Yelping About Architecture

If you happen to be reading my latest while dining out, the odds that you chose the restaurant as a result of reading yelp are about as good as a hair making an appearance in your soup.  If that's so, the place is also likely to be crawling with yelpers.  If your use of yelp is limited to consulting the site for restaurant recommendations, you might be hard-pressed to identify the yelpers.  Fret not, dear reader:  identifying a yelper is easier than identifying a Mason.

One thing yelpers don't do is acknowledge fellow yelpers with a series of gestures that, to the unfamiliar, resembles the carryings-on of the lunatic.  What I've described does not become the yelper - too gauche in such posh surroundings, as is a holler of "Hey, girl!" across a crowded restaurant.  You'll have to work a little harder to suss the yelper, but not too much.  If you spot someone in the foyer with a look of chagrin furiously scribbling something on his phone, you've likely identified a yelper, one who's upset that he hasn't yet been seated during peak hours.  They also like to gather in groups.  If you spot a party of three to five whose badinage is restrained yet hearty, you've likely identified a pack of yelpers.


Plus Personne Ne Peut M'accuser d'être <<White Trash>>

At this point, some disclosure is in order:  I consult yelp for a number of things, from finding out where a guy might get a good egg roll is this town to where I might find an obscure plumbing part.  I also yelp.  I yelp when my wife and I have eaten a meal worth yelping about (good or bad), about service received at a given business (more likely when the service is egregious such that, I like to think, I'm assuming the role of a consumer advocate), and, often, for the sheer joy of writing and the hell of it.  One of the personae I like to assume is that of the lout.  Boy I'll bet that makes yelp mad.  That tickles the devil out of me.

Still, to my mind, none of my yelping activities qualify me as a yelper.  I like the Grateful Dead, but I don't have the stomach to be a Deadhead.  I'm can't drop everything, pack a plastic shopping bag, and travel from one corner of the country to the other expecting everyone to give me money and food at all points of my psychedelic journey.

Likewise, I don't have the commitment, nor the savoir faire peculiar to yelp, necessary to fully surrender myself.  I am perfectly happy with my yelp outsider status, and I enjoy shopping at Big Lots and other businesses that attract a cheapskate like me.  Yelp just seems too rich for my blood.

I say, without shame, that I don't have the cultivation required for full membership.  Lack of cultivation is distinct from being an uneducated rube, which I am not (I paid good money for my degrees.)  I am, largely, disinterested in self-cultivation, and fully distrustful of cultivation as an enterprise.

For one, cultivation is conspicuous.  With the Information Age (is the term too quaint?  Does it beg cultivation?) in full swing, one cannot afford to be caught with his pants down.  His boss might be looking!  Worst still, his boss' boss might be looking over the shoulder of his boss!  That's why he's advised to mind his P's and Q's and take down that profile picture taken on he night he stuck the lampshade on his head and balanced a Budweiser tall boy on it.  The savages he hung out with that night sure got a kick of it.  The boss, on the other hand, is less than amused with his employee's shenanigans.  "Does he do that when I'm not looking?"  The picture he took at MoMA speaks better of him.  Now the boss thinks his employee is smart and cultured.

For another, cultivation is an act of negation.  When a person takes voice and diction lessons in an effort to remove all vestiges of his Southern twang (and, by extension, those that betray his Southern upbringing) and winds up sounding like William F. Buckley, that person engages in cultivating himself out of existence.  No longer can his peers claim that he's "white trash like me."  His boss thinks he's well-spoken.

Ultimately, acts performed in the name of cultivation are designed to help one get a leg up in the class above that he currently occupies, while, at the same time, his perceived lessers' grip loosens, a most propitious, welcome byproduct.  When one's grown sick and tired of driving that hunk of junk, eating junk, and staying at home and watching junk because he can't afford to go out and, as I've heard it put, "hang with the effective crowd," he's advised to take up ostentatious jogging, use NPR and The Daily Show as his sources for current events, both political and cultural, and start watching Girls because it serves as the voice for not only its generation, but, better put, the Zeitgeist.  He's advised to list them as favorites on Facebook.  His boss thinks he's hip and fit.  He can work some overtime without breaking a sweat, and look cool doing it.  

His friends will also advise him to splurge once in a while.  There's this place, godot's.  I read about it on yelp.  It just opened up.  Me and some buddies from the office are going on Friday after work.  Dude, their happy hour is supposed to be cray-cray, and they have a Four Horsemen, except they call theirs the Five Horsemen!  It's supposed to be in-teeeeense.  Dude, I'm worried about you, bro.  Tell you what, bro - first horsemen's on me.

His friend is right, so he'll go.  He'll drink six Five Horsemen, eat a Kobe beef burger with serrano ham, have some selfies taken, deal with the hangover on Saturday, and finagle rent on Monday.  His friends will drive him home because he had one horseman too many, and he'll spend much of the latter part of Saturday and Sunday scrubbing off the dicks his pals drew all over him Friday night because he can't go in looking like that on Monday.  He's advised to check Facebook sometime over the weekend - there are pictures up that his boss won't like.

Yelp is an all but essential vehicle if he wants to show everyone how much he's grown.


We Waited at godot's For What Seemed, Like, an Eternity Before We Were Seated


Food has become as treasured as books and virginity used to be, and yelpers seem to know better about what tastes good than anyone else.  One yelper's nickname (yelp asks you to choose a nickname, and I'm certain that all power yelpers have one) is "french fries....hand cut, fried twice, no exceptions. got it?"  Got it boss man, right away, and hand cut, if you're reading this, like, duh!

Not only do yelpers know what tastes good, they also know where to get it.  Moreover, yelpers aren't ginger when it comes to writing about their transcendent eating experiences.  It seems that they reserve their most florid prose for the most floridly priced and praised restaurants.  What follows are examples of purple prose written about a local establishment called The Hay Merchant, a relatively recent addition to Montrose that boasts 274 reviews and an aggregate yelp score of four stars.  My wife and I visited The Hay Merchant three or four times when we were the drinking kind.

First, my review (not published on yelp):  Quality and sheer selection of beers considered, a wealthy man could conceivably drink his way to a happy death.  I wish I could say the same for the food!  I've had a hambuger/chili-cheese fries combo from Sonic that was comparable in most ways, save price.  The wealthy man is well advised to spend his food dollar at The Hay Merchant's next-door neighbor, Underbelly, between bouts, if the scuttlebutt is to be trusted.

Hope my boss isn't reading this!

