The End

As Com 435 comes to a close, I can't lie, I'm a little bit happy.
I do feel I benefited a lot from the course, such as learning about really helpful technologies such as Google Docs (Which is quite awesome!)

But I won't lie, I'll be glad to get away from Twitter..I'm so ashamed that I had to activate it on my cell phone haha.

For my technology poster, I made a presentation for Sun Micorsystem's new music recommendation technology.

It is like Pandora, but better. It's completely computer animated and does the same work that takes a Pandora staff member 20 minutes to do in 3 minutes. The computer actually determines the genre and then the system gets information about the music from more credible sources (Music Reviews, blogs, etc) and cross references those to recommend music that you might actually like!

I never use Pandora because it usually recommends things I don't want to listen to. This site appears to be more accurate!

It was fun to learn about something that i might actually use! Plus I got to include a giant picture of John Mayer on my poster so I was a happy camper!

It's been a great semester.
I hope you've all enjoyed the song selections and were open to new types of music.

So here is the final one! This song just makes me happy. Plus the video is so awesome!
"Strawberry Swing" by Coldplay

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYtk1ZOUUue
(If this link doesn't work, just go to YouTube and type in the song and artist. For some reason the copy and paste feature on my computer is acting up...)
Enjoy!
Rock on!
Kimmy

For our final project for Com 435, we were to present an emerging technology to the class by competing with elaborate poster presentations to compete for our classmates' attention. It seemed somewhat like a third grade science fair in my opinion, which is part of why I actully had fun attending.



If we liked someones' presentation, we were to use our cell phones to tweet about it.



I looked high and low for technologies about music, but few presented themselves. I hope to change that for when I present on Friday!

How about some Ray LaMontange...
"Trouble"
Because with all the work I had to do this week, trouble is what I felt.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kp3ltmw6cml

"Simply Having a Wonderful Christmastime"

I consider myself to hold very high standards when it comes to music. That said, I don't believe that the holidays are justification for us to listen to bad music all season.

Don't get me wrong, I love one cheesy Christmas song after the next, and most of the classics are beautiful, I mean, come on, who can deny Bing Crosby?

But this is the time of year where I get excited to pull out some really good songs which I feel a little bit guilty listening to any other time of year.

One of my friends just introduced me to a new website Lala.com which has about any song you could ever think of.

I also enjoy searching Google to find my favorite artists' renditions of classics.

"Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" by Coldplay
"God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" by Barenaked Ladies and Sarah McLaughlin
"Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" By Jack Johnson

Each song is classic but the gets a little bit of flare from the artist that covers it.

I love to find new, nontraditional Christmas music as well.

My favorite Christmas song is "All That I Want" by The Weepies

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A0EJbr0rFV4&feature=PlayList&p=3C7EDDA78EE64DDD&index=1

So check it out!
And join in on the Christmas caroling this year!
"The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear!"

Kimmy

The announcement of the Grammy Award nominees is like an early Christmas gift for me...

I was pleasantly surprised by a few nominations this year.

Coldplay, Dave Matthews Band, The Fray, u2, Deathcab for Cutie, David Bryne and Brian Eno, Jason Mraz, Kings of Leon, and the guy who engineered Ray LaMontange's latest album are all up for nominations, but I'm most thrilled for nominations for progressive rock hippies, MGMT and Paris based rockers, Phoenix!!!

Taylor Swift, Beyonce, The Black Eyed Peas, and Lady Gaga all have a bunch of nominations and certain technologies make it easy to see how people feel about the academy's choices for nominees.

However you feel about the nominees, it is easy to post your feelings on Twitter. The nomination list came out last night and was in the top 10 topics tweeted about today.

If you're not familiar with all the nominees, there is no better (or easier) way to find out their music by simply popping their name into google or YouTube.

For a full list of the 2010 Grammy Nominees go to http://www.grammy.com/

MGMT is up for 2 awards, including best new artist!
Check them out!

"Kids" by MGMT
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAmcpsN1GL4&feature=related

Rock on!
Kimmy

I Listen to Music that is used in Commericals

If someone were to ask me to describe my music taste, I could easily tell them that I listen to a lot of the music that is used in advertisements.

I was watching TV yesterday and was pleased to hear "Sleepyhead" by Passion Pit in the HD Palm Pix commercial!

I usually know most songs in commercials, but when I don't, it's an awesome way to find new music. Commercials have led me to discover artists such as the Weepies and Oren Lavie. Thank goodness for the Internet, because I would have no way to find out who these artists were that were making me want to buy cars and shop at JC Penny's.

