Monday, May 14, 2007
Thursday, May 10, 2007
Chart Thursday: Spidey sets records
MOVIES (Last weekend, May 4-6)
1. Spiderman 3 ($151 mil, 1st wk)
2. Disturbia ($5.8 mil, 4th wk, $60 mil total)
3. Fracture ($3.7 mil, 3rd wk, $26.7 mil total)
4. The Invisible ($3.3 mil, 2nd wk, $12.4 mil total)
5. Next ($2.9 mil, 2nd wk, $12 mil total)
ALBUMS (5/1 - 5/7)
The top five:
1. Ne-Yo, Because of You, 251K (new)
2. Michael Buble, Call Me Irresponsible, 212K (new)
3. Rush, Snakes and Arrows, 93K (new)
4. Avril Lavigne, The Best Damn Thing, 86K (495K in 3 weeks)
5. Tori Amos, American Doll Posse, 54K (new)
------
Other interesting selections:
7. Daughtry, Daughtry, 50K (2.4 mil in 24 weeks)
10. Carrie Underwood, Some Hearts, 44K (5.3 mil in 77 weeks)
87. Elliot Yamin, 8K (180K in 7 weeks)
93. High School Musical Soundtrack, 7K (3.9 mil in 69 weeks)
114. Kellie Pickler, Small Town Girl, 6K (518K in 27 weeks)
157. Kidz Bop, Kidz Bop 11, 5K (242K in 11 weeks)
SONG DOWNLOADS (5/1 - 5/7)
The top five:
1. Maroon 5, "Makes Me Wonder," 177K (421K total)
2. Ne-Yo, "Because of You," 117K (206K total)
3. Carrie Underwood, "I'll Stand By You," 114K (238K total)
4. Avril Lavigne, "Girlfriend," 103K (1.2 mil total)
5. T-Pain, "Buy U A Drank," 89K (535K total)
------
Other interesting selections:
12. Carrie Underwood, "Before He Cheats," 52K (1.17 mil total)
32. Daughtry, "It's Not Over," 23K (1.20 mil total)
COMMENTARY
Thanks to excessive popularity and ever-increasing ticket prices, Spiderman 3 broke various records as it took in five times as much money as all other movies combined last weekend. I must be the only one in the country who hasn't seen it yet.
Meanwhile, some rapper who calls himself Ne-Yo sold the most albums and came in second on downloads. I haven't bothered to look up the lyrics yet. Maroon 5's new song stays on top for a second week. I've heard it once; it's OK.
Unfortunately, pop radio keeps playing the latest country single from Carrie Underwood, pushing her album's sales well over five million and threatening to overtake Daughtry's average yet decent single in downloads.
Speaking of Idol economics, Bon Jovi's feature on American Idol put all six of his performed songs in the top 50 for last week's downloads. Regardless of the overall talent or actual interest of the show in successive seasons, it continues to generate loads of money for both performers and the performed.
1. Spiderman 3 ($151 mil, 1st wk)
2. Disturbia ($5.8 mil, 4th wk, $60 mil total)
3. Fracture ($3.7 mil, 3rd wk, $26.7 mil total)
4. The Invisible ($3.3 mil, 2nd wk, $12.4 mil total)
5. Next ($2.9 mil, 2nd wk, $12 mil total)
ALBUMS (5/1 - 5/7)
The top five:
1. Ne-Yo, Because of You, 251K (new)
2. Michael Buble, Call Me Irresponsible, 212K (new)
3. Rush, Snakes and Arrows, 93K (new)
4. Avril Lavigne, The Best Damn Thing, 86K (495K in 3 weeks)
5. Tori Amos, American Doll Posse, 54K (new)
------
Other interesting selections:
7. Daughtry, Daughtry, 50K (2.4 mil in 24 weeks)
10. Carrie Underwood, Some Hearts, 44K (5.3 mil in 77 weeks)
87. Elliot Yamin, 8K (180K in 7 weeks)
93. High School Musical Soundtrack, 7K (3.9 mil in 69 weeks)
114. Kellie Pickler, Small Town Girl, 6K (518K in 27 weeks)
157. Kidz Bop, Kidz Bop 11, 5K (242K in 11 weeks)
SONG DOWNLOADS (5/1 - 5/7)
The top five:
1. Maroon 5, "Makes Me Wonder," 177K (421K total)
2. Ne-Yo, "Because of You," 117K (206K total)
3. Carrie Underwood, "I'll Stand By You," 114K (238K total)
4. Avril Lavigne, "Girlfriend," 103K (1.2 mil total)
5. T-Pain, "Buy U A Drank," 89K (535K total)
------
Other interesting selections:
12. Carrie Underwood, "Before He Cheats," 52K (1.17 mil total)
32. Daughtry, "It's Not Over," 23K (1.20 mil total)
COMMENTARY
Thanks to excessive popularity and ever-increasing ticket prices, Spiderman 3 broke various records as it took in five times as much money as all other movies combined last weekend. I must be the only one in the country who hasn't seen it yet.