Why don't we, instead, read the words that come from more informed tongues?  Their words follow:

"I put the fun in funeral" luxuriated re:  the pig ears:  "The pig ears were amazing-like fried bacon, but better." (sic)  [Five Stars]


No Nickname wrote, 

Astonishing beer selection and inventive, delicious pub menu. I love this place. Sadly though, on our most recent visit (a busy Wednesday), the service was abysmal. Complete indifference from the front staff. I'll be back for the food and drink, and hopefully they'll get their act together on the service end [Four Stars]

Finally, and from undoubtedly the yelper with the best yelp nickname I've encountered yet, "PRUVEIT - that's what my license plate says."   

Ok, I'm a little late on writing this review, but wanted to definitely get this one in!

Great place for dinner, drinks, oh and did I say drinks.  Beer - tons of everything on tap, mainly from local (Texas) brewerys and they are indeed tasty.  Lots of Belgium esque beer, mmmm.

Food, great and good healthy portions.  Fried chicken and maccaroni are phenominal, gotta love it.  Great portions too.

You can go here to have a nice dinner with friends at a table, or drinks and food at the bar, or just plain old drinks at the bar or outside on the patio.

It's not your typical bar scene, which is nice.  Go here to drink good beer, eat good food, and just chill.

Just go!  (sic) [Four Stars]

Besides licentious spelling and grammar (though, in "Pruevit"'s defense and in his words, he "definitely had to get [his review] in"), one item of note is the Most Sensibly Nicknamed No Nickname's mention of "abysmal" service.  I've read more than my fair share of restaurant reviews on yelp, and, surely as ants will swarm a dog a day dead, a yelper will yelp about a service slight, busy night or not.  In my experience as a restaurant gadabout, I can recall but two instances of service so bad that they warranted any amount of attention; for yelpers, bad service seems like a fait accompli.  Never does bad service go unmentioned.  Yelpers don't go out with a whimper.  Many of them yelp before leaving.  

In the Room the Yelpers Came and Went


Bad service's frequency of mention leads me to believe that service, or maybe even the food, is not the true subject of discussion at all.  Really, the yelper yelps about himself.  If, like me, you're the type of masochist who'll endure mild discomfort in the name of entertainment, surely you've noticed this, too.  If you really want to get your kicks, make friends with someone who's well-heeled with yelp and beg this new friend to invite you to a Yelp Elite party.

I've attended several of these so-called "Elite" parties (short and blunt, becoming an Elite is nothing like becoming a Green Beret), and, enjoying the privileges membership bestows, if only for an evening, I cadged all the high-class food and drink I wanted.  Almost as much, I enjoyed listening to yelpers yelp on and on about themselves.  If they're to be believed, yelpers are true movers and shakers, real shapers of opinion who dropped the names of cool people, places that pained them to pronounce, and shiny things they paid pretty pennies for with the same elan it took to fill their faces with free food, and every bit as effortlessly as the fellow who stopped, dropped, and yelped after the house had served him one too many pink drinks.  I wonder whether yelpers have ever yelped about yelp or yelpers other than themselves (if I were a yelper, yes.)  I also wonder whether the yelper who yelped a night's worth of pink drinks is still in yelp's good graces.

Yelp:  Reviews You Can Trust



This past weekend, my wife and I decided that we desperately needed a foray well outside Montrose, which, for me at least, had become too stifling due, in part, to the unbending smirks its new residents probably picked up at Walmart.  They'd never tell you, and they'd sooner do that than yelp about Walmart and its smirk aisle.  

We were on the way to Katy when we'd just passed the entertainment complex on I-10 across the street from Ikea.  We'd both heard about about this Asian buffet that sits near a bowling alley within the complex.  As legend has it, the buffet is a like a double decker luxury liner filled to groaning with food, only moored adjacent to a Dave and Buster's and the bowling alley.

Traffic was only getting thicker the farther west we went, and we were starved.  We were fast upon the U-Turn when we decided to ditch the Katy idea and head for the buffet.  When we hit the eastbound feeder, our excitement mounted.  Still, I was a bit apprehensive.  

Opinion about the place was as colorful and loud as a grown man brought to his knees by a pink drink too many, except on yelp.  The place had been reviewed seventy-four times, and had an aggregate score of three stars.  Sushi was good, not great.  Selection was dazzling, and every item was good, but not up to yelp snuff.  As I negotiated the left turn to the restaurant, I chuckled to myself.  "Gets three stars on yelp.  Can't be that bad!"  

All that food (including a churrascaria?), but no egg rolls?  The sushi was not only not great, it was also hot and gray in the middle.  My mind was made, and my notes detailed.  I, too, would weigh in.  I didn't think twice. 

Five Stars. 

I told you I'm not a yelper.

The Pizza That Would be King

The Pizza That Would be King

"Where were you on the day that Pizza Hut announced that you could order any pizza, any size, any number of toppings, for $10?"  I remember where I was when Elvis died.  I was at the doctor's office.  KPRC delivered the news.  I remember the announcer's grave intonation, and the final line, delivered darkly:  "Elvis Presley has died."  I was eating lunch at a Mexican restaurant in Port Lavaca, Texas, where I learned about the Space Shuttle Challenger tragedy.  Every station interrupted the afternoon stories with news of the explosion.  The footage was looped, a nation's hope renewed each time the loop began anew.  I was spending the night at a buddy's when Saturday Night Live was interrupted by the news of a crackdown on the Polish Solidarity Movement.  Bill Murray was the host, and the news broke during his monologue.  The bulletin's timing was such that we both thought it had to be a joke.  I wasn't even a glimmer in my daddy's eye when JFK was assassinated, but I do know that Joe Dimaggio acted alone, and I also know that Pizza Hut's announcement was a banner day for me. 

At the time, I was working at the library, where I was paid dog food wages, and by dog food wages, I mean one can of store brand dog food per day.  Every once in a while, though, I took fiduciary license and ordered out.  I could order a $10 pizza stacked to the Heavens and eat it for two days, relieving me of eating dog food for two days.  Since Pizza Hut was down the street, I could pick it up, thus avoiding tipping the pizza guy.  But some evenings, the ones when I felt generous and lazy, I'd have my masterpiece delivered (having delivered pizza for the Big Three and lesser outfits during college and lean times, I understand what tips mean to the delivery guy.  I sometimes tipped extravagantly, enabling the pizza guy to pick up a sixer of Shiner after his sweaty, greasy shift instead of his usual swill.)  

Yes my friends, the day of Pizza Hut's announcement was one that will go down in history for me.  A $10 pie and a six pack of lonester set me up nicely many an evening. Two pies and a case of cold stuff when I had company and no one was complaining, until we ran out of beer.  Ordering a pizza itself was fun, but to confess, I feel a little sorry for anyone who's ever taken an order from me.  Surely the person on the other end of the phone thought my orders pranks.  While I never made demands such as "form smiley faces with pepperoni," "place one cube of pineapple precisely in the middle," or "Italian sausage, mushrooms, a deck of playing cards fanned out on it, and candles," I still pushed the envelope.  Once, upon placing an order for what would have been a truly mammoth whopper of a pie, the dispatcher stopped me before I could tell him what I wanted my fifteenth topping to be with "Whoa, whoa, whoooa, un-uh.  No.  No.  No WAY."  "But you said unlimited..."  "Yeah, I know what we said, and now we regret it, but you've gone too far!"  To my knowledge, I'm the only person Pizza Hut's said "No, you can't have that on your pizza" to.

