Culture – Page 5 – Life on the Wicked Stage: Act 3

Apple TV+ Price Increase and the Dummy Price

Death, taxes, and subscription price increases

Times have changed how money changes hands. Back in the day purchasing a subscription meant you got a deal. It also created a relationship between the customer and the service, that often, but not always, protected subscribers from price increases. At least for a time. That really no longer exists. Sure there are deals and free trials to seduce new customers, but typically those deals are for a period of time and then the price goes up. It’s changed the definition of what we used to call “the dummy price.”

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“The dummy price” was for those who didn’t subscribe, thus paying full price. We used to joke in the theatre biz that “the dummy price” was for the guy who’s wife told him she wanted to see a show, and then he’d have his secretary use his credit card to buy the tickets when he got to the office.

When we had to raise prices we’d do so on single tickets and reward our subscribers by telling them we’d keep their current prices intact, thus increasing their savings and further building trust in relationship. That made it a bit easier sell when we inevitably had to raise subscription prices.

It was similar to buying the newspaper each day, instead of subscribing. A subscription was always cheaper than the newsstand price.

The only thing I think I subscribe to these days that actually offers any type of real savings is an E-ZPass, which in my state cuts the cost you pay at the toll booth by 50%.

Of course those are different markets than streaming entertainment, which didn’t exist when I was setting “dummy prices.” Subscriptions for streaming entertainment only gets you access. Certainly a lot of content is available for the price you pay, but realistically it’s more than anyone could ever consume. But the promise is access. The quantity makes much of the content as disposable as it is available, even if it is cheaper than back in the day when you had to purchase physical or digital media in order to view it at home.

The only thing you’re really buying is the inevitable price increase and a bit more frustration in balancing out your entertainment budget.

The new definition of “the dummy price” is hoping there are enough customers who don’t pay attention and miss the price increase.

Apple announced today it’s increasing its monthly subscription price for its streaming entertainment service, Apple TV+ from $9.99 to $12.99 a month. Other streaming services do the same thing, more frequently than Apple. But every player in the market affects the perception of all the rest.

It’s led to a sort of comedic game for consumers who want to stream from different services. They cancel a service for a period of time, often waiting for new content to become abundantly available or a particularly desired title, and then they’ll resubscribe after canceling another service. Or they’ll just keep creating new email accounts, resubscribing under a new name.

Currently the streaming companies seem to be comfortable enough with this type of customer churn, but it builds more attraction to titles than it does to a service’s brand, which in turn drives up the marketing costs for each new title. I imagine at some point streaming companies will find a way to clamp down and try to minimize that churn, the same way they have done with password sharing.

But the subscription game is not just an entertainment industry business practice. There are quite a few services that want your monthly tithe and offer the same kind of price inducements. But it’s certainly easier to cancel Netflix for a period of time than it is some of these other types of services once the inevitable price increase comes along. It will be interesting to see how the AI market shakes out once the first big company needs to break the $20 a month barrier for general consumers.

Bottom line it’s a shell game for both customers and companies. Death and taxes used to be the only constants in that old axiom about the only things certain in life. That needs to be amended to include price increases for subscription services.

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Mainstream Media Continues to Dismantle Itself

MSBNC to become MS Now

It’s been an accepted part of conventional wisdom for quite some time that what we consider mainstream media is gradually fading away in the face of newer generations turning to other sources available on the Internet for news and entertainment. Heck, even some older generations are turning what used to be the dial.

The business models have suffered for a while now whether it’s print, broadcast or cable. The fading away has gained new and seemingly panicked momentum thanks to the depredations of the Trump administration, aided by the greedy cowardice of the corporations worried more about avoiding the wrath of the beast they helped create, than the standards they all proudly trumpeted for years. Those trumpets have largely fallen silent or just ring hollow.

The end of late night comedy shows captured a lot of attention recently, but eventually most broadcast scripted news and entertainment will also give way. Which is ironic given that the convicted felon largely responsible for this quickening pace came to prominence via Reality TV, which let me tell you is anything but reality and is very scripted.

Now NBC Universal, owned by Comcast, is making a move away from MSNBC, attempting to distance the Peacock from controversy by rebranding as MS Now. That little branding acronym stands for My Source | News | Opinion | World.

