"To see what I'm all about, keepin' my head down."

Great news: Coldplay has announced a North American tour. While I celebrate, my mind turns also to the music industry as a whole. In certain ways, the commercialization of beats and tunes has turned music-making into a competition - if you want to make money. Let's face it, most people do. (Oh capitalist! My capitalist! Spring forth, and let notes of divinity flow from the lips!). The evolution of record labels and the demanding (and in some ways limiting) contracts which come with them have changed artists' perspectives. Can one still make "good" music while staying competitive?

Let's look at Coldplay. The dashing British foursome have enjoyed a steadily rising audience since their first stab at glory, Parachutes, and have since then released a series of best-selling albums. Their reputation among critics is perhaps described most accurately by Pitchfork's Ian Cohen, who declares that they "explore the tension of wanting to be one of the best bands in the world and having to settle for being one of the biggest." In simpler terms, they are viewed by critics as being competitive but not artistic, best-selling but not best-sounding. (As you probably can tell by now, I'm not among this crowd). Here is my question: do these people criticize Coldplay's music simply because they are popular?

A friend of mine once listed out to me all that he found revolting about the band: cheesy lyrics, simple instrumentals, "overly mainstream songs." He argued that they were in fact, just another sold out pop act, releasing complete crap just to rake in money. To me, the first two are both undesirable qualities in an artist, but they do not necessarily go hand in hand with being mainstream. A band like Coldplay releases full albums, not endless lines of singles. They create themes for each album. They let their creativity dictate their writing, not their revenues. The best part is, they do all that while being immensely popular. They are forging a narrative which seems to be rare today: achieving massive "mainstream" success while maintaining artistic integrity. In this manner, they are indeed one of the best bands in the world.

A song off their latest album, performed live.

A Naïve Examination of Nukes and Nations

The recent IAEA report on Iran's nuclear program has set off an interesting series of international political moves. In a way, these events challenge my concept of competition in general, but we'll get to that later.

From Iran, we see the now typical "America is plotting against us" response, reminiscent of their statements regarding the revealed plot to assassinate Saudi ambassador to the U.S. of about a month ago. Interestingly, the report has given Ayatollah Khamenei and President Ahmadinejad something to agree on (America-bashing), despite rising tensions between the two major figures of the Iranian government.

On the other hand, from Israel comes a subtle hint of potential military action against the threat of an Iran armed with nuclear warheads and the technology to deliver them. Israeli leaders have made no official declarations of an intent to invade Iran, but rhetoric has been far from reassuring.

What's interesting about this little game is that the incentives of the players are not clear, at least to me. If Iran really is nourishing a nuke somewhere in the country, why do they continue to deny it? They have stated that if it was their intent to build a bomb, they would do so regardless of the international community's meddling. If they actually do build one now and announce it, they are dealing a significant blow to their diplomatic credibility. What's the point of building the thing if a.) using it or even declaring its existence will significantly lower your standing among the international community and b.) the firepower it grants you will simply increase tensions with neighboring Arab states to a fever pitch, perhaps starting an arms race which might result in an overwhelmingly nuclear and volatile Middle East.

Israel also baffles me with its hints of invasion. Given their current conflict with Palestinians, it hardly seems to be in their interest to enter an all out war with Iran. Perhaps these insinuations are simply meant to encourage further sanctions against the Islamic Republic from other powers, but that doesn't seem to be biting with everyone.

Lacking a clear understanding of Iranian and Israeli politics, history, and domestic leadership, I am left wondering at the incentives behind their current actions. If I view their acts as moves made in an international competition, I arrive at an interesting conclusion. That is, incentives are inherently assumed in and essential to any forms of competitiveness. Perhaps this is an observation which could've been made by a 1st grader, but I find its simplicity to be very important. Without an understanding of underlying motives, competition is just chaos, but by articulating our rationale for doing things, we can create new meanings for the same words and change "doing" into "competing." This is how a term like "swimmer" attains the attached meaning of "competitive swimmer," because when you say "he's a swimmer," the most reasonable role that comes to mind is that of someone who swims to win, or compete, not some oddball who constantly lives in a lake.

This has been a quirky train of thought to wrap my mind around.

Democracy In A World Of Money

Can't buy me love, but a seat in Congress ain't out of the question. While we're near the topic of corporate influence on American politics, we might as well mention the Koch Brothers, those iconic paragons of libertarian wealth. Strong supporters of the Tea Party movement, the dynamic duo spent $40 million in the 2010 Congressional elections to help launch Tea Party Republicans into the House of Representatives. Each with a net worth of $25 billion, Charles Koch and David Koch are a political force to be reckoned with; they are expected to contribute substantial funding to prevent a reelection of President Barack Obama in 2012. To be sure, I have strong opinions regarding the Koch Brothers' political agenda, but in the interest of keeping this blog away from spewing overly partisan hogwash, I will stay away from the topic and just say this: it is frightening how much influence one can possess simply for being wealthy.

I'm really liking this subject; perhaps we will examine it more in the future.

