Reflection Time
Has it been a year already?
Today marks the 110th Post here at My Integrated Life. Time to pause for a moment, look back and reflect a bit. As a writer, a musician, a composer, a father, an educator, and storyteller I have found deep satisfaction in producing these posts for the platform.
For years I’d held off from diving headlong into social media until Julie Gammack last year persuaded me to try Substack and the Iowa Writers Collaborative. I first encountered the Internet in the late 1980’s and by the early 1990’s, Howard Rheingold the author of Smart Mobs, offered one of the first salient reviews of how the landscape of social media was going to operate.
Howard, himself an new media pioneer at Stewart Brand’s Whole Earth Catalog, was present at the dawn of the social media age. His presence on The Well (Whole Earth ‘lectronic Link) made him and pioneers like my friend and digital iconoclast Ted Nelson major contributors to the “rules of the road” of the early Internet with it’s collection of MUDs, and other digital gathering spots.
It was egalitarian, it was community supportive. Flame wars did break out but were generally confined to the “mind-combatants” directly involved.
Social Media…ummm, No Thanks!
This model was first broken by 1996 with the advent of an audio streaming program called Napster.
Instead of egalitarian, Napster’s model was Pirate-tarian meaning that “if you could access it (“It” being any then-conceivable form of digitized creative expression), it was yours without charge and without regard for the intellectual property rights of the de facto copyright owners, authors, composers, institutions or creative entities responsible for bringing said expression to life.
After legalistic interpretations of intellectual property rights gave “wiggle room” to those who would “sample without compensation” the trap was layed for creatives who ventured forth onto the thin ice of intellectual property law conceived for a world of paper printing presses and buggy whips.
The market for creatives has never actually recovered from this digital destruction as we face a world where our intellectual property is not safe from uncompensated exploitation.
Interestingly, in the academic years 1996-2000, as Director of Technology at The Branson School I actively instituted a code of “digital morality” which stressed that “just because you can access something online, doesn’t mean the rules of intellectual property, or indeed basic humanity are suspended.” Of course, others have a much different perspective on this question and they appear to be winning.
Mine was a different from the ‘move fast and break things” mentality springing up during the dawning days of Internet Protocol and digital media. Young computer hackers everywhere were pushing the boundaries and similar to car-crazy kids with hot rods of the 50’s-60’s they posed a very worthy moral challenge.
One of my Branson students of the class of 1999 took this important challenge to heart. He engineered a high-respect platform that today enables artists and their fans to form a channel by which fans and supporters can literally pay respect to artists, writers and creators. You might have heard about it, it’s called Patreon. CEO and founder Jack Conte was one of the most fun, creative and respectful young geeks in my computer lab of the late 90’s. Running a major business enterprise is definitely hardball but Jack poured his ethical foundation into a business that reflects the nature of the the kid I knew in the 90’s. A foundation which is the exact opposite of the exploitive seemingly (to me) amoral types who run an organization like Facebook.
I post my work here on Substack because as a writer/audio artist it offers us, my dear readers, listeners and supporters a way to honor our relationship in a way that no one else in this space currently does.
Conditions for digital commerce could’ve been even more rewarding and less exploitive from the beginning of the ‘Web but we know what happens when HUGE MONEY is at stake.
The following links review the posts that I think will give new readers an idea of the topics, personalities, issues and stories that have been featured here at My Integrated Life since January of 2024. After reviewing what’s been posted (knowing that there is much more to come), you will become a paid subscriber either monthly, yearly or as a major supporter.
Now…A brief recap of year one here at My Integrated Life:
Extraordinary Iowans Musician
Extraordinary Iowans Media/Advertising
Black Iowa History Family Edition
Iowa Youth Music (1960’s Edition)
Iowa Youth Music (2010 Edition)
Iowa Blues All-Stars (Blues Hall-of-Famers)
Standing on the Shoulders of Giants (Never Lose Hope)
How My Integrated Life Came to Be (part one)
How My Integrated Life Came to Be (Part Two
Puppets, Puppets, Puppets ! 50 Years of Iowa Storytelling
The Fourth Estate The view from Freshman Year J-School
My Integrated Life Begins Here; Episode One
Ok, that’s a quick review of some of the past year’s topics. I’m striving to make the days to come as equally intriguing as the last 12 months have been. There is certainly no shortage of topics on the horizon. History, Culture, Civic Action, Interviews, the Arts and more. My gratitude to you dear readers and listeners for your appreciation of the stories and sounds behind My Integrated Life.
When I’m feelin low, I know just where to go
Up the road I’ll head to hear my Webster County friend
Songs and stories he tells, some true, some are myth
You’ll Always hear some wisdom from my buddy Shadric Smith
The Iowa Writers Collaborative is fast becoming my favorite destination for Stories, Songs, Images and…Recipes
HAPPY SUNDAY YA’LL
Thank you for this reflection and connections to the past year of your _My Integrated Life_ posts, but also the history of the internet, the rise of social media, and the challenges and possibilities technology poses. 🙏🏼 Thank you for what you've done and continue to do to keep us reflecting, connecting, and moving forward with knowledge, care, connection, and solidarity! 💜
Thanks, Brother! I’ll forward this to many because most people figure that if you’re a musician and you’ve played on “records” and been on stage that you’re set for life and what are you complaining about? This spells it out very well in a non-complaining tone!