Yeesh. I guess the marketing department was the first place they made changes. As a social media friend Judgment Dave says, “it sounds like a translation of something in Japanese that doesn’t translate well into English.”

It’s weird, yet it isn’t to hang onto the ‘MS’, given that MSNBC was birthed as partnership with Microsoft and NBC, long since dissolved. Somewhere Bill Gates is laughing because it also sounds like a software program delivered on a CD-ROM.

Whatever sturm and drang comes from this news of the moment, (news of the Now?) the bigger picture is that these troubled corporations, in what feels like desperate efforts to try and save themselves, are essentially hastening their eventual final curtains in the wake of current trends already overtaking them.

Some may lay blame on the rise of the Internet and mobile devices in every hand, but the fact of the matter is the smart folks at the top of these corporations missed the moment. Some eventually tried to make changes. Remember CNN Plus? But in my opinion their failures were less about the delivery mechanisms and more about the decline of the news and entertainment products that they delivered as the cost cutters held sway.

NBCUniversal isn’t done trimming the sails yet. Plans are in place to spinoff other properties as well (CNBC, USA, Oxygen, and E!).

Some will blame it on advertisers seeking the best way to reach customers. That’s mostly true, but ask podcasters how that’s going for them these days. Chasing advertising revenue is always a cyclical game for just about everything except sports.

It’s no wonder then that it feels like we see our politics more and more resembling blood sports. Of course the irony is audiences claim they want less, not more in that realm. What will be interesting to see in the next decade or so is how political advertising, which fills so many corporate media coffers sorts itself out, once the usual outlets fade away as they continue to play to ever diminishing audiences that keep spreading themselves wider and wider, attempting to flee the same old, same old.

Certainly ads will continue to be designed to run on social media and circulate that way. But the only folks making real money off of that trend are the political consultants and ad-makers.

I hope I’m around to see how my grandkids eventually consume what we once revered and respected as the news. I’ll regale them with what I imagine they will view as fairy tales and myths.

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Sunday Morning Reading

The lazy days of Summer

We’re technically out of the Dog Days of Summer, but it doesn’t feel much like it. It’s the kind of hot Summer I remember as a kid when the dogs would spend the hot part of the day lazing under the porch. I’m spending mine traveling (too much traveling) and sharing what I can here and there. Find some shade and check out this week’s Sunday Morning Reading.

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Peter Wehner thinks the only way out of the wreckage we’re in is to rewrite the cultural script. Tall task. He spells it out in The Virtue of Integrity.

Knowing is half the battle. What you do with knowledge is an altogether different story as knowing and knowledge are two different things. Check out Jim Stewartson’s piece The War on Knowing.

Somehow in all of the wreckage we’re sorting through, empathy became a bad thing for those doing the wrecking. NatashaMH thinks this crazy Artificial Intelligence race we’re in is taking the human out of being human. If you ask me it’s all a bit too human as we look to foist off responsibility for the choices we make. The Risks of Synthetic Empathy is a great piece. Give it a read.

Then take a look at Mathew Ingram’s piece, People Fall In Love With All Kinds of Things Including AI Chatbots. When chatbots start filing for divorce I think we might have created Artificial Generative Intelligence.

Kyle Chayka is exploring The Revenge of Millennial Cringe. Home may be where the heart is, but it was a terrible song.

Stephen Marche is talking about Profound and Abiding Rage: Canada’s Answer to America’s Abandonment. Abandonment is a good way to describe what we’re all feeling these days.

Apple’s about to unleash new operating systems for its devices in a few weeks and the one that has my interest is for iPads. From what I’ve seen (I don’t run the betas) the changes to the multi-tasking capabilities will be a positive step forward. Craig Grannell takes a look at how long it took for Apple to finally make these changes in Apple Finally Destroyed Steve Jobs’ Vision of the iPad. Good.

Chicago’s Uptown Theatre celebrated 100 years this week. Robert Loerzel takes a look in Uptown Theatre: 100 Years of Glory and Decay.

When you think you’re the center of the universe it can rock your world when you find out you’re not. Kids learn this. Republicans in the current administration have not. Eric Berger writes about NASA’s Acting Chief Calls For the End of Earth Science at the Space Agency.