Meanwhile, some rapper who calls himself Ne-Yo sold the most albums and came in second on downloads. I haven't bothered to look up the lyrics yet. Maroon 5's new song stays on top for a second week. I've heard it once; it's OK.
Unfortunately, pop radio keeps playing the latest country single from Carrie Underwood, pushing her album's sales well over five million and threatening to overtake Daughtry's average yet decent single in downloads.
Speaking of Idol economics, Bon Jovi's feature on American Idol put all six of his performed songs in the top 50 for last week's downloads. Regardless of the overall talent or actual interest of the show in successive seasons, it continues to generate loads of money for both performers and the performed.
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
Terrorists Can't Burn DVDs, or Military Forts
Sounds like we got lucky on this one.
The big headline is that they foiled a terrorist plot by six Islamic militants to attack Fort Dix in New Jersey.
The details are still unfolding, but it appears that these guys weren't in any hurry. The feds have been investigating this for fifteen months, apparently. They also say that they don't know if it's linked to al-Qaeda, although the guys were watching bin Laden videos in their free time. I suppose the government is paranoid about linking anything without undeniable evidence these days...
It also appears that the first tip came from a store clerk when a customer asked to have a DVD made of a video that "showed men in military fatigues shooting assault weapons while calling for jihad, or holy war, and shouting in Arabic, 'God is great.' "
Wait... so we caught the guys because they didn't have DVD-writeable technology? And they were dumb enough to have it done at a store?
Thank God for snooping, curious clerks. But what does that say about our official intelligence? It was only after the clerk called police that the smart boys discovered that some of them were here illegally and had illegal firearms. What if they had actually been smart enough to avoid letting incriminatory footage into the hands of an outsider?
Well, New Jersey's safe for now. Mother Nature's looking more dangerous than Father Turban these days. A tornado wiped out 90% of a small Kansas town, only killing 10, while the rest of the state as well as parts of Missouri are flooding, thanks to all the recent rainfall.
And there's thunderstorms forecasted for tomorrow.
The big headline is that they foiled a terrorist plot by six Islamic militants to attack Fort Dix in New Jersey.
The details are still unfolding, but it appears that these guys weren't in any hurry. The feds have been investigating this for fifteen months, apparently. They also say that they don't know if it's linked to al-Qaeda, although the guys were watching bin Laden videos in their free time. I suppose the government is paranoid about linking anything without undeniable evidence these days...
It also appears that the first tip came from a store clerk when a customer asked to have a DVD made of a video that "showed men in military fatigues shooting assault weapons while calling for jihad, or holy war, and shouting in Arabic, 'God is great.' "
Wait... so we caught the guys because they didn't have DVD-writeable technology? And they were dumb enough to have it done at a store?
Thank God for snooping, curious clerks. But what does that say about our official intelligence? It was only after the clerk called police that the smart boys discovered that some of them were here illegally and had illegal firearms. What if they had actually been smart enough to avoid letting incriminatory footage into the hands of an outsider?
