Writing for The New York Times, U2 lead singer Bono offers up “10 ideas that might make the next 10 years more interesting, healthy or civil.”
Bono’s “ideas” include:
• Return of the Automobile as a Sexual Object: The Obama administration — while it still holds the keys to the big automakers — ought to put some style fascists into the mix: the genius of Marc Newson … Steve Jobs and Jonny Ive from Apple … Frank Gehry, the architect, and Jeff Koons, the artist. Put the great industrial designers in the front seat, right along with sound financial stewardship … the greener, the cleaner, the meaner on fossil fuels, the sexier for me.
• Intellectual Property Developers: A decade’s worth of music file-sharing and swiping has made clear that the people it hurts are the creators — in this case, the young, fledgling songwriters who can’t live off ticket and T-shirt sales like the least sympathetic among us — and the people this reverse Robin Hooding benefits are rich service providers, whose swollen profits perfectly mirror the lost receipts of the music business. We’re the post office, they tell us; who knows what’s in the brown-paper packages? But we know from America’s noble effort to stop child pornography, not to mention China’s ignoble effort to suppress online dissent, that it’s perfectly possible to track content.
• An Equal Right to Pollute (and the Polluter-Pays Principle): Your average Ethiopian can sell her underpolluting ways (people in Ethiopia emit about 0.1 ton of carbon a year) to the average American (about 20 tons a year) and use the proceeds to deal with the effects of climate change (like drought), educate her kids and send them to university.
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Bono could make a Woodstock Festival Porta-Potty look empty.
I wonder what Bono’s carbon footprint is?
I’m sure it’s a lot more than mine.
Let’s see him live like am Ethiopian.
Bono could make a Woodstock Festival Porta-Potty look empty.
Then why give him any attention?
Techdirt, as usual, has a good response to this nonsense from Bono – excerpts:
Today, however, the opportunities for the young, fledgling songwriter to build a following, build a business model and make a living have grown tremendously. Ask Jonathan Coulton. Or Corey Smith. Or Matthew Ebel. Or Moto Boy. Or any one of thousands of other songwriters who didn’t go the major label route, but have figured out ways to make a living (or better) that simply would not have been possible just a few years ago. […]
The problem here is that, again, Bono seems to equate file sharing with a loss of money or decrease in output from the wider creative industries. He’s flat out wrong. The overall industries continue to grow. It’s just a small group of the more powerful middlemen, who have refused to adapt and change with the times, who are stuck in the past. And it’s because of their own unwillingness to adapt, that they may be losing some money. But the creative output, and the economic impact of those overall industries continue to grow, no matter how confused some rockstar on a crusade might be about them.
This is just like when Bono was defending himself for moving U2’s business entities out of Ireland when the taxes went up for him, while at the same time telling the government officials they should send more money to Africa.
Those ideas are all great….as long as it doesn’t affect my grand lifestyle.
Hey Bono, how about a tracking device in your cool Blackberry, so your wife knows when you’re with the groupies.
It’s always the same, no matter if there’s an ISP involved or not:
When you’re a young musician, you want people to hear the music, no matter what, but when you’re rich, it’s all about protecting the empire.
Frank Gehry would make your car out of cardboard!
Koons would make his car out of Cicciolina.
Hey, Bono! How about sharing some of those millions you earned with the Irish tax authorities instead of hiding them in your off shore accounts for decades. You know, what you legally supposed to do? Huh?
Hypocrite.
Who really cares what Mono of Used To thinks?
<crickets>show of hands</crickets>
He is and shall always be a douche bag.
this is not news worthy, bono (gayest name ever) is the biggest tit ever and who the fsck cares what he thinks! especialy the government! if they take advice from that turd, there is no hope for humanity!
People do realize that Bono is a tax-dodger, right?
The same NYTs in the past couple years have shown that bands like U2 launder their royalties thru the Netherlands, where they don’t pay tax.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/04/business/yourmoney/04amster.html?sq=u2 and tax haven&st=cse&scp=1&pagewanted=all
And, here is where Bono blames his Irish critics as hypocrites:
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/u2-respond-to-critics-of-their-deal-with-the-taxman/?scp=1&sq=u2 and tax&st=cse
what a tosser
It seems increasingly clear that Bono is all about the Benjamins.
Notice that he is suddenly all aflutter about file sharing (supposedly on behalf of the “independent artists”) yet he has been curiously silent/non-commital on the Ticketmaster/Live Nation merger — a potential monopoly that will, IMHO, result in higher ticket prices … bad news for indie artists but great news for the big and rich … like U2.
Really getting sick of this guy.
Looks like a village in ireland is missing their idiot!!!!!!
Repeat after me, there is NO Global Warming, never has been, never will be..
If someone or some company wants to try and save a dime by going green, go for it, however if your doing it thinking your saving the planet, your wasting your time and probably money installing wind or solar power from which you may never get your ROI..
Bono deserves to die slowly and painfully.
And U2 sucks!!
Yes, I said it.
@TheConfuzed1
I’d go fo STFU.
I don;t mind him singing.
Why is there a picture of Sonny Bono here?
“Repeat after me, there is NO Global Warming, never has been, never will be..”
Oh, if only you had shared your knowledge and wisdom with the world from the beginning.
“Why is there a picture of Sonny Bono here?”
And I thought I was the only one who noticed the the photo mix-up. I don’t believe U2 ever released “I’ve Got You Babe”?
Hard to believe that MDN would first post a picture of Sonny Bono on an article by U2 lead singer Bono and only one other person has caught it.
For all you others Sonny partnered with Cher, became a member Congress and killed himself skiing.
Amazing how someone can be such a liberal- except when it comes to HIS money- THEN send in the storm troopers. Ultra-rich piece of crap. And just makes this guy worth a million times anyone else who works their a$$ off? Music piracy has not hurt the little guy- more likely has given him exposure- but groups like U2- Oh yes, they have lost millions- but despite that- these guys are still millions ahead of most of us here.
Cher sent MDN the photo! : )
RIP Sonny Bono!
Regarding Boner, er, Bono, the “1 idea that might make the next 100 years more interesting, healthy or civil.” is if YOU and U2 retire and that will let you do more than be a mouth piece for the various charities you speak for. Now you can spend all your time and all your money that you made helping these various people all over the world!
Then you can win the Nobel Peace Prize and the Vatican can make you Saint Bono!
I would love to see Apple allow independent musicians sell their music through iTunes without a label as the middleman. Although I can see many legal hurdles.
U2 didn’t make enough money from the highest grossing tour of 2009?
While Bono is looking for suggestions, here’s one. Drop the price of CDs below $10.00 and see how that improves CD sales. When the evolution from albums to CDs happened, prices more than doubled but consumers were assured as soon as the “new technology” caught on that the prices would come back down. Still waiting two decades later for that one to happen.
You already can. It’s called TuneCore and it’s really, really cool.
The photo sure looks like Sonny Bono of Sonny and Cher fame. Or did the late Congressman Bono resurrect himself?