(Image from Machekhin Evgenii on Shutterstock.)

If you’re interested in just what the heck Sunday Morning Reading is all about you can read more about the origins of Sunday Morning Reading here. If you’d like more click on the Sunday Morning Reading link in the category column to check out what’s been shared on Sunday’s past. You can also find more of my writings on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome.

Chicago’s Uptown Theatre Hits 100 and is Still On The Skids

Decaying majesty

They certainly don’t make movie theatres like they used to. That’s not surprising or new, and long ago signaled a passing of a time when building special places for people to gather became less of a priority than so many other concerns. Chicago’s Uptown Theatre was one of those special places back in the day. It’s been decaying and shuttered since 1981 and every now and then efforts surface to try and bring it back to life.

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The Uptown celebrates its 100th birthday on August 18. Built as a grand show palace by Balaban & Katz and the architectural firm Rapp & Rapp, it was hailed as spectacular, and a “splendiferous palace of a place.” The Uptown sat 4,320 in what was called “an acre of seats.”

Offering movies and live entertainment it was billed as a “shrine to democracy where there are no privileged patrons. The wealthy rub elbows with the poor — and are better for this contact.” It also had air conditioning.

Obviously a lot changed throughout the years, talkies took over from silent films, the Great Depression, and the advent of TV changed the dynamic. The Uptown part of town itself fell on hard times and saw big changes, and during much of my time in Chicago was the last section of the lakefront resisting redevelopment. The final act on the Uptown stage was a concert by the J. Geils Band in 1981.

Robert Loerzel has a terrific piece looking back at the Uptown Theatre in the Chicago Tribune that’s more than worth a read as we approach the show palace’s centennial. There’s also an excellent gallery of photos, which the photo above is from. The link should be a gift link, although I don’t know how long that lasts. Loerzel has also authored a new book, The Uptown: Chicago’s Endangered Movie Palace

When I first moved to Chicago in 1999 there were still a few of these show palaces in operation around the city, but the Uptown had long since shuttered. I got to take a tour of the place in the early 1990’s and the scale of what it once offered was impressive to see, only dwarfed by the decay and disrepair.

There are still efforts to try and find funding to restore the Uptown, but I’m sad to say I think priorities have shifted in such a way that we won’t see that happen.

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Sunday Morning Reading

Back home from travels. Still sharing stuff that warrants attention.

Back home after a couple of weeks on the road. Good times. Crazy times. Nevertheless, it’s Sunday and there’s Sunday Morning Reading to share.

“Life isn’t just about knowing what you should do, or having the resources to do it, it’s about following through.” So says, John Burn-Murdoch in his piece The Troubling Decline In Conscientiousness. I agree there’s a decline. I’m not so sure the remedy is as simple as it sounds.

The AI race is continuing whether we want it to or not. Apparently there’s now a way to create your own TV show if you want to keep diving deeper into your own delusions. Nina Metz has a great piece on this intrusion into the entertainment industry saying After A Long Day, The Last Thing I Want Is To Tell GenAI To Create a TV Show For Me To Watch.

In Notes From The Circus, Mike Brock takes a look at The Faux Intellectuals of Silicon Valley. “When oligarchs treat human civilization as thought experiments while sophisticated courtiers provide intellectual cover, democratic discourse itself becomes impossible.” Nailed it.

I don’t know about you, but my handwriting went downhill mere minutes after I was no longer graded on it. So it has always sucked. So, I’m not sure if NatashaMH’s latest applies in my case, but she is taking a look at what happens When The Handwriting Changes, suggesting that the body keeps score and so does the pen. Damn, if I’d know there was score keeping…

Mathew Ingram takes a look at age gating, the move afoot to protect kids from the perils of the Internet in The UK’s Well-Meaning Online Safety Law Is A Dumpster Fire. American dumpsters won’t be far behind, because we like to hide from the things we think are bad, pretending we’ve solved the problem, instead of addressing the problem.

Matthew Wolfe tells a great story about Chicago and America’s first black detective, who had a few secrets of his own in The Talented Mr. Bruseaux.

The turmoil among Apple users continues to roil for lots of reasons. Certainly this week’s obsequious bending of the knee by Tim Cook has added more to it. I wrote a bit about that here. I like John Gruber’s take on the issue in Gold, Frankincense, and Silicon.