Even so, when I ordered pizza from one of the Big Three, nine times out of ten, it was from Pizza Hut.  Domino's, one can't escape, reeks of "game of chance," and "Better Ingredients, Better Pizza" my ass.  I worked for Better Ingredients for a mercifully brief period, and what they mean is "They were pretty good ingredients when we received them a month ago.  We hope you don't get food poisoning."  Consider the preceding an "Insider's Consumer Tip," and then order accordingly.

Pizza Hut had one sure thing going for it that the other two simply couldn't come close to:  good thin crust.  Make no mistake:  Pizza Hut's is largely lowest common denominator fare.  Arguably, its thin crust resulted due to an accident in the kitchen.  If that's true, it's one of the happiest accidents in culinary history.   That accident begat a crust that inspires envy and curiosity; indeed, I'd tried for years to divine its recipe, to varying degrees of success.  It's too bad that of late, Pizza Hut tops its miracle with psychiatric hospital-grade ingredients.  The last several I'd eaten caused unusual, disturbing cramps.  Maybe that's their way of exacting revenge against smart-alecks with the nerve to take their promotion at face value.

So to Hell with Pizza Hut:  I'll just make my own, and I'll put what I damn well please on it, and as much of it as I want.  A few nights ago, I came close to making the best pizza I've ever eaten.  The crust was almost perfect:  the first three-quarters of the crust were a little floppy, but the outside was perfectly crunchy.  A work in progress.  I also used good ingredients.  Lots of good ingredients.  Truly, my pizza served as a fine example.  It was so good, one might choose it as a last meal, to name but one special occasion.

Some folks say that the crust isn't important.  If you're of this mind, disregard much of what follows and instead, buy a loaf of Wonder Bread.  If, like me, you think that crust makes or breaks a pizza, start here: http://www.101cookbooks.com/archives/001199.html.  That's the best dough recipe I've used yet.  The recipe yielded two pizzas and two calzones.  If you're fortunate enough to have a Trader Joe's where you live, you can get most of your ingredients there for pennies on the dollar; furthermore, Trader Joe's products are of the highest standard.  We're lucky that we have one down the street.  If you don't have a Trader Joe's, shop around.  If you bought Wonder Bread, you can probably get away with using ketchup, too.  Or Ragu.  

If you have a pizza oven, a coal burning oven, or an oven that reaches 1000 degrees, you're in luck; if not, you'll need to crank yours to screaming.  It'll scream around 500 degrees.  A pizza stone helps.  If you have one, preheat it.  As the oven heats, roll out your dough.  I rolled mine on a large wooden cutting board, one big enough to accommodate the butchering of a turkey.  I laid down a couple of fistfuls of corn meal, which is helpful for two reasons:  your dough won't stick, and your can slide it right onto your heated pizza stone for shaping.  

I rolled my dough to near water cracker thinness, a true exercise in patience.  Also, the dough wasn't round.  It didn't matter.  When the stone was heated, I slid the dough onto it, trimmed the excess, poked holes in it with a fork to prevent those tumors that tend to form (some people like a tumor or two, I understand), and then put into my 550 degree oven.  If you aren't Gwyneth Paltrow, I strongly recommended par baking your crust.  Par baking increases your odds of a crispy crust.  Do that until the crust is nicely browned and crisp (to test for crispiness, I reached in the oven and poked the crust with my finger.  I'm not recommending that, but, since I'm more prone to kitchen catastrophes than most, you might dare.)  

Crispiness achieved, remove the crust, stone and all, from the oven, and top your pizza.  I topped mine to the very edge.  That helps to prevent the edge from turning black.  I also topped mine such that it barely fit into the oven.  I baked the pizza until the toppings looked done.  Since I'm not Gwyneth Paltrow, I turned on the broiler during the last couple of minutes of baking time, which encourages your pepperoni to shrivel up, among other things.

I won't kid you:  making a pizza is somewhat labor intensive.  The reward for your hard work is a pizza of the sort that you'll snap pictures of for posting on Facebook and a blog.  All told, I'm not sure how long the process took.  It doesn't matter.  The pizza was incredible.  Also, we avoided food poisoning and poorly-considered promises.  What the heck:  I'm putting fireworks on the next one.  

Up yours, Pizza Hut! 

"Wait, I'm Not Finished"

I subscribed to Media Matter's mailing list several years ago, and receive frequent email alerts from them.  During the past couple of years, I typically throw their alerts away unread.  One vexing reason for the sheer frequency is that Media Matters often issues alerts that seem like little more than tattle-telling.  These alerts are issued with the same "stop the presses" urgency as those of real import.

Media Matters lost me after I'd received an alert about so-and-so calling Hillary Clinton names.  I don't care about these alerts of a "Johnny pulled Suzy's hair" nature, and I'm certain that former Secretary of State Clinton cares even less that some blowhard called her a witch or whatever it was.  However, several days ago, I received an alert with a  subject so tantalizing, I just couldn't not read it.  The alert concerned Rush Limbaugh's latest on-air stunt.  The subject was:  "Inevitable: Limbaugh Finally Says N-Word On Air."  I waited a while before throwing out this alert.

I knew, alert unread, that this was going to be good; yes, it was good.  What I didn't know was just how good it was going to be.  I found out soon enough.  The following is worth watching, excepting commentary from one of Media Matters' wishy-washy talking heads (I'm still not all that crazy about Media Matters):  http://mediamatters.org/video/2013/07/16/limbaugh-after-jenteals-interview-i-can-now-say/194904   And no, the footage is not taken out of context, nor is it doctored.

Rush argued that he should be able to use the term in question with impunity. Newly liberated, he can sashay around, say, Houston's Fifth Ward and mouth the epithet to his black heart's content and emerge on the other side without having gotten his fat ass rendered into a blob of greasy white lard.

Yes, some black people refer to one another using the term. I dare say that most black people think the practice a denigration of their race. Regardless, and here, I'm defending neither the term nor the practice, for some black people, it's a term of endearment (some might argue that it's "a way of gaining ownership of the term." I don't buy that.) Out of Rush's maw, the term in question is not one he uses in the name of brotherly love.