It's great, you can type in the commercial to Google and almost instantly find the song you want. Then you just YouTube it and can hear it for free...and if you're like me, it will lead you to purchase an album!

Oh, the power of advertising...or in my case, the power of music in advertising.

Below are some commercials which have AWESOME music in them.
Enjoy!
Kimmy

"1901" by Phoenix in a Cadillac commercial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHuZJJUNDyc


"Sleepyhead" by Passion Pit in a PSP commercial from Canada ( I Couldn't find the Palm Pix Commercial)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHuZJJUNDyc

"Stars" by the Weepies in an Old Navy Commercial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVikPdlgYVw

"The Way I Am" by Ingrid Michaelson in an Old Navy Commercial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-7luX488iY

"Trouble" by Ray LaMontange in a Traveler's' Insurance commercial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5G7bGBUlx2M

"A Punk" by Vampire Weekend in an HP Commercial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BunlV_t2JAI

Evolution of Sound

I've come to a simple realization. I hate Twitter.

Before I merely thought Twitter was just stupid, especially if you have an account on the Facebook in which you can update your statuses in an instant so your friends can know what you're doing at every second of everyday. . .

Kimmy likes "Say Yes to the Dress"
Kimmy is "at work"
Kimmy is "updating her facebook status."

I promise by facebook status updates are not this mundane nor frequent, and I must admit that I enjoy entering the more exciting or humorous aspects of my day to day scene on the facebook so my friends can make fun of me, but Twitter takes it to a whole other level.

Once I was forced by my Emerging Technologies class to 'Tweet' so to speak, I have come to the realization that not only do I think it's stupid....but I think it's ridiculous.

Maybe it's just me, but I don't understand the for mate, I can follow people without their permission, and what's up with the 30 plus friends made me follow when I signed up? (One of which was John Legend...that one is okay!)

The only thing that I like about Twitter is that I can follow John Mayer and his witty, charming, and handsome tweets...(yes a tweet can be handsome!)

I was, however, impressed when I learned that I could type in a key word and find all the tweets including that word or phrase at my finger tips.

For example, I typed in "Battle Studies" which is John Mayer's new album released on Tuesday, and yield TONS of results!

Speaking of John Mayer's new album, I went to purchase the new album and received a free vinyl with the album! Thank God not all old technology is dead. The quality of vinyls is amazing. My rant at Twitter makes me want to rant about how much better sounding records are as opposed to MP3s, but that maybe saved for another day...

So check out "Who Says" off of the John Mayer's new album.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWg6EzdX-04&feature=fvst

Boy, he's pretty!
Rock on!
Kimmy

P.S....Iroinically enough, John Mayer LOVES Twitter....we all have our flaws I suppose.

Gaga

I have never felt as popular as I have in the last two weeks.

Last Friday, the Purdue Student Concert Committee (SCC) announced that Lady Gaga with special guests KiD CuDi and Jason Derulo would be coming to Purdue on Thursday, January 14.

As vice president of SCC, I've know about the show for well over a month now. As SCC members, we are required to keep the show secret until we come to an agreement with the university, promoters, and press as to when to make an official announcement of a show to the public.

So I was shocked when I started to receive texts from friends a week or so prior to the announcement asking if Lady Gaga was coming to campus!

As the days approaching the announcement passed, I got more and more texts from people wanting to know if the rumors were true.

By the night before the announcement, I received a text message from a friend that "Lady Gaga had taken over the Facebook."

Sure enough I checked online and everyone and their mom was talking about Lady Gaga coming to Purdue....there was even a Facebook event created about the show.

It is crazy how the use of social media and text was able to spread the word about the show before it was even announced. Texts and the Internet make information so much more accessible.

If you're going to the show, tickets are on sale tomorrow at 10am!

I'm really excited for the show because it's gonna be so entertaining.
Even the support acts, KiD CuDi and Jason Derulo have big followings.

So this weeks song recommendation is actually the song "Hide and Seek" by Imogen Heap...let me explain.

Jason Derulo's single, "Whatcha Say" is actually a sample from this Imogen Heap song that came out a few years ago. I couldn't believe it when I heard the Derulo version, but I dig both.

So you can compare:

First Derulo-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBI3lc18k8Q

Second Heap-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5cpSv2mNhhc

It's a really weird song, but you'll get past it...


Rock on!

Kimmy