(Image from OlegRi on Shutterstock)

Marc Maron’s Panicked Is Worth Watching

Don’t panic. Just watch.

Got a chance to watch Marc Maron’s latest on HBO or whatever it calls itself this week. Called Marc Maron Panicked, it’s genuine good stuff if you’re a fan of Maron’s comedy and satire, or even if you’re not.

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Playing off of the panic most of us feel about most things these days, Maron’s pointed observations not only hit his targets, they knock a few of them down, delivering more than a few belly laughs.

If you think he’s panicked and anxious about the criminals running the country these days, you’re right. But as usual Maron takes sharp aim at liberal failings that helped usher them into office. It’s not all politics. Evacuating during the LA fires, end of life issues, avoiding Nazis and other calamities fuel his panic and his comedy.

Highly recommended, even if you’re not a Marc Maron fan.

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

David Mamet’s Woke Pain Behind His Masks

“Always tell the truth. It’s the easiest thing to remember.” -David Mamet

I first arrived in Chicago in 1999 aiming for a theatre career. I arrived just as David Mamet, one of the bright lights in the theatre firmament at the time, was spreading his wings and moving on from the city that birthed the characters in his plays. Here’s the thing, I was never that big a fan of his work.

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I saw the genius in it, but in the viewing it was always as predictable as it was entertaining. In later years after Mamet had found success in film I actually came to believe that his work for the big screen was actually better than it ever was on a stage. As an example, I enjoy the film version of Glengarry Glenn Ross more than I ever have on stage and I attended the Amrerican premiere of that play at The Gooodman Theatre back in 1984. The Spainish Prisoner and State and Main are delights that I always enjoy revisting.

To be fair, I’m in a minority among my professional peers. There’s no denying Mamet’s influence in the theatre and film. Personally, I was more a fan of Sam Shepard’s work. The two ran neck and neck in popularity in my early days in the theatre. But that’s not what this is about.

Somewhere along the way, Mamet became even more of an enigma when he opened up about his political views, which in some ways spun in counter orbit to the milieu of much of what his plays seemed to profess. His plays had a power dynamic that while not completely in sync with the “eat the rich” vein, both celebrated and condemned the powerful, alongside empathy with the downtrodden or less capable.

He was always a gadfly who reveled in that reputation. But there’s reveling, and then there’s reveling. At times it seemed as if he aspired to assume a Bertolt Brecht-like influence. I’m referrring more about his views on theatre, than his political views. Check out his book True and False, or the videos and articles you can find all over the Internet.

No matter what you thought of his work on the stage or in the cinema, once he began commenting about politcal and social issues he became, I dare say, more entertaining than any piece of dramatic literature he created.

In a recent podcast with Sam Fragoso, Mamet revealed that part of the reason for his seemingly 180 degree turn in professing his political beliefs was because those in the media and literary circles that had always promoted him turned away from his work. No criticism stings more than being ignored. I’m not sure what’s the chicken or what’s the egg in that discussion, but it was a statement that did leave quite a bit of egg on his face. He later got fed up with Fragaoso and walked off the podcast.

Continuing to stay in the entertainment news this week, Mamet authored an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal called Sorry, Billionaires — There’s No Escape, essentially saying we’e all doomed regardless of how we’re measured on the wealth scale in life. Biilionaires who think they’ve built doomsday hide-aways will be undone by the laborers they hire to keep the places running. Of course those less privileged don’t even matter in the equation. It’s a reguritation of the history of the world that Brecht and Sondheim did better.

The thing of it is, for many Mamet was always as entertaining as he was enigmatic . I find him more so in these later chapters of his story, even with its odd and often confusing mix of woke hurt feelings bouncing up against his conservative bent.

But then, as Mamet, contradicting his maxim about truth says, “it’s not a lie. It’s a gift for fiction.”

You can also find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

A Trip Worth Taking: Billy Joel Documentary ‘And So It Goes’

Terrific trip down my lanes of memories.

Talk about bringing back the memories and the feels. The excellent Billy Joel documentary, And So It Goes, is a must watch if you’re a fan. Or even if you’re not. I am a fan and have been since I worked a load-in, load-out shift for a Billy Joel concert back in my college days and partied with his road crew.