For all of his bluster, Mr. Limbaugh is prone to whining like Media Matters does himself.  He whines that he can't walk around and act like a thug, too.  But he can; as Mr. Limbaugh might be fond of saying, "It's a free country," so he can act like a thug.  He already does, in fact.  He does it five days a week on his show.  But Rush also wants to act like a thug without getting his fat ass kicked.  Alas, free speech has consequences, dear friends, something that Rush Limbaugh doesn't talk much about, with regards to himself, anyway.  At the  Limbaugh Ranch, Rush eats what he wants and as much of it as he wants, smokes as many fine cigars as he wants, used to take enough Oxycontin to knock off a horse plus a man twice his size, and says whatever he wants without consequence.  Rush Limbaugh might characterize all that as enjoying the fruits of his labor or living the American Dream, but the Limbaugh Ranch does not represent America.

At the Limbaugh Ranch, Mr. Limbaugh enjoys immunity and isolation.  His isolation is such that he just doesn't understand that there's a disconnect between him and most Americans.  His boasts of a large listenership*  notwithstanding, most folks strongly prefer a healthy berth between themselves and Rush Limbaugh and his kind.


Rush Ventures Forth

I'm genuinely surprised that Mr. Limbaugh visited the final frontier.  Although he's flirted with all manner of derogatory language throughout the course of his career, I still couldn't bring myself to believe that he is a racist.  After all, and to his credit, he is typically well-spoken, if you'll excuse all the Beavis and Butthead-like "uh-uh-uh's" between bouts of thought.  Not only is Limbaugh articulate, he's also a master of his black art.  You don't have to believe me, but maybe David Foster Wallace will convince you.  To consider:  http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2005/04/host/303812/


Without question, Rush Limbaugh is an intelligent man - that his is a native intelligence refined through his autodidactic pursuits is immaterial.  My mistake occurred due to my faulty thinking.  I thought intelligent men, even a man such as Rush Limbaugh, simply incapable of feelings so heinous.  What's worse, Limbaugh still possesses uncanny powers of persuasion and exerts tremendous influence.  Worse still, he still has loyal listeners who will rise to his defense, his outrages excused for a variety of dubious reasons.  That's an awfully bitter pill to swallow.


Before You Accuse Me...

One cannot accuse me of having never listened to Rush Limbaugh's program.  Twenty years ago, I lived in a small town a couple of hours south of Houston, where I managed a warehouse that stocked parts for transmissions.  Since I was the only employee I managed, I had full run of the warehouse radio.  I listened to not only Mr. Limbaugh's program, but other programs of its hue as well.  I listened to them partly to amuse myself, and partly because I couldn't listen to any good music unless the wind blew right.

Certainly, I was amused, but also outraged, freaked out, and downright puzzled.  As it turns out, I received a pretty good education in the warehouse.  I heard the voice of America's Underbelly, a population which most mainstream Americans would rather just go away, mainly by refusing to acknowledge its existence, its members so gauche you dare not invite them to your child's birthday party for fear that they'll spoil it with all their Fear of the Wrath of God gibberish, thus facilitating the children's subsequent nightmares about burning in Hell.  The representatives of this population (chiefly radio and television talk show hosts) fulminate breathlessly against women's health issues using the familiar enough "pro-life" canard, homosexuality, the Civil Rights Act, and labor unions, along with hobgoblins such as Hollywood and Halloween.  Amusing stuff all right, and scary.

Equally amusing, for the right reasons, was Roger Gray's broadcast, which, at that time, ran hot on the heels of Rush Limbaugh's.  Mr. Gray was a talk radio anomaly:  he claimed no ideological affiliation.  Indeed, Mr. Gray analyzed a given issue using, as he put it (to the best of my recollection), "pure, cold reason," a more rigorous method than first filtering the issue through an ideological lens.  His methodology ruffled many listeners' panties, but Mr. Gray took on all comers (as well as I could ascertain, he did not screen his calls), and he did so fearlessly.  I didn't nearly agree with him issue for issue, but still, twenty years later, he remains one among a handful of great thinkers who have exerted profound influence on my own political thinking.

Sadly, there just wasn't any room on the dial in Houston for someone who thinks like Mr. Gray.  Dan Patrick, former KHOU TV sports buffoon and current Texas Senator and born-again Christian, owned the station, and eventually helped to run Gray out on a rail.  People talk often about "a voice that will be missed," or the voice we could sure use right now.  Roger Gray's voice ranks among them.**

Many, by no means all by a long shot, conservatives remind me of a hapless high school senior, the victim of countless taunts and wedgies at the hands of assorted jocks, stoners, the garden variety of mean creeps, and the garden variety of cruel teachers, who will go to the prom with the first girl who accepts his invitation.  The conservative who perceives that he's similarly disenfranchised and despised, whether his perceptions have basis in reality, will often, quite gladly and readily, let someone else do his talking.  Someone Like Rush Limbaugh.  And Ann Coulter.  And maybe even Ted Nugent, a truer paragon of red meat killing and eating virtue you couldn't hope to meet.


My Thinking, Reconsidered

I've heard Rush called a contemporary Mark Twain, a true satirist of the first order.  The satirist has a tall task before him.  It is incumbent upon him to maintain ironic distance from the subject at hand in order to point up its folly.  Let's say that Rush Limbaugh is a satirist, one in league with Mark Twain, or even Jonathan Swift.  Mr. Limbaugh is no blowhard or even bigot at all; rather, he portrays the part of a blowhard and bigot, and has done so throughout the course of his long career.  In doing so, he has pulled off the greatest media con since Andy Kaufman wrestled women. ***  Mr. Limbaugh's hoax might be even better than Kaufman's:  he never breaks character.

Rush Limbaugh's commitment to maintaining the persona he has so scrupulously cultivated is unrivaled.  Such is his commitment that he chose to let it all hang out during the initial fallout from the Trayvon Martin trial.  A lesser talent would be accused of racism and stooping to vile new lows.  Now that I know better, I see Limbaugh's latest "stunt" for what it is:  his boldest statement yet.  Yes indeed, Rush Limbaugh has ventured forth into new territory, territory that even Archie Bunker didn't have balls big enough to enter.

Some twenty-five odd years into his career, Rush Limbaugh still has some fresh tricks up his sleeve.  My thinking adjusted, I look back now in awe.  We all thought he couldn't top even himself after the Sandra Fluke affair, a high water mark in its own right.  I see now that that dust-up was the Huckleberry Finn to his current achievement's Tom Sawyer.  I can't wait to see Rush' A Modest Proposal.

Until then, a word of advice to Rush:  don't apologize this time.  While I understand that that apology was a token, you came too close to comfort to breaking character.  Then again, it really pissed some people off even more.  Like those crybabies from Media Matters.  I'm sorry, Rush.  I'm still getting acquainted with my new thinking, and I hope you'll forgive the lapse.