National Hockey League, National Football League, National... Senate League?

Let's take a break from the unoriginal blathering of Yours Truly and look more closely at what others have to say. Specifically, I'd like to direct you to a post from a mysterious young voice who goes simply by the name: Darrell.

This piece is a few weeks old, but it has some substantive ideas worth looking back in time for. Mr. Darrell talks of the different forms of rhetoric used by President Obama in pushing for his American Jobs Act and the deficit reduction proposal which would fund such a plan. The overarching idea emerges from this ending sentence though:

Congressional rhetoric is connected to the internal politics and tension that appears on the political battlefield called Washington, D.C.

That is a haymaker among sentences, but I'm not particularly opposed to the direction this punch is thrown in. American politics have almost become, by definition, a struggle between left and right, Democrat and Republican, Keynesian and Keynesian-opposed. To be sure, political disagreements are a sign of a healthy democracy. (The lack of such activity might suggest authoritarian rule, which most would agree is rather distasteful.) But what we have today resembles a professional sport with only two major teams and lots of corporate sponsors. In calling Washington a "battlefield," Mr. Darrell himself was appropriately using some clever rhetoric.

The American political system will probably always foster a competitive atmosphere like this, but, as Mr. Darrell aptly puts it, in a context like our current one, "compromises are hard to reach." If the vast majority of the American people view their role as a voter as choosing either Team 1 or Team 2, there really isn't much hope for finding a middle ground. The limits of a two-party system are frustrating: you essentially have two options, and in the case of the U.S., many become so glued to these two options that finding the third is akin to growing another arm.

Lightly walking through the White House's website, it's not hard to see that the President himself tires of congressional sloth. "WE CAN'T WAIT ON CONGRESS: THE TIME TO ACT IS NOW," declares the top of the home page. Mr. Obama's not so subtle criticism of blatant Congressional partisanship is far from unreasonable. Our friend Mr. Darrell cites a Harvard study revealing that a full 27% of Senatorial press releases between 2005 and 2007 were devoted to the noble public service of... taunting other Senators. The point, my friends, is this: When competition over political influence becomes just as important as upholding the responsibilities which that influence entails (namely, serving and governing our nation in a democratic manner), we have a problem, and that problem compromises our ability to solve other problems. Unfortunately, we have a lot of other problems right now.

On a lighter note: It would be amusing to see two teams of U.S. Senators dressed in Democrat and Republican jerseys duke it out on a basketball court or football field. "Durbin to Franken and it's STOLEN by McCain!"

Innovation Station

I would not like to be an engineer working for Apple. I have nothing against engineers, nor do I dislike Apple, but the company has set a precedent for itself which in my opinion will eventually become unsustainable. In essence, the iCompany has amassed a loyal following which demands innovation on a regular, literally scheduled, basis. With the release of the 5th generation iPhone, the company unveiled yet another one of its amazing feats of technological magic, but iPhone users have simply come to expect more. Concerns over the tardiness of the product compared to past releases were raised. Why didn't they do it during the summer? A few of my friends asked, "Why does it look the same?" Why can't it do this and why can't it do that? The crux of the disappointment stems around the question: why is it not the iPhone 5?

Why indeed? Apple has established itself as a major competitor in the smartphone industry by cultivating an air for its products: sleek, powerful, light on buttons and heavy on features. To maintain this reputation for its products while consistently releasing 'revolutionary' new gadgets... I'm not an expert but that sounds close to impossible. Yet they've done it for years now, under the leadership of the late Steve Jobs. The old adage that innovation stems from necessity holds true, except here the necessity is consumer demand. In this year's iPhone's case though, could it be that - say it ain't so, you must be joking - the company simply couldn't come up with a smooth version of the technology fast enough? If Apple doesn't live up to this image of itself that it's created, it risks losing a significant number of fans, an unacceptable outcome in the vicious modern markets, where myriads of companies can step up to replace customers' purchasing needs. How much pressure must Apple engineers be facing constantly, with the expectation of creating a vastly improved and simultaneously polished smartphone every single year?

Perhaps I'm being naïve. Competition is an aspect of virtually all industries in the global economy, and there are bound to be more companies than Apple which must rely heavily on constant innovation to remain competitive. But it still astounds me that consumer culture has grown into this - a persistent hunger for sleeker, faster, bigger, smaller, lighter, better. It's created a system similar to evolution, in which only the best products get bought so that the companies that provide those best products may survive to sell another day. The difference is that technological innovation is intentional while genetic mutations are random. But how far can innovation go? That's what worries me. Competition can only motivate; it's up to the actual players to figure out the innovating part.

Credit Where Credit Is Due

Here's a great post, from the blog Sociological Images, which provides some data very relevant to my post the other day about the Occupy Wall Street movement. This particular blog was recommended to me by my English teacher and it often provides interesting ways to look at telling data.

Sibling Rivalry

Rough childhood. (Slightly disturbing footage).