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The excellent two-part documentary chronicles the ups, downs, and of course there’s plenty of Joel’s music, because it’s always about the music and where it took Joel and those of us who grew up with him. It’s more than a trip down memory lane, the four hours is a well spent vacation back in time. I highly recommend this.

It’s interesting, and I dare say rewarding, that two of the music artists I grew up with, Joel and Bruce Springsteen, have had excellent recent documentaries about their careers. As they and I both hit later decades of life it’s a good way to look back and dredge up memories often buried in the hurly burly of the current day to day. I consider these documentaries on HBO (or whatever it calls itself this week) gifts well received.

For those interested further, there’s a playlist of the music from And So It Goes available on all the usual music streaming services. If your library, like mine, is filled with the entire catalog of Joel’s music, it’s worth adding just to track and hear how some of his songs have matured, yet not lost any of relevance, and even gained both relevance and resonance with time.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Rest in Peace, Ryne Sandberg

Chicago Cubs legend passes away.

Watcing the Chicago Cubs lose to the Brewers last night when word came over the broadcast that Ryne Sandberg, the Cubs superstar second baseman had died, succumbing to cancer.

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Hit me harder than I would have thought imaginable. Not sure exactly why, but guessing it’s because Sandberg represented an era in my life when life itself seemed simpler, more sane, and as true as a line drive cleanly smacked to the outfiled.

I’m probably deluding myself with those thoughts, but that’s how it struck me last night.

Sandberg played baseball. He was a great at what he did. By all accounts he was genuinely kind to others. That’s all we should ever aspire to because in the end that’s all that matters.

And it is more than enough.

You can find more of my writings on a variety of topics on Medium at this link, including in the publications Ellemeno and Rome. I can also be found on social media under my name as above.

Sunday Morning Reading

A bit of this, a bit of that. All good bits.

It’s the Dog Days of Summer and it’s been a hot one so far. We’re traveling again, but there’s still some interesting Sunday Morning Reading to share. Some of it hopeful, some elegiac. Some just geeky and fun. Enjoy.

Kicking things off is a piece in The Atlantic from Anna Deavere Smith called When You Don’t Look Like Anything. She’s a singular artist always worth paying attention to. Her story of her 50-year search for the American character is certainly more than worth your time. Damn good stuff.

A.R. Moxon popped up on my radar this week with a piece called Total Eclipses. It’s part 2 of a series, the first being Be Bolder, Not a Boulder. If you’re like me and looking for any light at the end of any tunnel these days, do give both pieces a read.

NatashaMH offers up An Ode To The Poetic Detours. It’s about writing and where she finds inspiration, but more broadly, it’s about observing, noticing, listening, seeing, and feeling between the lines we sometimes get trapped within.

Will Dunn asks Are Emoji’s Killing Language? I’ve been saying they are for quite some time. For the life of me I don’t understand why we seem intent on regressing back to an age of hieroglyphics instead using the complex beauty of words and language.

Mathew Ingram says The Google Link Economy Is Dying and It’s Not Coming Back. He’s not wrong. Actually, he’s very right.

Health is a big deal in tech these days, especially when it comes to adding features to improve monitoring what’s going on in our bodies. Frankly, as someone who uses medical devices for monitoring my diabetes, the promises to add that kind of monitoring to smart devices, along with blood pressure and other conditions, sound hollow, seeming as realistic to me as self-driving cars. We may get there one day, but for now it’s mostly a clever way to market something new to increase the bottom line. Victoria Song takes a look at Samsung’s recent effort to check out our level of antioxidants with their smartwatch in I ‘Fooled’ Samsung’s New Antioxidant Feature With a Cheez-It.

Much has been made of Paramount’s caving to Donald Trump, leading to the firing of late not comedian Stephen Colbert. That was quickly followed up by the Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s skewering new season opener of South Park. Paramount paid up, got its merger, and in an Aristotelian, if not Mel Brooksian sense there’s some grand comedy in the entire thing. I’m a fan of Alexandra Petri’s piece examining the moment pre-South Park titled Are You Laughing Yet?

Sometimes we just need to laugh at what feels like no laughing matter.

(Image from Milen Kolev on Unsplash)