Still, courage Rush.  Never allow your courage to falter.  So what if a few advertisers bail out?  You'll never make some people understand.

Yeah, I said that Rush Limbaugh is a fat ass.  It's a free country, right?  Besides, what's he gonna do about it?  Kick my ass?

Ha ha ha - suckers...

* Rush Limbaugh's audience is said to number15-20 Million listeners weekly.  That's 16% of the total population using the most generous numbers and math available.  But still, maybe not:  http://www.businessinsider.com/rush-limbaughs-audience-may-be-so-much-smaller-than-you-think-2012-3

** Mr. Gray's impressive dossier follows:  http://www.dbandassociates.net/RogerGray

*** Admittedly, this piece finds an antecedent in this:  http://www.citizenschwartz.com/nation-still-reeling-after-rush-limbaugh-revealed-to-be-30-year-long-andy-kaufman-prank/  I so wanted this brilliant bit of Internet hooliganism to be true.  To tell you the truth, I did entertain the notion.  Sucker...

Kickstarter: A Kick Right In The Balls, or New Starts For Dead Careers. Part 4

Three Beneficiaries Under the New Paradigm, From A to Z

Following are three examples of creators who have benefited most generously from using Kickstarter (Kickstarter didn't make out so badly itself.)  I'd planned to provide commentary for each campaign, but I'll largely refrain in favor of providing information, and then allowing you to judge for yourself.  

Note:  Wikipedia, a scourge for information professionals, serves the purpose for providing biographical information well enough.  Net worth figures are culled from http://www.celebritynetworth.com/, the only resource of its kind on the net.  I cannot guarantee the accuracy of the figures, but in these cases, they seem close enough.  

Zach Braff

Bio:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zach_Braff

Partial Resume:  Garden State, Scrubs

Full Resume:  See http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0103785/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1

Kickstarter Project:  Wish I Was Here
Kickstarter Project Page:  http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1869987317/wish-i-was-here-1

Sought:  $2,000,000

Received:  $3,105,473
Kickstarter's Cut:  $155, 273.65

Zach Braff's Net Worth:  $22 Million
Gall Factor:  High

For further reading:

http://www.ifc.com/fix/2013/05/zach-braff-kickstarter-backlash
http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2013/may/16/zach-braff-kickstarter-controversy-deepens
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/zach-braff-kickstarter
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/26/magazine/was-it-ethical-for-zach-braff-to-take-to-kickstarter.html?_r=0

Whoopi Goldberg

Bio:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whoopi_Goldberg

Partial Resume:  The Color Purple, Comic Relief, Ghost, The View, "Roman Polanski wasn't guility of 'rape-rape.'"

Full Resume:  http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000155/?ref_=sr_1

Kickstarter Project:  Whoopi Goldberg's Documentary, "I Got Somethin' To Tell You"

Kickstarter Project Page:  http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1085942094/whoopi-goldbergs-documentary-i-got-somethin-to-tel

Sought:  $65,000

Received:  $73,764
Kickstarter's Cut:  $3,688.20

Whoopi Goldberg's Net Worth:  $45 Million

Gall Factor:  Pretty high, considering that, surely, Ms. Goldberg could find that kind of money underneath her couch cushions.  Also, her reasons for seeking funding via Kickstarter are puzzling.  I invite you to visit her project page and look at her rewards.  I'm not sure that her net take will cover those and a documentary.  You be the judge.

Amanda "Fucking" Palmer

Bio:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amanda_Palmer

Partial Resume:  The Dresden Dolls, Made Big Stink After Kickstarter Campaign, Self-Styled Provocateur, Wife of Neil Gaiman, Successful Author
Kickstarter Project:  Amanda Palmer:  The new RECORD, ART BOOK, AND TOUR

Kickstarter Project Page:  http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/amandapalmer/amanda-palmer-the-new-record-art-book-and-tour/posts

Full Resume:  I'm Certain You Can Find It At The official website of Amanda Fucking Palmer. Yes it is.

Sought:  $100,000  

Received:  $1,192,793
Kickstarter's Cut:  $59,693.65

Amanda "And By Now I'm Tired of Perpetuating Her Cult of Self-Styled Bad-Assness So From This Point Forward I'll Simply Call Her Amanda Palmer-Gaiman" Palmer-Gaiman's Net Worth:  No Resources Found

Neil Gaiman's Net Worth:  $18 Million  

Gall Factor:  Not measurable with current technology. Maybe someone should design an app expressly for measuring all of Amanda Palmer-Gaiman's galling activities, and, after securing her blessing (she's the all-but-official cheerleader for Kickstarter), pitch the idea to Kickstarter.

For further reading/consideration:

http://gawker.com/5944050/amanda-palmers-million+dollar-music-project-and-kickstarters-accountability-problem
http://www.stereogum.com/1151562/steve-albini-amanda-palmer-is-an-idiot/franchises/wheres-the-beef/
http://www.stereogum.com/1154552/amanda-palmer-albini-is-a-grumpy-fuck-albini-shes-gross/franchises/wheres-the-beef/
http://www.stereogum.com/1156841/amanda-palmer-now-paying-volunteer-musicians/franchises/wheres-the-beef/

Also:

Here, I'll touch on two noteworthy items from the graphic above.  First, I don't doubt that there's "something magical" about receiving over $1 Million from total strangers.  Second, and more significantly, she refers to Kickstarter's "art-supporting fanatics" as a "club."  The term "club" smacks of exclusivity and privilege.  Surely she didn't intend it that way, right?  Maybe not, but it looks as though Kickstarter celebrity gerrymandering is well underway.  

Their gerrymandering actually dilutes the pool, forcing the struggling artist to compete against the likes of Zach Braff, Whoopi Goldberg, and Amanda Palmer-Gaiman.  Who knows who else in the future?  KISS?  A Kickstarter campaign doesn't seem beneath them.  

Before I wrap it all up, here's a final question:  how does any of this differ from Kenny G. approaching a street musician, telling him that he needs backers to make a new album, and asking whether he can have the change in the guy's hat?  Well, I don't know.  What are Kenny G's rewards?    



I Did It Myself

"The pen is only mightier than the sword if it still has ink." -

I Quoted Myself

In my proposal, I thanked Kickstarter for providing a forum for me and other struggling artists to tell our stories.  I thought my story compelling enough to attract benefactors.  I thanked them too soon -  Kickstarter's denial ensured that I never got the chance to take my plea to donors.  I still think my story is compelling, so I elected to keep my campaign going, almost certainly without Kickstarter's blessing.

Although I lack a benefactor (a job would be nice), I still hold to hope.  I'm married to the best woman a guy could hope for.  I have plenty of supportive friends, all of whom are the best a guy could hope for.  I have health insurance, which is a true luxury for anyone now, artist or not.  I should qualify for disability between current unemployment and ultimate career, and, for now, my computer still allows me to listen to "Ventura Highway" on Spotify (deprecated version) and write.