A Spectre Is Haunting America

Let us go then you and I, to that famed metropolis of New York City, where hundreds have taken to the streets to protest corporate greed, economic disparity, and blatant special interest lobbying. There is little love in their song: "APATHY IS FOR ASSHOLES", "EAT THE RICH", "TAX WALL STREET LEECHES", and the even less subtle "FUCK GOOGLE" were only a few of the signs recorded by journalist John Cassidy in his post for the New Yorker about the Occupy Wall Street protests. How is competition reflected in this relatively peaceful (but not confrontation free) gathering?

Fundamentally, the protest illustrates an important component of conflict theory sociology: competition for limited resources among groups. From a straightforward viewpoint, the groups in play right now are simply separated by socioeconomic status. Participants hail from a variety of religious, political, and financial backgrounds, but you'd be hard pressed to find a Fortune 500 company CEO among them. Putting this situation into a simple model, we see the protesters constitute one group and their perceived rivals constitute the other - Wall Street bankers, corporate executives, and to a certain degree, rich people in general. The limited resource being contested is of course money, and along similar lines, job benefits and employment. "Why am I struggling to put my kids through college while Mr. MBA over there is struggling to put his Ferrari back in the garage?"

Is that all? People want more money because they've been pummeled in the race for wealth? I think not. Exacerbating the conflict is the narrative that many protesters have perceived. That is, the view that the rich caused this and the rich haven't been held accountable. Even worse, the rich use their money to influence the government so they can get richer. This is the simplest form of the story they see and admittedly, it is infuriating. The U.S. has a family income disparity rating of 45 on the widely used Gini index (the higher the number the more uneven the income distribution), coming in as the 39th highest in the world. For the #1 economy in the world, that's not something to be proud of. The effectiveness of corporate lobbying on the democratic political process is also rather shameful. A recent and decent example would be Rick Perry's support of HPV vaccination - initially, it seemed the governor had valiantly gone against his party on a matter he felt strongly about. But soon the familiar and ugly truth emerged as it was revealed that Perry had received extensive funding from drug giant Merck, manufacturer of the Gardasil vaccine. Do American politicians represent the people or the Mercks of the U.S.?

These are just a few of the realities which have prompted the Occupy Wall Street movement to Occupy Wall Street. Some of the other reasons are far too complex for a person of my limited knowledge to even approach, like the collapse of the housing bubble and the global recession as a whole . But the important thing to realize about the recent manifestations is this: the people aren't just protesting the outcome. They're protesting the system. To give a simple analogy, they are opposed not just to the rich winning the game of money-making by so much, but also to the rich breaking the rules to do so. Economic competition in the modern system is governed by rules which guide the competitors. Though businesses do their best to sidestep them constantly, the guidelines are still there. What Occupy Wall Street is saying, nay, yelling, is that their competitors are cheating - and thus winning unfairly.

Photo Credit: Paul Stein, September 26, 2011. Hosted link.

Welcome

This is the start of what will hopefully be a mutually beneficial and enlightening relationship between you, reader, and me, writer. I'm setting out to learn some things about the world and the way it works and you are coming along for the ride.

Most of my friends call me Chen; from this day forth, consider yourself an honorary member of that group. I'm a 17-soon-18-year-old from a quiet suburb of Chicago, ready for college to start but not ready for high school to end. What qualifies me to write this blog? Nothing. If you've come for a Harvard-educated sociologist's thoughts about the effects of modern American sports culture on young males, look somewhere else because you are painfully far from being in the right place. As mentioned above, this will be just as much a learning process for me as it will be for you. That being said, I'd like to think that I'm of at least average intelligence. I will discuss current and past world issues, relevant literature, and whatever else I feel fits the focus of this blog.

And what, you might ask, is that focus? To put it as generally as possible, I will be examining the content of the world through the broad and flexible lens of competition. Sprinters dashing to the finish line. MNCs scrambling to seize new markets. Candidates frantically campaigning for votes. Competition has been an integral component of the human experience, contributing even to its biological evolution. We will look at this driving force in as many ways as possible. We will examine its nature. How do the individual perspectives of competitors meld into a system with dynamic parts? We will examine its effects. What circumstances cause competition to drive a group as a whole towards progress? Does it always do that? We will apply these ideas to the real world. What constitutes the rules of competition in our steadily globalizing world? When examining the international system like this, we will often touch upon economics and politics. These questions describe the general direction I plan on taking this venture. They are flexible. Changes of course will likely occur, but the general lens will remain constant.

Hopefully this introduction has incubated at least a minute growth of excitement within you. If not, I apologize. Carry on with your life and forget about this dusty little corner of the web. But if indeed you feel even a hint of a flutter of interest in your chest, then I cordially invite you to stay, and to listen, and to speak. Rest now, for much lies ahead of us.

"In the clearing stands a boxer and a fighter by his trade,
And he carries the reminders,
Of every glove that laid him down or cut him 'til he cried out,
In his anger and his shame,
'I am leaving, I am leaving,'
But the fighter still remains."

-Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel