Is Timbaland the "Web 2.0" of the music industry

What I mean by the headline is this: Is Timbaland the shiny gleaning, gloss covering the logo's, brands and sounds of today's musicians?I think so. I think the trend of web 2.0 is strong online as the trend of Timbaland's sound is in music. And you know what? It's pissing my off. Have a look here for a YouTube list of Timbaland stuff.Madonna is the latest victim:Let's have a look and listen to some other artists who have fallen prey to the sights and sounds of Timbaland (and his accomplice Justin Timberlake):Nelly Furtado:Omarion:Visit this link - embedding disabled.The Pussycat Dols:Timbaland himself:And another:50 Cent:Now it may appear that I am berating this trend. I'm not. I'm saying that Timbaland is the pervasive artist/producer that everyone wants to get their hands on, understand, duplicate and be a part of. Just like web 2.0.Hell, for someone of Madonna's stature to work with Timbaland and JT must mean something is being done right. Or it means that Madonna can't innovate anymore and she needs Timbaland to reproduce his innovation for her.Much like web 2.0. People innovated and other followed suit with reproductions, Facebook took the MySpace model and made it better for some, there is Bebo, Linkedin and many, many, many others. Much like Timbaland in fact. You have him and his sound and then you have many other producers trying to duplicate his sound and vibe.Britney Spears is the perfect example. Not sure who produced this song, but it's got a Timbaland feel about it:So in a nutshell what I am saying is... where is Timbaland 3.0? I am over Mr 2.0, let's bring on the new vibes, the hip trends, the music innovation. Timbaland did a great job, but everything he does sounds the same and now every mimic is sounding like Timbaland and doing an average job of it.

Web 2.0 in under 5 minutes - it can be done

For those of you who took part in the Carte Blanche debate, here is a video (thanks Shaun) that can explain things simply, easily and... SHOCKING...in under 5 minutes. How long was the Carte Blanche piece? No main character, no interviews, no mobile, no random pics of children holding cellphones for no apparent reason.I have seen this before a while back but it is appropriate for right now.Remember, under 5 minutes:There it is. It is simple and basic but it is one of the most succinct explanations I have seen yet.

I've had it with Carte Blanche

I'm done with Derrick Watshisname and the Carte crew. I am honestly disappointed with the quality of their stories. More and more often I am seeing one sided, ill-researched pieces that lack any semblance of coherence. I'm also not sure what Tyler was on about in his post, lauding the piece as decent and fairly accurate. Think I might have caught a different show in a parallel universe on a different tangent to the one Tyler watched.Their piece on Web 2.0 was horrific. Congratulations to Rafiq and Dave for cracking the nod and showing some sense in a show filled with rambling and jumping from topic to topic.I followed Twitter throughout the show and there were some interesting responses to it throughout. Jason from Zoopy was insistent that we should take the story from where it comes, ie: old media. Boring argument that means nothing to me.I work for an "old media" company that is moving forward in leaps and bounds. M&G have been relentless in their new media endeavors and have definitely been heading the web 2. shove in SA.Carte Blanche, it appears, searched for "blogging" using this new toy they've found called "google" or something and came up with two names. Dave and Rafiq were both interviewed and made alot of sense. But what happened to getting more than one side of the story and more than one opinion in a piece? Dave and Rafiq work relatively closely with one another and are both based in CT. Now to the average viewer in SA it appears as if there is only web 2.0 development happening in CT. What about George, JHB, Durban and developers who roam the country? What about innovation on a national level?Why did they not take a look at the gurus of web 2.0 in SA who are pushing the envelope? Props to Rafiq for doing what he does and Dave for spreading the ideals and concepts to those who don't know, but I know for a fact that UKZN is also pushing new media as well as Rhodes University. Why not talk to those people too? Why only UCT as an institution.One twitterer commented: "@rafiq @daveduarte @zoopedup nice one guys...wife still doesn't get it though LOL ;P". That reflects bad journalism.John Webb has done some brilliant stuff with 702 Talk Radio and Carte Blance but this was dismal. The story jumped from web, to Mxit, to Facebook, flashing screenshots of TED conferences, YouTube videos and a host of other irrelevant pictures to look more web 2.0. None of these things were spoken of in the actual story.Another whopper of a quote from the story: "The pace of change has exceeded our ability to keep up." What exactly does that mean and who exactly are they referring to?In essence all that I am saying is that a show like this should never have been broadcast without an actual point. In fact, an explanation of something would've been great. There was no definition of what web 1.0 was, never mind what web 2.0 is and where it's headed.Pictured in a few of the scenes were Charl Norman and his site BlueWorld. Not a word spoken about the site, its competition with Facebook or a peep from Charl. I wonder if they knew Charl was behind BlueWorld when they filmed him with Rafiq, having coffee?I'm disappointed but not surprised with the level of their reporting and hope that they read this post (if they've learned anything from their own story) and realise that there is a lot more going on out there than two gurus in one city.Please don't mistake my post for ranting. I have no value to add to the show that was broadcast so this is not a jealousy thing. It's a responsible journalism thing.Again, congratulations to Dave and Rafiq who both deserved their exposure and it's great to see some exposure around the topic.See for yourself:

What has web 2.0 done to us? Passive time vs Active time

I just watched an interesting video over on Vinny's blog. A great video to watch inspite of the video itself being old.I picked out one very interesting concept from the video that caught my eye. This was the difference between what we did with our time before the "web2.0" boom and what we do with our time now.The difference is simple and quite profoundly true. Before the massive concept of User Generated Content (UGC) we would spend our free time passively. Watch TV, go to a pub, read a book. And sure we are still doing these things. But now we as a generation are much more active with out time.We blog, we interact on social networks, we create videos to upload and we search for any and all information using the search engines available to us. Everything is more active with nuances of "passive relief" in our daily habits.What I mean by passive relief is the need to break away from the activity. It is tiring earning YouTube, Myspace, Digg, Blogger, Facebook and others all their money. And I really mean that. As users we are earning all of these sites their cash. If we don't like a website or concept it will crash through lack of UGC. If we do, it booms and the creators get loaded. Simple.But invariably this will become web 2.0's antic disposition. The greatest strength and one of the distinct differences between web 2.0 and web 1.0 is UGC. What would YouTube be without user gerenated videos? It would me nothing, or it would be a media organisation employing people to produce video much like The Times here in SA.What do you think? Will UGC be the climax and downfall of web 2.0? Will there be a downfall of web 2.0? Or are you already on the bandwagon trying to create wealth via web 2.0?

Internet companies in one graphic

Very cool cartoon: