Facebook Campaign Decides UK Christmas Music Charts 362
Posted
by
kdawson
from the rage-against-the-commercialization dept.
from the rage-against-the-commercialization dept.
uglyduckling writes "A grassroots Facebook campaign has pushed the 1990s Rage Against the Machine song 'Killing in the Name Of' to the top of the British music charts for Christmas. The campaign was planned to prevent the X-Factor winner from charting Christmas number one, as has been the case for the past four years. It was supposedly a kick against the commercialism of Christmas and commercial dominance in the music scene, although Rage and the X-Factor winner Joe McElderry were actually signed to the same label. Despite this minor detail, it's interesting to note that this is the first song to reach the number one spot through downloads alone in the UK, and is a testament to the organizational power of social networking sites like Facebook. The Facebook group also asked for donations to charity, and has raised £70,000 for the homeless charity Shelter."
Charity (Score:5, Informative)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8423340.stm [bbc.co.uk]
Re:EPIC WIN (Score:5, Informative)
Re:EPIC WIN (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Charity (Score:5, Informative)
(They stuck a Shelter link on the Facebook page - not quite the same thing!)
The band are additionally giving the proceeds from the record sales to Shelter, from the Beeb article:
Guitarist Tom Morello said it had "tapped into the silent majority of the people in the UK who are tired of being spoon-fed one schmaltzy ballad after another". He added that proceeds from the single would go to homeless charity Shelter tying in with the Morters' Facebook campaign which includes an online link to give to the charity, raising over £70,000 so far.
Re:Not the same label (Score:5, Informative)
- Tom Morello via Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]
Re:EPIC WIN (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Charity (Score:5, Informative)
Personally, my eyes are now on Sony UK and, to a lesser extent, Simon Cowell. Sony have profited to the tune of 500,000 digital downloads on the RATM track, plus probably a good 100,000 extra copies of McElderry's bought by X-Factor fans to try and keep RATM off number one spot. Total materials cost: £0. I think it only fair that they make a gesture in kind and make a sizable donation to Shelter as well.
Not the first number one on downloads at all (Score:4, Informative)
it's interesting to note that this is the first song to reach the number one spot through downloads alone in the UK
Umm, no it isn't. Crazy by Gnarles Barkley was the first song to reach number one in the UK on downloads alone. This was the first song to be the Christmas number 1 on downloads alone.
Re:Charity (Score:3, Informative)
Who claimed this was anti-establishment, or anti-SonyBMG. This was merely people speaking out about thinking X-Factor, and the music that comes out of it, sucks cocks.
Re:Purpose is not stated (Score:5, Informative)
Amazon.co.uk sold both downloads as loss leaders. The 40p limit applies to the wholesale price, not the retail price.
- I pay Amazon 29p
- Amazon pays Sony 40p (or more?)
- It counts towards the chart
- Amazon hopes my retail experience was good, and I'll come back for more music downloads in future. This time at a profitable price.
Everybody's happy.
Re:Purpose is not stated (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Not the same label (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Charity (Score:3, Informative)
>implying that a single track is 3GB
wat
Also the track is 5:14 so it's actually more like 10MB for a 256kbps encode, so ~5TB total transferred, which would cost about $850 from Amazon S3
two parties is a natural evolution (Score:4, Informative)
its not decided by anyone
third parties, if successful, either replace one of the dominant two, like the whigs in the 1800s in the usa, or one of the dominant two parties coopts the third party's message, relegating the third party back to maginalization, like with ross perot in the 1990s
furthermore, the similarity of the two dominant parties is not a weakness of democracy, but a strength. two parties compete for the moderates of the country, this forces them to moderate their own message in order to win votes. this leads to the parties being a better representation of the moderate middle, which leads to greater social stability: parity between the leaders of a country and its citizens
if the party has a strong zealot streak, such as currently in the usa with the teabaggers on the right, this is a good thing for the left, because by forcing an ideological litmus test on right-leaning candidates, the teabaggers force right-leaning candidates further right, thereby weakening their appeal to moderates, thereby weakening the right's showing in elections. if you are left-leaning in the usa, you should thank the stars for the appearance of right wing zealots like sarah palin and rush limbaugh on the landscape: this helps the left by giving moderate votes to left moderate candidates
meanwhile, if you believe that two similar parties is a weakness, or under some shadowy force's control, you are either a paranoid schizophrenic, or you simply don't understand that marginal, fringe parties should never dominate a country. because no matter how progressive your beliefs, the purpose of a government is to provide stability, first and foremost. the government should reflect the great moderate middle as much as possible, and this is what two parties achieves, and this goal is far more important than any other you can put forth
finally, third parties merely siphon votes off from their more moderate cousins, and therefore perversely empower the party most opposite you and your beliefs. its simple math
two parties the ultimate natural evolution of all democracies, and this is a good thing, despite you and your fringe beliefs, whether far right or far left. your marginalization is a benefit to the stability of your country
Re:two parties is a natural evolution (Score:3, Informative)
meanwhile, if you believe that two similar parties is a weakness, or under some shadowy force's control, you are either a paranoid schizophrenic, or you simply don't understand that marginal, fringe parties should never dominate a country. because no matter how progressive your beliefs, the purpose of a government is to provide stability, first and foremost. the government should reflect the great moderate middle as much as possible, and this is what two parties achieves, and this goal is far more important than any other you can put forth
finally, third parties merely siphon votes off from their more moderate cousins, and therefore perversely empower the party most opposite you and your beliefs. its simple math
two parties the ultimate natural evolution of all democracies, and this is a good thing, despite you and your fringe beliefs, whether far right or far left. your marginalization is a benefit to the stability of your country
You really couldn't be more wrong.
Go read the Federalist Papers or George Washington's Farewell Address [yale.edu]
The short version is that the learned individuals who founded our Democratic Republic
thought that political parties were bad and that a two party system was even worse.
About 40 years after Washington left office, a bunch of assholes decided to create ballot access laws to prevent third parties from joining the political process. This grand tradition has lasted 150 years and leaves us with our current duopoly.
Re:Charity (Score:3, Informative)
Just for the sake of accuracy, Rage is signed to Epic. The X-Factor dude is signed to Syco. Both labels are subdivisions of Sony/BMG, but unless Simon Cowell has stock options at Sony (which, I'll admit, is pretty damned likely) then this download campaign isn't necessarily "lining (his) pockets." Purchases of a RATM song may increase the value of a company in which he has an investment, but there's no money from the sale going straight to him.
Re:Simon does not own Sony! (Score:3, Informative)
No, the song is about former KKK members and the like from the Southern states of the US who went on to hold political positions later in life.
Re:Charity (Score:3, Informative)
but if it really is only $850 for 5TB then it's a bit of a bargain.
Huh? I pay $666 a year for a dedicated server, and for that I get 4TB a *month*
superb.net if you want to check.
Re:Charity (Score:3, Informative)
...they have been told to buy by some 'part-time rock DJ making a Facebook page'... people failing to think for themselves.
Which is where your reasoning falls apart...
The people supporting the FaceBook campaign weren't being told what to buy, as normally most of them would abstain completely from the whole Xmas pop chart fiasco. What they did was CHOOSE to get involved in a campaign that aimed to focus people's dissatisfaction at the status quo (not Status Quo the band!!! hehe, that's NEXT year's campaign...) in one concerted effort to make a giant audible statement that the established order of the media conglomerates couldn't really ignore.
They could just as easily have chosen not to get involved, but they didn't - and all have donated to charity too, whether out of their own pocket directly, or through RATM's donation of proceeds to Shelter. Not bad for a FaceBook group really.
Re:two parties is a natural evolution (Score:3, Informative)
two parties the ultimate natural evolution of all democracies, and this is a good thing, despite you and your fringe beliefs, whether far right or far left. your marginalization is a benefit to the stability of your country
Rubbish. The two party system is a consequence of our first-past-the-post electoral system, a vote for any other party is wasted. Also, this is a bad thing because people will vote for the least-worst option, rather than the best, the Conservatives will swing the marginal seats they require to win the next election in the UK. Most people are effectively disenfranchised.
Re:Astroturf (Score:4, Informative)
Some interesting things about that site:
* It was not set up by the same people who set up the main facebook campaign group
* It was set up after the campaign became popular and got coverage in the mainstream media
* It is not linked to from the main facebook group
* It does not link to the main facebook group (it links to its own facebook page, which is inactive in comparison to the actual campaig group)
* It seems to exist only to sell t-shirts (10% to charity but I bet they still make a profit)
I see no evidence that this has anything to do with the main facebook campaign and plenty that hints that it is just someone's attempt to cash in. If that is the case then it doesn't suprise me that someone who used to work with Simon Cowell is involved.
Re:Astroturf (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Not Facebook - Simon Cowell (Score:3, Informative)
Actually last year they tried to get the original version of Hallelujah (The song covered by the X-Factor winner) to #1
[pedant]
The campaign was for the Rufus Wainwright version. The original was by Leonard Cohen. The X-Factor version's arrangement mimicked the Rufus Wainwright version however.
Load of schmaltzy rubbish anyway IMO.
[/pedant]