NOTE:  Spotify crashed during my writing of and research for this piece .  Maybe I should have closed TextEdit.

Yes my friends, the pen still has some ink in it yet, and as long as it does, I'll keep going. One of my true blessings is that I have a voice; with it, I've told my story, the one that Kickstarter wouldn't allow me to.  To borrow a bit of lingo from the new paradigm, I hope my story has been a reward for you.  It has been for me.  

And who knows?  Mabye one day, and I'm guessing that that day is still in the distant future, I'll have the opportunity to create another Kickstarter campaign, one that competes with an aging, ever-more-whacked-out Axl Rose's.

Last Words, Bound for Infame 

To see for yourself just how smitten Kickstarter is with transparency, go here: http://www.kickstarter.com/help/faq/kickstarter+basics#Acco
Even if you don't particularly care about that, you should at least read the bit about U2.

What do you know?  A handy link!  "Is it really U2?!"  "Well, it is if Bono's talking about the project."  See, that's how you know.  You should read it for yourself anyway.  

Kickstarter charges 5%, and Amazon charges anywhere from 3-5%.  
From Kickstarter:  http://www.kickstarter.com/help/faq/kickstarter%20basics

From Amazon:  https://payments.amazon.com/sdui/sdui/helpTab/Checkout-by-Amazon/Creating-Managing-Your-Account/Amazon-Payments-Fees

Amazon states, "Our standard rate is 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction for transactions of $10 or more."  Amazon's cut, then, could be as high as 5.9%.  At 10.9%, maybe you'd be better off going to the bank.  The bank doesn't expect rewards.

These folks put it pretty well themselves:  http://www.newrepublic.com/article/politics/magazine/110225/the-false-promise-kickstarter#

When my wife returned from work earlier, she informed me that we have to be careful if we pay the cable bill.  Our cable package includes Internet.  Do I publish or do we starve?  Often, art requires the efforts of two.  Sometimes, husband and wife starve together.

Kickstarter: A Kick Right In The Balls, or New Starts For Dead Careers. Part 3

A Dream Unequivocally Denied


“We all know that dreaming is free, but converting fantasies into reality can be pretty expensive and that's where a new Web site, kickstarter.com can help.” 

(http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112506250 & http://www.kickstarter.com/start)


Kickstarter's next denial response wasn't nearly as kind as their first (graphic follows.)

That Kickstarter used my phrase "keep it goin'" indicates that someone read my proposal somewhat thoroughly.  I must admit:  I am, at once, impressed and amused by this.  What immediately follows insults me:  the implication that I'm using Kickstarter as a means for funding a, to use their term, "fund my life" project.

Two questions immediately spring to mind:

1. Might Kickstarter suspect that I'm going to put my new computer to non-creative uses, such as balancing our checkbook, or filling out job applications?
2. Does anyone think that Zach Braff isn't going to use part of his $3.3 Million Kickstarter haul for hair gel?  Might anyone suspect that Zach Braff sought donations in order to avoid dipping into his own personal wealth/retirement (after all, he hasn't worked in a while, it seems)?  I'll address this question in greater depth later; for now, I'll depart from it by stating that Zach Braff might use part of the proceeds to purchase sandwiches for his film crew.  That's a nice thing for him to do, but does such a purchase violate Kickstarter's guidelines?

I seem to recall Kickstarter stating that once the funds are acquired, theirs is a hands-off policy.  The beneficiary is free to spend the money as he sees fits, and Kickstarter has no role in determining the direction of the final product.  If I find the passage specifically, I'll cite it.  Until then, you'll have to take my word for it.  At any rate, that policy introduces another question:  So what if I use the computer to balance my checkbook and apply for jobs?  Isn't that all but implied?  Also, is Kickstarter asking Zach Braff how he allocated his monies?  Money in hand, are they telling him, "Mr. Braff, we see that you've spent inordinate amounts of money not consistent with our guidelines, if the line item 'Grooming' is an indicator?"  According to their policy, no.    

At any rate, my dalliance with Kickstarter was finished.  They didn't like me and I like them less.  They don't have the time to trifle with SPF One Million's $50.  I, on the other hand, have nothing but time right now, and I want to keep my campaign going.  

The problem is, Kickstarter leads on struggling artists, having them believe that they're welcomed with open arms.  Indeed, the folks at Kickstarter fancy themselves as torch-bearers of the noble tradition of cultural patronage:

 As an enticement, you, the artist, is invited by Kickstarter to join such august company.  You might call the enticement a reward.  

"When Did "Independent" Become "Indie?"

“...an unexpected influence on indie culture, a new model for a D.I.Y. generation.”

(http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/08/movies/08kickstarter.html?_r=0)

A lot of space, perhaps too much, devoted to "indie" and "D. I. Y." culture is in order, as well as a caveat:  cultural criticism is murky business by its nature. So many people, whose credentials vary from "self-styled" to "PhD," comment on culture, for one, and for another, an entire language was created expressly for the task of cultural commentary because plain English won't do and in an effort to keep the barbarians at bay.  Inevitably, questions along the lines of what is "is" arise, burning questions such as, "When did 'independent' become 'indie?'"

Murky business for sure, and damn near intolerable, yet necessary.  Here, I'll admit to a fondness and strong preference for plain English.  Plain English, for one, is malleable, and ripe for manipulation.  A phrase, commonly credited to Frank Zappa, to describe music discourse, "Writing about music is like dancing about architecture," illustrates beautifully the expressive power of simple, everyday English, and Zappa was no dummy, even if he had no truck with Derrida and his brethren (which is what my gut tells me.)  If you revel in the joys of plain English arranged artfully, you're probably suspicious of the business of cultural criticism, the entire school of thought that sprung from it, and the language created for the purpose.

If you endured four years of college, you likely have a working knowledge of this language, or can at least identify it.  It's not important to possess a thorough understanding of cultural critical theory (I'm going to demonstrate my lack of mastery in the following section), but it is important to place the terms in context to understand their purposes.  Kickstarter, like the rest of corporate America,  understands the usefulness of these critical terms.  They understand that for almost anyone with a bachelor's degree, the words themselves have an exotic allure.

It's almost like this:  say that you love food.  You've always wanted to try Indian food, but you haven't.  Maybe you've smelled Indian food, but weren't willing to take the leap to putting it in your mouth because the aromas weren't familiar; besides, a lot of Indian dishes have peas, which many people refuse to eat.  You read food blogs because, for one, you revel in the joys of plain English arranged artfully and because you love food.  You've read that other food lovers love Indian food, so much that they can't get enough of the stuff.  Saag paneer?  The blogger luxuriates on its merits to the point at which you might begin to think, "Maybe spiced cream spinach with hardened cubes of cottage cheese isn't so bad."  If you're particularly curious, you'll read about samosas, too.  That you can get a handle on - no irksome consecutive vowels in "samosa," and they're fried.  You'll have one samosa.  What's chutney?

