JOHN THE OBSCURE ™
By John Ruch
© 2006
Did I Kill id1g1t?, And Other Sticky Strands
of the Web
I think I killed id1g1t.com.
A web site that was just starting to build blog buzz as an astonishingly huge free library of pop music—and likely next victim of a music industry hit—went dark within 48 hours of me e-mailing its owner, identifying myself as a journalist and asking how it all worked.
id1g1t was amazing fun while it lasted—thousands of songs, including full albums; genres ranging from famous opera to obscure punk rock; a whole slate of music videos; and an easy-to-use index and search function. The music came in streaming audio, but you apparently could also click-and-save files.
It appeared to be a one-person job, which made it all the more impressive to the handful of bloggers who happened across the site and mentioned it. All the stuff was free; the owner merely asked for donations to keep the site alive and suggested that the music be used as a sampler, after which the listener should go somewhere else and buy tunes from artists they liked.
id1g1t had the potential to be the next Napster, both in terms of popularity and controversy. It wasn’t a file-sharing site, but more of a lending library model. It could have made for a fascinating legal case.
It wasn’t to be. On Jan. 16, I sent my e-mail, making some of these points and explaining that I’d like to write about it. I got no response. When I checked the site again a couple days later, it was gone, leaving only, “The page cannot be displayed” as a suicide note.
Whodunit to id1g1t? If it’s me—the journalist in the computer room with the scary e-mail—then it’s a shame. Anybody who sets up a free music site like that has to know they’re making a social statement, deliberately waving garlic under the nose of the music industry vampire. They should be not only prepared to defend and explain themselves, but eager to.
I’m all for shoot-then-disappear guerilla warfare. That’s how music trading/sharing mostly exists today, lurking in the darknet and similar places. But that’s just how the music industry wants it. It doesn’t mind music-sharing at all; indeed, it was happy to gut Napster and reanimate it as its own zombie. What pisses off the industry is effrontery, visibility and popularity—the things that rival its own incredibly greedy and imagination-free hierarchy of how music is produced and experienced.
Here’s hoping id1g1t comes back—with a vengeance.1
* * * * * *
There’s an even sadder obituary to write. Loompanics Unlimited, one of the greatest underground publishers, is going out of business.
Along with fellow staples of 1980s back-of-martial-arts-magazines ads like Paladin Press, Loompanics was the Web-before-the-Web, a cornucopia of obscure weirdness intended to feed individualism and freedom to the masses.
As the
Its books covered the basics: how to pick locks, hide stuff, make fake IDs, build homemade weapons; drug legalization tracts; outlaw culture histories. You can’t write about Loompanics without quoting a few titles. So, for posterity: “Asshole Conspiracy,” “Collector’s Guide to Switchblade Knives,” “Construction and Operation of Clandestine Drug Laboratories,” “Dirty Little Secrets of the Vietnam War,” “How to Be an Ass-Whipping Boxer,” “How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found,” “I Am Not a Number!,” “Jobs Your Mother Never Wanted You to Have,” “My Life Is a Weapon,” “Native American Anarchism,” “New Bullwhip Book,” “Policeman Is Your Friend and Other Lies,” “Revolution for the Hell of It,” “Sell Yourself to Science,” “Stoned Free,” “Temp Worker’s Guide to Self-Fulfillment,” “Uberhacker II,” “Under the Table and Into Your Pocket,” “War Is a Racket” and “You Are Going to Prison.”
These sorts of publishers always verge into the worlds of ultra-right survivalists, Libertarianism and general racists and sexists. But Loompanics always stood out for having a very low percentage of such material, being based more in ’60s hippie independence and Abbie Hoffman’s pranksterism-as-lifestyle philosophy. (The name is a play on the old satire magazine “National Lampoon.”) Frankly, it was one of the few freedom-obsessed members of the underground that truly seemed interested in freedom, not some grim, sour brand of bare subsistence.
Many of the books were of questionable value besides their amusing titles. Loompanics, more than anything else, was selling inspiration and a lifestyle. And that’s OK. You might find it goofy or objectionable. But it’s hard to think of anything more essentially American. A Loompanics catalog is a more patriotic object than any flag.
Loompanics didn’t respond to an interview request. But a cartoon on its site depicting a conversation between founder Mike Hoy and his cat, Miss Demeanor, explains things pretty well: sales were down, and Mike’s getting old. Still nostalgic as ever, he thanks the people who helped Loompanics over its three decades, including “everyone who made it necessary: all the censors, prudes, prigs and pigs in the world, especially in the U.S.A….”
The Internet has already largely usurped the role of provider of strange information—likely a reason for the company’s sales crisis. But it will never have the air of concentrated naughtiness Loompanics had in its heyday. There will still be a fight for freedom. But will it ever be as much fun?
* * * * * *
So much for the passive consumption part of our program. How about a site that can make you an Official Outer Space Explorer?!
You may have heard about NASA’s recently successful Stardust mission, which achieved the incredible feat of approaching a comet (Wild 2) and capturing particles spewed from it in a gel. The Stardust craft with its cometary payload (and also some generic interstellar dust) returned to Earth on Jan. 15.
So much was reported in the mainstream media in its token coverage. Unreported by anyone except the stalwarts at Space.com is that the Stardust mission will rely almost entirely on amateurs to detect the cometary debris.
While some of the debris trapped in the gel was big enough to be seen with the naked eye—a surprise to scientists—much of it is not. Hunting for particles in the block of gel means looking for microscopic tracks, like long bullet holes. It will be massively time-consuming work—way more than just a handful of scientists can tackle themselves, and way too sensitive for any computer program to do it automatically.
What NASA
needs is thousands of pairs of eyes to look for the tracks. A
You’re already sitting here staring a computer screen. You have time to help out one of the most significant and perhaps startling space explorations in history.
Stardust@Home won’t accept everybody who applies. There’s a test of sorts and similar fine print. But when you have a chance to join in discovering the wonders of space, why not take it?
1
It appears most of id1g1t has either found refuge at www.thumbtak.tk or was piloted there in the
first place. In any case, there it is—for the next 16 hours or so, at least.
May the world no longer be safe for $18 CDs of lip-syncing cretins enslaved to
five-album deals.
A
further update: On June 26, I received two e-mails from someone claiming to be
the new proprietor of id1g1t. Here’s what the person (I have chosen to withhold
the name) had to say: “Just found your little blurb about id1g1t. Actually, you
had nothing to do with the close of that site. You just asked about it at a bad
time, when it was already in the process of going private. The original owner
set it up as a public service, and didn’t appreciate some of the heckling he
was receiving from some people. It did disappear, but of course, those in the
know have the URL. I’m the new admin of it, and it is completely legal, btw. It
completely complies with the standards set by DMCA [Digital Millennium
Copyright Act] and US copyright laws. It is still around; I’m sure you’ll find
it someday. Oh, and that other shit site just ripped the content off from it.
They are in no way affiliated with it.” He also said he’s rebuilding the site
and, while it has gone public, he isn’t ready to publicize it yet. Stay tuned….
Meanwhile, possible future discussion points: It is ironic, or merely rude, for
another site to rip off id1g1t’s content? Will the hordes of corporate IP
attorneys be as convinced by a rebuilt site’s utter legality? And as long as
Metallica’s oeuvre is posted, what do I care?
The
latest news: id1g1t appears to be on its way back as www.leantop.com, as of September 2006, as a reader
kindly pointed out to me. No comment yet from the aforementioned claimed new
proprietor of id1g1t’s legacy.
Posted