Shorty: What are you doing with microphones, a camera, and a computer in here?! … This is a BATHROOM!
Bubba: Just waiting for the County Commission meeting to start.
Shorty: HA!
via KnoxViews.com
What: Regal Entertainment Group presents Sundown in the City 10th anniversary series
When: Thursdays, April 12 thru June 28, 6-10pm
Where: Market Square in downtown Knoxville
How much: Absolutely free! With free parking after 6pm at the Locust Street, Market Square and State Street garages.
KNOXVILLE — One of the most successful ongoing events in Knoxville history began 10 years ago. In 1997, A.C. Entertainment hosted a free concert on Market Square with local favorites Scott Miller and R.B. Morris. A few thousand people enjoyed the exciting street party atmosphere in Knoxville’s downtown district that was just beginning to expand. That initial event has blossomed into a yearly 12-week concert series starring national recording artists and drawing several thousand music lovers of all ages to a thriving downtown with bars, restaurants and retail shops. And the concert series that started it all continues in 2007 with what promises to be one of the most diverse and exciting line-ups in its history:
4.12 — Edwin McCain w/ Antibalas and Low Stars
4.19 — George Thorogood w/ The American Plague
4.26 — Scott Miller & The Commonwealth w/ Anne McCue
5.03 — The Wailers w/ Brett Dennen
5.10 — Brazilian Girls w/ Christabel and the Jons
5.17 — Gin Blossoms w/ Vertigo
5.24 — Corey Smith w/ Jennifer Niceley
5.31 — Ozomatli w/ Toubab Krewe
6.07 — The Avett Brothers w/ Mad Tea Party
6.14 — John Butler Trio w/ Artvandalay
6.21 — Drive-By Truckers w/ Dixie Dirt
6.28 — Tony Joe White and Dave Barnes (co-headline)
UPDATE: Watch live interviews with some of these artists.
via concertwire.com and more here.
Everything can’t always be just about Knoxville or that would get boring. Occasionally we have to spice things up with some useful links or random funnies. Although this post will be slightly off topic it does come from a friend who lives in Knoxville. Nearly everyday he has some humorous quote on his wiki-blog and I felt the need to share a couple with you.
The first and funniest is related to the title of this post and is from the Schlock Mercenary Wikipedia Article. Well these are actually more like rules than habits and there are more than 7 but that is of no consequence as we are talking about pirates.
1. Pillage, then burn.
6. If violence wasn’t your last resort, you failed to resort to enough of it.
8. Mockery and derision have their place. Usually, it’s on the far side of the airlock.
9. Never turn your back on an enemy.
12. A soft answer turneth away wrath. Once wrath is looking the other way, shoot it in the head.
13. Do unto others.
16. Your name is in the mouth of others: be sure it has teeth.
27. Don’t be afraid to be the first to resort to violence.
29. The enemy of my enemy is my enemy’s enemy. No more. No less.
30. A little trust goes a long way. The less you use, the further you’ll go.
31. Only cheaters prosper.
34. If you’re leaving scorch-marks, you need a bigger gun.
35. That which does not kill you has made a tactical error.
36. When the going gets tough, the tough call for close air support.
37. There is no “overkill”. There is only “open fire” and “I need to reload.”
xx. Give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Take his fish away and tell him he’s lucky just to be alive, and he’ll figure out how to catch another one for you to take tomorrow.
xx. Just because it’s easy for you doesn’t mean it can’t be hard on your clients.
Speaking of pirates, isn’t POTC 3 going to be in theaters soon? Can’t wait.
The other is much shorter and probably more relevant to this blog. It is the following quote from Pat Paulsen:
All the problems we face in the United States today
can be traced to an unenlightened immigration policy
on the part of the American Indian.
The “Bag Of Crap” category is a phrase borrowed from woot.com or if you prefer wine.woot.com. Posts that you find in this category will be random and could contain good, bad, or otherwise useless information.
My good buddy Jed over at http://tennessee-jed.blogspot.com/ thought I might be intersted in reading Julie’s letter to “The Rep”. Jed was right, I am interested in this story that appeared yesterday but I didn’t bother to blog about it as VV, Newscoma, and NIT already had done a fine job covering the news.
I wouldn’t be writing about this now, except for the following: When I clicked the link this morning from Jed, the post was gone. That’s right, Julie took the email thread down and replaced it with “I have taken this post down in an effort to work through more diplomatic channels… Thanks for the support everyone!”.
Unfortunately, Julie’s blog was not in my feed reader otherwise I would repost the contents of the email conversation here. If you have an old copy of the post cached in your feed reader please use the contact form to notify me.
The question we all get to ponder is why Julie would take this post down so quickly?
Marriott International will double the size of its Knoxville-Oak Ridge Innovation Valley business services headquarters to 500 employees. To accommodate the expansion, the company has signed a lease on an additional 50,000 square foot building now under construction next door to its current facilities.
Marriott’s Innovation Valley employees provide accounting and other financial services to the company’s hotels. New hires will primarily be involved in project management and various accounting disciplines, according to Bryan Daniels vice president of the Blount County Economic Development Board.
