in Washington, going back to the 18th century, and that Ted Cruz is just a latter-day version of whoever... Same with arguments about income inequality, or anything that matters. This argument does not help clarify where we are at present: You do not have to acknowledge the existence of a golden age to want things to be better or to resist and criticize the way they have gone. 

But Allen's an extremely sharp guy, a lively writer, and he deserves to be heard. Here's our Salon conversation. 

David Lowery vs. Silicon Valley

CAMPER Van Beethoven's singer David Lowery has become the most ornery of those fighting for musician's rights. He's erupted over piracy, Spotify, lyric websites, and the battle between the surviving Beastie Boys (with the ghost of Adam Yauch) and GoldieBlox.

I speak to him for Salon here.

He makes a pretty good case for what's wrong with Silicon Valley techno-utopianism, which leaves artists out of the revenue stream.

(Lowery and his argument also make an appearance in my book Creative Destruction, which comes out next year.)

The Web, Jaron Lanier and the Disappearing Middle Class

TODAY I have a long and I hope substantial Q+A with web visionary-turned-skeptic Jaron Lanier. Here it is. We get into some ideas that reflect on my investigation of the fate of the creative class in the 21st century, including the growth of a tiny digital plutocracy at the expense of the imperiled middle class.

The piece is provoked by his powerful and odd new book, Who Owns the Future?

Musicians vs. the Internet

THIS week has seen an exchange between young music fan Emily White and indie rocker David Lowery about how fans consume music these days, and where that leaves the artists. 


So far, the argument between the two has remained civil – and Lowery refuses to condescend to White or her generational peers in his piece -- but the nasty tone of the Web all but guarantees that things will get ugly.


HERE is my piece for Salon on the matter, which dovetails with my recent writing on the plight of the creative class.

Digital Parasites

THE Internet has brought us lots of good things; it's also put an enormous number of people out of work, especially members of the creative class who've been turned into underpaid, unstable content providers. Information, after all, wants to be free.

"It's tempting to believe that the devaluation of creativity we've seen over the last decade was somehow inevitable," writes former Billboard editor Robert Levine, "that technology makes information so easy to distribute that any attempt to regulate it is futile."

Levine's new book -- Free Ride: How Digital Parasites are Destroying the Culture Business, and How the Culture Business Can Fight Back -- argues that it didn't have to be this way. Various industries -- music, newspapers, publishers -- swallowed a lot of b.s. about how the Web was going to make everyone rich, and now they're living with the consequences.

I spoke to Levine for today's Salon here. It's part of the Art in Crisis series I'm writing with a number of other scribes. Please check it out.

UPDATE: And here is a review from Sunday's (27 Nov) NYT Book Review, calling this book an important statement.

Cool New Blog Launch

TODAY I want to announce the launch of a new blog dedicated to subjects of pressing importance here in California -- education, books, technology, libraries and reading. Dig Me Out -- the name comes from the founder's roots in '90s indie rock -- looks at these subjects and takes a special interest in Young Adult fiction.

It's run by Pasadena school librarian Sara Scribner, who like many of her ilk in Southern California has been pink-slipped by her school district.

The fact that Sara -- and that this turn of events could exile us out of state -- is my wife makes me even more enthusiastic at directing readers of The Misread City to Dig Me Out.

Sara'a two latest posts are about the erosion of quality public education -- something she and I both benefited from on different coasts in the '70s and '80s --  and the disappearance of parents from YA novels.

Hope my readers find Sara's new blog intriguing.

Saving SoCal's Libraries

THIS blog is dedicated, of course, to West Coast culture, from classical music to science fiction, and I tend to stay away from politics here. But an issue crucial to the survival and access to West Coast culture is breaking now: the closing of libraries and especially school libraries in Southern California. This has been brought about by the recession and bad political judgement.


Pasadena Unified and LAUSD have plans to fire all of their school librarians, with the closing of those libraries likely. It feels like they are fulfilling the very East Coast stereotype of Southern California as shallow and anti-intellectual that I have spent much of my time in LA combatting. Who needs Bradbury's "firemen" from Fahrenheit 451, torching books, when locals decide to dismantle access to books and ideas on the basis of "fiscal responsibility"?


It's coming at a time when the economic climate has caused use of libraries nationwide to surge, and when the need for students to be information literate had made school librarians more crucial than ever.


HERE is the Op-Ed piece from today's LA Times. The piece concentrates on the way the Internet -- that great blessing and curse -- has made the work of school libraries more complicated and more important. Information flows so freely that young people can't separate the good from the bad. As school librarian Sara Scribner writes:


And to most kids, whatever they read on the Internet is "all good." I've been told, quite emphatically, that the Apollo moonwalk never happened, the Holocaust was a hoax and George W. Bush orchestrated 9/11 -- all based on text, photos or videos found online.


I should add here that Sara, a former LATimes and LA Weekly music writer who reviewed major records by Beck, Wilco and Sleater-Kinney before beginning  a new career as a teacher a decade ago, is also my wife. If she, along with these other school librarians who've been pink-slipped, loses her job, your favorite culture blog will be broadcasting from Portland or Austin, or not at all. (Because the LA Times decided that I was expendable, the two of us and our young son depend on her health insurance.)


Politically, we're seeing a combination of short-sightedness by the school districts and a lack of courage by Gov. Schwarzennegger to properly fund the schools and the rest of the state's infrastructure with tiny taxes on the wealthy. Gov. Reagan had the political guts to raise taxes for the sake of building the state; this supposed macho man has shown nothing but cowardice and confusion in dealing with the financial crisis.


So if you care about West Coast culture, or about The Misread City, please tell your friends in Pasadena and LA to make some noise. Interested parties can check out this site dedicated to saving Pasadena's schools through a Yes vote on Measure CC... To be -- I hope -- continued.


Addendum: Sara and others were on NPR's To the Point with Warren Olney, for a wide-ranging and fascinating conversation about these issues and more -- here is a link.