Corporate America, of which Kickstarter is a part, understands this sort of legerdemain very well.



Hegemony, Control of the Narrative, and Their Applications in Plain English

Basically, the terms "indie" and "D. I. Y." exist in hegemony (basically, and God willing, briefly, a power struggle between two factions.  The victor "controls the narrative," or defines the terms), between artists who truly used to do it themselves, with little, if any, hope for a benefactor, and corporate interests and media, dutifully falling in line, that have vitiated the terms such as to render them all but meaningless, save for their marketing cache.  Currently, corporate interests and media define the terms in question.

Maybe it is time for truly independent artists to jettison those now meaningless terms and replace them with more suitable ones in an effort to distinguish themselves; then again, maybe that doesn't matter.  Truly independent artists have never had much say in their own narrative until well after the fact.  Their concerns were more fundamental, like choosing between art and starvation.  Michael Azzerad's Our Band Could Be Your Life, while, perhaps, not definitive, serves as the most well-known chronicle of the 80's underground, and provides not only good definitions for "indie" and "D. I. Y," but also plenty of examples to demonstrate that "indie" was, at least one time, not synonymous with "glamourous."  But don't take my word for it (I wasn't quite there yet):  Click To Look Inside.

One thing's certain:  few so-called "indie artists," according to the contemporary definition, have to choose between guitar strings or a trip to Taco Bell, and none of them have the stomach to play through a vicious bout of diarrhea like Mike Watt did when The Minutemen toured as support for REM in 1985 (Azzerad, Our Band Could Be Your Life, From Memory:  I No Longer Have the Book).  Now, they don't have to.  Many venues offer food, if the artist can't already afford to go out, and if an indie artist like Zach Braff gets diarrhea, he can call in sick.  Even when he's not playing, he's still getting paid.

After all that verbiage, we can all agree on this:  English doesn't get any plainer than diarrhea, and none of us like it.  That includes Kickstarter.


Laurel:  Public Face of Kickstarter.  Indicator of a Shifting Paradigm.

Upon attempting to "locate" the etymology for the term "paradigm," I was met with a barrage of disagreeable English.  I suspected that the term found vogue in academia, and was plucked from that ghetto by corporate America, who then  conscripted it for its uses.  What I do know is that corporate America adores the term more than I do, and uses it at every opportunity.

The graphic above illustrates that CNN thinks that Kickstarter marks a shift in the paradigm, presumably that of funding art.  To my way of thinking, a shift in the art itself should follow if Kickstarter is funding the sort of projects it purports to.

Over the course of my campaign, I've seen plenty of Laurel.  Laurel's created a successful campaign to help fund a "memoir [not a book - lacks elegance, too plain] about her late father."  You can read about her successful campaign here:  http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/laurelholland/spindrift-the-memoir-of-a-climbers-daughter

Two details about her campaign beg mentioning.  First, Laurel sought $8000; 217 benefactors chipped in that amount plus $3,415 more, or 43% more than the original amount she asked for.  Kickstarter gets a 5% cut from all successful campaigns.  Their cut from Laurel comes to $570.75.  I'll grant this:  that's far less than if she'd asked the bank for a loan.  For the sake of argument, I'll assume she has perfect credentials:  if she sought funding "the old-fashioned way," the bank would have received a 9% cut (I checked.)  Five percent doesn't seem so Draconian.  Of course, the bank wouldn't have asked her to produce rewards, and the bank wouldn't ask questions money in hand, either.  Zach Braff could have walked into a bank (I'm assuming that his credentials are impeccable, except maybe work.  What's the last thing you've seen him in?), but he elected to seek funding through Kickstarter.  I'm not done with him yet.

Second, Laurel's "Funding period" ended on July 12, 2012; surely by now, she received all $11,415 less 5% (let's say she has.)  Her campaign completed just over a year ago now, her likeness graces Kickstarter's home page.  It seemed like I saw her more often than I did Jack, Melissa, or Michael.  My curiosity inspired the following experiment:  I performed twenty separate Google searches using the query "kickstarter" (twenty searches seemed to serve as a representative sample.) Sure enough, the link to Kickstarter's home page appears first.  I accessed Kickstarter's home page after each fresh search.  The results of my experiment follow:

• Laurel:  Appeared on six different instances.
• Melissa:  Appeared on four different instances.
• Jack:  Appeared on six different instances.
• Michael:  Appeared on four different instances.

My only real surprise was Jack's showing.  Otherwise, the result is clear:  Laurel vies as the ideal candidate for Kickstarter's Public Face.  That's not to knock the other candidates.  The bespectacled, baseball cap wearing novelist Jack vies strongly; Michael, whose resemblance to the no-account Jeffrey Lebowski will leave you speechless, is still not quite a slouch, if maybe too "hippie-like," and Melissa stares vacantly into space like you'd expect a self-proclaimed conceptual artist to do.  In short, strong showings from each, but Laurel makes the strongest impression.  Incidentally, all of the candidates, save for Michael, who hails from Waltham, Massachusetts, claim New York City as their hometown.  Laurel and Melissa name Brooklyn specifically.  Zach Braff, the recipient of over $3.3 Million, has not appeared on Kickstarter's home page.  

With Laurel, all the signifiers of the new indie paradigm fall firmly and nicely into place.  Laurel, set amidst an urban tableau of cool yet familiar images such as stairs and pipes and graffiti notably odd due to its legibility, is a fair-skinned indie maiden living in Brooklyn with a memoir on the way.  She faces away from the camera, certainly demurely and perhaps even contemplatively, and wears a scarf.  Laurel's the next best thing to Zooey Deschanel, maybe better because she probably agreed that Kickstarter could use her likeness for its own purposes (that way, Kickstarter doesn't have to compensate her.)  

Kickstarter's home page itself, regardless of who happens to pop up on it, is a coup of indie-design smarts itself.  Its design scheme, a coup of color and san-serif fonts, could serve as inspiration for the new Asian fusion bistro slated to open later this year.  The Kickstarter logo simply winks at you and says, "Hey, over here - we're fun and approachable, and a lot cooler than your mom and dad."  The logo itself could serve as inspiration for the packaging for a new line of gourmet marshmallows.