As part of the Marriott expansion, the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development awarded a $239,040 grant to Blount County to install two traffic signals and widen exit and entrance ramps, according to Daniels.
The new, $6.9 building, owned by Stock Creek Partnership, is scheduled for completion in May.
More from Knoxville News Business Journal Here
Chelsea Conn is the 19-year-old University of Tennessee sophomore who recently dished out $3,000 to settle with the RIAA rather than face a lawsuit as reported by the Knoxville News Sentinel last week.
I wish Chelsea would have read my previous posts on this topic before settling. It is my firm conviction that the RIAA is simply using scare tactics to try and recoup a small portion of the millions of dollars they are losing every year. They give the “guilty” party this easy to access settlement website which cost them very little to setup and maintain and then send out thousands of letters counting on a certain percentage of letters to successfully scare their customers and/or potential customers into paying a settlement fee.
I honestly feel bad that Miss Conn had to borrow the money from her parents and will now need to work to repay them.
“That’ll be all summer,” she said. “I don’t mind paying it back. It was my fault.”
So here are 5 reasons not to settle with the RIAA:
1. Lack of Evidence: Chances are the RIAA doesn’t have anything to prove that you were actually downloading or uploading music via a file sharing application. This point is made stronger if you have uploading disabled.
2. Cost of Lawyers: Lawyers for big companies and organizations like the RIAA charge a hefty hourly rate, probably around $200-$300/hr if not higher. It would be very unlikely for the RIAA to try to come after an individual when the cost of litigation is so high and the lack of evidence (1) is so great. Hire a lawyer for a couple hundred dollars and have him/her write a letter that asks for further correspondence to go through his firm and chances are you won’t hear back from them.
3. Legality of Copying Music: Several court cases have determined that music owners are allowed to make copies of their files in order to protect from loss or damage. If you have previously purchased a copy of the files on your hard drive you are entitled to have more than one digital copy legally. You could probably make this argument for downloading files that you already own
4. Ignorance of Software: Usually ignorance to the law doesn’t get you vary far, but ignorance on the particulars of a given piece of software (like KAZAA) is probably fairly arguable in court. Software applications have become increasingly more complicated and harder to understand for common users as technology has advanced. It is conceivable to think that many of the folks using file sharing software like KAZAA have no idea that they are actually allowing others to download music from their personal library. In reality, the end user might have installed KAZAA to download open licensed music and accidentally or unknowingly allowed others to access their personal music collection.
5. Customers Don’t Pay For Mistakes Of Corporations: This last reason isn’t a legal point (although I could think of a hundred more) as much as it is a personal complaint. The RIAA and the companies it represents failed to address or chose to ignore the changes in technology and are losing money as a result. Most of the money they are losing is not because of people downloading music illegally (at least in the US), but rather it is from people using technology to be more selective in their purchase. Instead of buying Beyonce’s latest CD for $15, they are buying the 3 songs they like off of the CD for $.99 a piece. Why pay for 8 songs you don’t even like?
The reality is that you don’t find many artists trying to sue their fans because the RIAA takes 90% of the money from CD sales. The artists make most of their money touring and selling merchandise. Further, I don’t know a single person who doesn’t support their favorite bands by buying their CD’s. I have every DMB CD ever created by the band because I want to support their music and their families.
Bottom Line: Illegal downloading of music is a much smaller problem then the RIAA claims. Companies like Sony are wasting millions of dollars researching useless DRM solutions like the one that installed a root kit on your computer. Their decline in revenue in recent years is of their own doing, but they want to blame it on you the consumer and loyal customer. Don’t fall prey to their scare tactics, hire a lawyer. RIAA sucks, so says FoxTrot.
Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer and this post should not be considered legal advice.
Here are this weeks collection of the best of Knoxville Tennessee links. If you didn’t have time to keep up with all of the fun stuff going on in Knoxville this week these should catch you up. Please add a comment or use the contact form (more anonyomous) if I missed a story that should be on this list.
From Michael Silence: First rides on Dollywood roller coaster auctioned on eBay
Bidders with at least $500 can be first in line to unlock the mysteries of the new roller coaster at Dollywood. The Pigeon Forge amusement park is holding an online auction on eBay for the first 56 official rides on the $17.5 million Mystery Mine.
From Knoxville Trivia: Knoxville Trivia 101
Do you tuck your tail between your legs and run when someone mentions John Sevier, William Blount, or James White? Do you tremble with fear when you are sitting around the dinner table and someone starts talking about Burnside, Longstreet, and the battle of Fort Sanders? Well fret no more. Below are 10 Knoxville Trivia facts that you can squirrel away in your old noggin, that will make you look like bonafide Knoxvillian.
From KnoxNews.com: Adams: UT at a loss after second-half wrongs
SAN ANTONIO — Tennessee basketball fans are accustomed to disappointment, but what happened Thursday night in the Alamodome goes way beyond disappointment.
From Michael Silence: Get your Fred Thompson bumper stickers
And this: In our last email, we mentioned that we were missing a few states and within hours, we had grassroots volunteers signed up in all 50.
From Cup Of Joe Powell: Money Trumps Traffic Camera Changes
Despite evidence that lengthening the time a traffic light is yellow reduces accidents, the TN legislature has decided to support the tactic of using automatic cameras. So more tickets and more revenue win the day.
From KnoxNews.com: Knox to hire 300 teachers
Knox County school officials expect to fill close to 650 teacher vacancies for next school year, and they’re exploring new ways to be more competitive.
From Sean Braisted: .20 Gets The Party Started
Senator Cooper turned himself in today (really just went in to get his mugshot and finger prints taken) in regards to his accident last month. According to the Tennessean, Sen. Cooper had a wee too much to drink, with a .18 BAC, over twice the legal limit of .08.
From KnoxNews.com: Playboy hopes to find “Girls of the SEC” at UT
Playboy photographers are headed to University of Tennessee April 2 and 3 looking for the finest of UT. (Best of The Worst News of the Week)
Did I miss a link? Add your favorite stories for the week in the comments to this post.
Ben over at Taxing Tennessee does a great job of keeping tabs on our elected officials. He recently highlighted on a great resource that can be used to keep track of our House and Senate representatives, opencongress.org. We all need to continue to pursue opportunities that make available the details of local, state, and national government.
I created two feeds from the data at opencongress.org, one for Tennessee House representatives and one for our two Senate representatives. You can use these links to quickly get an idea of what Tennessee politicians are doing in Washington.
Representatives:
Rep. David Davis [R, TN-1]
Rep. John Duncan [R, TN-2]
Rep. Zach Wamp [R, TN-3]
Rep. Lincoln Davis [D, TN-4]
Rep. Jim Cooper [D, TN-5]
Rep. Barton Gordon [D, TN-6]
Rep. Marsha Blackburn [R, TN-7]
Rep. John Tanner [D, TN-8]
Rep. Steve Cohen [D, TN-9]
Senators:
Sen. Lamar Alexander [R, TN]
Sen. Bob Corker [R, TN]
Get your feed readers loaded so you can keep track of these folks and don’t forget to check out opencongress.org and Taxing Tennessee.
Michael Silence has two wonderful links on his blog today. The first is the Ebay auction to win a ride on Dollywood’s Mystery Mine and the second is a possible announcement that a Costco store could be coming to Knoxville.
More details of the ebay auction:
The starting bid is US $500.00. All of the proceeds of the final sale price will support The Dollywood Foundation and the winner will receive:
Tickets to Dollywood for the winner and a guest for Friday, April 13, 2007 and Saturday, April 14, 2007.
Participation and VIP seating for the Media Day activities at Dollywood at 9:00 AM on Friday, April 13, 2007
1 of 56 seats on the first official ride cycle of Mystery Mine at Dollywood on Friday, April 13, 2007
A photo with Dolly Parton
A framed display featuring an image of your ride, a signed photo with Dolly and other Mystery Mine memorabilia to commemorate your historical place as one of the first official riders of the Mystery Mine.
More details of the Costco link:
Costco is currently looking at the possibility of expanding into more than 300 different areas across the US and is planning to open between 30-40 new stores a year. Knoxville is on the list of places that Costco is considering and hopefully they will view the Knoxville and surrounding markets as a worthwhile investment. Having moved from a state where there are an abundance of Costco stores, I can tell you that they are a wonderful change from the boredom of Sam’s Club. Plus, Knoxville residents have the added bonus of Costco bringing new competition to Sam’s Club. Then we’ll only need to add a BJ’s Wholesale Club and Knoxville will be all set.
Thank you Mr. Silence for doing a wonderful job in the blogosphere as usual and for bringing these links to our attention.
Almost every blogger in Tennessee has commented on the recent news that Fred Thompson may run for President in 2008. Michael Silence has been in a Fred Funk for some time now and his blogging nemesis has jokingly countered the Silence attack with Al Gore propaganda. A.C. Kleinheider even threw a few blows at Silence saying the following:
Well, you’ve certainly done your part now, Mr. Silence. The blogosphere can act as an echochamber and a reinforcement of one’s previously held beliefs. There very well may be a groundswell for Fred — but there is also one because you are looking for one and because you are participating in the manufacture of one.
I have to confess that I was convinced this excitement for Thompson was limited to Tennessee, but It seems as though this may be more then just a “groundswell for Fred”. Consider this poll from Hannity.com where Fred has more than 50 percent of the votes. It looks like this excitement may be reaching further than just Thompson’s home state. I don’t plan on following this story as there are plenty of people covering Thompson.
If you are interesting in finding out more about Fred visit one of the links above and check out the Official Draft Fred Thompson Website and this Draft Fred Thompson forum.
Update: Hot off the N-S Press: ‘Draft Fred’ presidential bid gains steam
All three GOP U.S. House members from East Tennessee are backing the new “Draft Fred Thompson” for president committee, and Bank East in Knoxville will handle its campaign fund.
