Michael Henley

So here I am sat drinking a glass of fizz having spent an afternoon at the pub, in a punt, and actually in the Isis. Great fun on all accounts. The thing is that when I got back I put on Palladio, and the I put on the Ode to Joy from Beethoven’s 9th Symphony. As soon as I did, I was reminded of a BS article I read recently about Susan Greenfield, and how she had some kind of spiritual experience while listening to this movement of Beethoven’s 9th, and how she felt that those of my generation would be missing out on this by their (our?) infatuation with raves etc etc yadayada

I have to say that in my humble opinion she is full of it. Beethoven’s 9th, and the Ode to Joy are undoubtedly amazing magical moving pieces of music which give me shivers every time I listen to them, but that doesn’t mean that not listening to them will in some way adversly effect the development or the spiritual understanding of ‘the young’. It comes down to a matter of taste. I can sit here and listen to a movement of Beethoven, perhaps Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, the Jupiter Symphony by Holst, or even Karl Jenkin’s Palladio and love every minute of it. Meanwhile I have had equally, possibly even more, moving experiences listening to ‘Smile like you mean it’ by the Killers.

I have to say that it is absolute snobbery for her to be using her position to suggest that the kind of things she, and possibly I, felt listening to the Ode to Joy in her most miserable times at this place (and believe me, there are some very miserable times) suggest that there is some kind of shortfall in my generation. For one, she forgets that not everyone in her generation was listening to the same kind of things she was (personal taste?!?). Secondly, she suggests that everyone in my generation ISN”T  listening to the same thing as her. I just jammed ‘Ode to Joy’ into Spotify and have eneded up with something amazing by The Deadly Snakes after listening to a couple of renditions of Beethoven. This is variety. This is progress.

Ms Greenfield might feel superior to my generation. She might even feel sorry for my generation, but she should not. Just because the music played at clubs and raves isn’t Beethoven’s 9th, we shouldn’t forget that mine is probably the most muscially and legally literate generation that has lived. The previous one, rightly or wrongly, has guaranteed that by their actions. We are humans, just like her, and it would do them well to remember that. We have the same kinds of responses to moving pieces of music, and just as members of the previous generation are moved by different things, so are we.

Susan Greenfield should get off her high horse. She may think that she is doing us all a favour by saying that we are not exposed to this, and maybe we aren’t, but don’t use that to suggest that we are missing out on these experiences. Just as she felt moved by the Ode to Joy, I might feel moved by O Valencia. Don’t suggest that just because it was written 150 years later it is any less melodic, moving, or influential than Beethoven. That is simply closed minded and petty. Just like Alex DeLarge, we all like a bit of the old Ludwig van.

I’ve been reading recently about plans by Rupert Murdoch’s news empire to begin charging for their content and I thought I’d throw my two cents in as to why I don’t think it will work.

While the dead tree press is undoubtedly dying, I get the feeling that the majority of this I because its readers are dying. While I never buy a newspaper and get all of my news online, my parents do both but rely on papers more. While my dad will go onto the BBC news website and may forward me the odd link they still buy the newspaper almost daily. I, on the other hand, have bought one maybe three times in my almost 19 years on this planet. Every time I do I undoutedly find myself skimming most of it and only reading the odd article or opinion column with a good title. In short, I read the newspaper like I read the Internet.

This morning I picked up a copy of the Observer lying on the table in the coffee shop where I was having a pastry and flicked through it. A few interesting pieces here and there but I honestly don’t think I got anything more from it because I (in theory) paid for it. When hearing arguments in favour of print one of the commonest things I hear is that we will lose people reading opinions other than the one they already hold but I can’t see how this I the case. Newspapers often have obvious bias and people are often very loyal to their newspapers. Therefore already we have the situation where people are not really encountering opinions other than their own. Meanwhile if you take the blogosphere you encounter many thousands of opinions, some of which will be in line with yours and some which won’t be. If you chose not to read the ones that you disagree with then I expect you would have done that with the newspaper as well.

The other thing which confuses me about what Murdoch wants to achieve. His companies recently laid off a lot of their Internet sub-editors and gave their work to the print sub-editors. I know this to be the case because a friend if mine was until recently a freelance Sun online sub-editor. What does that say about the priorities being placed on the web division over at News Corp?

Just like the record industry we are seeing another example of them taking their old business model and a big hammer, and then bashing hell out of it until it vaguely fits a shape to wrap around the internet. If they don’t totally throw out the old and bring in the new we will see their demise sooner than later. Opinions are nice, but I don’t have to pay for them for them to be any good. Some of the best I know have been heard over a pint. Free speech, but not free beer…