To borrow the ergot from the new indie/hipster paradigm, Kickstarter has cred.  The approbation of heavy-hitters such as CNN, The New York Times, and Rolling Stone, to name a few, doesn't hurt, either.  If you have your indie signifiers all lined up and an idea you're dreaming to bring to fruition, then why shouldn't you start your own campaign?  Under this new paradigm, asking mom and dad or a bank for a loan, or working consecutive double shifts at Papa John's to finance the production, pressing, and promotion of 1000 copies of "Cantus About My Memories of Zooey Deschanel" is for squares.

Where's the Shift?

By all appearances, Kickstarter is where the cool kids hang out, and if your Dionysian impulses are screaming to run riot but you're late on the rent again, you might be thinking that it's not only cooler in their cool blue pool, but also a lifeline.  If so, take a dip, or go soak your head.

No one can maintain a state of permanent sensory derangement and get out unscathed, and here, I urge you to consider all this new paradigm business with your cool, Apollonian head.  To start, when corporate America or media outlets proclaim that a paradigm shift is underway, and that a business' (e.g) practices best emblematize that shift, you should approach that business with caution.  Kickstarter is such a business.

For one, Kickstarter boasts that it is simply the latest (and current best) iteration in the grand tradition of noblesse oblige.  That bit about "Mozart, Beethoven, Whitman, Twain, and other artists?"  That would signal a return to old practices, and those practices were subject to the caprice of the wealthy.  Nice if you could get it, sure, but let's just say that the wealthy didn't answer every knock on their doors.  Also, never mind that noblesse oblige might not really exist anymore.  Here, a broadside:  many members of the wealthy class use every trick to avoid paying taxes, which is the least of their societal obligations, and even the wealthiest tax cheat gets to enjoy the benefits of society.  

I guess someone's got to deliver the tax cheat's pizzas.  Maybe the delivery guy's working a double to finance an album.  Maybe the tax cheat will tip the pizza boy handsomely.  Maybe the pizza boy should pitch his idea to the tax cheat; that is, if the pizza boy's a square.

Funny enough, consumers' attitudes concerning the acquisition of art are similar.  Their attitudes constitute, in part, the new paradigm concerning art's acquisition:  consumers expect something for nothing.  Artists who profited under the old paradigm can proceed more or less in the manner to which they'd grown accustomed because they've established enough cache, either with consumers, the industry, or both.  Most artists operating under the new paradigm should do so with the understanding that they'll receive little more than "hugs and beers" as compensation for all their hard word.  Kickstarter addresses this shift thus:  balloon rides, aka rewards (see Part 2).  Each creator is expected to create rewards in an effort to entice potential donors (and by rewards, we're not talking coffee cups), which, to me, seems like more work piled atop the project proper.  For better or worse, Kickstarter sussed out that part of the new paradigm.  

I'd argue worse, of course:  under the new paradigm, consumers expect us to operate under the old independent artist paradigm so that they can enjoy the benefits under the new paradigm.  Effectively, consumers tell artists, "If you want me to listen to your stuff, you're going to have to work consecutive double shifts at Papa John's, and don't keep me waiting."  Ian Mackaye, a music veteran of unimpeachable credentials and the true exemplar of the old independent artist paradigm, addresses this shift in plain English:  "[P]eople should be prepared to have fun with the past because the only music that can possibly be free is the music that's from the past. It costs money to make music. And if people are prepared to only have the past to listen to, then let it be free."  In response to Mr. Mackaye well-pointed declamation, Kickstarter might respond, "And that's where Kickstarter comes in."
  
If, as Kickstarter might have you believe, Kickstarter is the answer, then I'm trading in my broken computer and my other music equipment for the gaudiest pair of golf slacks you can imagine.  Ask yourself:  In Kickstarter's five years of existence, has the artistic landscape changed?  Again, it seems to make sense that if, instead of corporations, ordinary folks such as you and me are digging deep to provide funding, then the consequent art should reflect that.  I don't see or hear much art that I'd be willing to fund, at least any that's broached mass consciousness.  I'll leave you to answer the question, "Where's the shift?" Rolling Stone says, "Kickstarter funds the future."  Maybe, if you read Rolling Stone religiously.

And let's face it:  Kickstarter, the fact that it allows a few small fries through the velvet rope and a design scheme that serves as inspiration for the living rooms of our social betters notwithstanding, didn't dispense with all of the practices under the old paradigm wholesale.  They threw out some of the nasty beige bath water, but they kept the baby with the good head for business.  To wit:  What Is Kickstarter?   Scroll to the bottom.  If you're not inclined, I'll save you the time.  Under the heading Our mission is to help bring creative projects to life, you would find, "We’re a for-profit company based in New York City’s ["New York:  Where All Worthwhile Art Gets Made"] Lower East Side. We spend our time making Kickstarter a little bit better every day, answering questions from backers and creators, and finding new projects to share. If a project is successfully funded, we apply a 5% fee to the funds collected."  Consistent with the practices of an ages-old model, Kickstarter gets down to business a couple of layers deep, and once you've managed to get through them, you still have to go to the bottom.  Business on the bottom is business as usual. 

"What is Kickstarter?" is fair game.  Is it a vehicle for "grassroots funding of the arts?"  Yeah, and I'm Mr. Peanut in his top hat partying in a hot air balloon.  Is it a business?  Indubitably, albeit one that pretends that not to really be one, at least as you know it (I imagine a sign that hangs above the entrance of Kickstarter headquarters:  "Leave your tie at the door.").  Is it "[p]aradigm-shifting?"  Does CNN, decent source for current events that it is, truly know much about culture?  It doesn't appear that way, but I will accept its claim in part, if, by "paradigm-shifting," they mean that the shift more greatly favors the Z-List celebrity rather than the A-List celebrity now.  

As it turns out, Amanda "Fucking" Palmer-Gaiman (wife of author Neil Gaiman), Whoopi Goldberg, and Zach Braff, none of whom you'd heard much from until they mounted their own campaigns, still have enough cache that ordinary people like you and me, people whose comparative wealth is negligible, will fund their projects, seemingly because they just had the gall to ask.  Consistent with their policies of funding only "creative projects" and not asking questions once these no-counts, whose collective resume consists, in part, of The Dresden Dolls, The Color Purple, Ghost, Hollywood Squares, "Roman Polanski wasn't guilty of 'rape-rape,'" Garden State, and Scrubs, get their greedy grip around their money, Kickstarter first looked the other way, and then mounted several of their own  backpedaling campaigns.  Their campaigns must have been successful enough:  they kept the money, and artists, struggling and otherwise washed up, are still lining up for their share.  

For a company that cherishes "transparency" (Kickstarter uses that term quite a bit, too, and always with regard to creators), it seems that Kickstarter has problems of its own.  No matter.  They have their money, and there's more on the way.  

I can distill all of that verbiage, plain and academic, pithily:  Attractive public face notwithstanding, Kickstarter is mostly business as usual.

Perhaps this is the true question:  That's the shift?  I'll leave you with that.