Well, New Jersey's safe for now. Mother Nature's looking more dangerous than Father Turban these days. A tornado wiped out 90% of a small Kansas town, only killing 10, while the rest of the state as well as parts of Missouri are flooding, thanks to all the recent rainfall.
And there's thunderstorms forecasted for tomorrow.
Friday, May 04, 2007
Gas Breaks Record, Breaks From Pattern
Gas prices have risen a lot over the last three years, and there's been a lot of fluctuation. I've carefully followed the prices of both gasoline and crude oil since Katrina damages sent crude oil to a record $70 and local gasoline to a record $3.09 a gallon.
There have plenty of gas price spikes since then, and many like to accuse the big oil companies of deciding to gouge prices because they can. However, I knew there was more than that, because gas prices would typically spike whenever the price of crude oil jumped, and trickle down when it had some catching up to do. After two years, I became familiar with the relative prices (for a while, $70 meant $3 a gallon; $65 meant $2.50, and $60 meant $2) and I could guess with decent accuracy what days the price of gas would go up.
This custom graph from stlouisgasprices.com shows that in the last three years overall gas prices and crude oil have risen and fallen together, suggesting that the big oil companies aren't randomly raising prices because they can. The two red spikes in the middle are post-Katrina and post-Rita, after which crude oil dropped back to "normal" and gas prices trickled down to under $2 through the end of 2005.
Suddenly, last month, that pattern was broken. Gas jumped several times without a justified spike in crude oil. Notice the very end of the above graph, where blue drops and red rises. If we zoom in to the last six months, there is a clear and sudden disparity:
Since the beginning of April, I have not been able to predict what gas prices will do. At the end of this week, St. Louis prices shot up to a record $3.19, while crude oil dropped to $62. Last summer, crude oil in the record $70's kept us under $3 for gas.
Before, conspiracy theorists claimed that big oil companies jacked up the price just to make more money, but the data showed a different cause. But now, I don't know. For the last month the past patterns led to the prediction that gas would slowly trickle down until it had caught up with crude oil. Instead, gas has continued to spike, reaching new records.
Reading several articles across the 'net gives some insight. "Reduced output due to refinery problems" seems to mean that the crude oil bought is not being refined into gas as quickly as it usually is. If gasoline supplies have been declining for twelve consecutive weeks, a decreasing supply coupled with increasing demand (of US gas short-term, not world oil long-term) this would anticipate a rise in gas prices that was unrelated to the price of crude oil.
I still don't like that it's broken years of its pattern, though. I don't like it.
There have plenty of gas price spikes since then, and many like to accuse the big oil companies of deciding to gouge prices because they can. However, I knew there was more than that, because gas prices would typically spike whenever the price of crude oil jumped, and trickle down when it had some catching up to do. After two years, I became familiar with the relative prices (for a while, $70 meant $3 a gallon; $65 meant $2.50, and $60 meant $2) and I could guess with decent accuracy what days the price of gas would go up.
This custom graph from stlouisgasprices.com shows that in the last three years overall gas prices and crude oil have risen and fallen together, suggesting that the big oil companies aren't randomly raising prices because they can. The two red spikes in the middle are post-Katrina and post-Rita, after which crude oil dropped back to "normal" and gas prices trickled down to under $2 through the end of 2005.
Suddenly, last month, that pattern was broken. Gas jumped several times without a justified spike in crude oil. Notice the very end of the above graph, where blue drops and red rises. If we zoom in to the last six months, there is a clear and sudden disparity:
Since the beginning of April, I have not been able to predict what gas prices will do. At the end of this week, St. Louis prices shot up to a record $3.19, while crude oil dropped to $62. Last summer, crude oil in the record $70's kept us under $3 for gas.
Before, conspiracy theorists claimed that big oil companies jacked up the price just to make more money, but the data showed a different cause. But now, I don't know. For the last month the past patterns led to the prediction that gas would slowly trickle down until it had caught up with crude oil. Instead, gas has continued to spike, reaching new records.
Reading several articles across the 'net gives some insight. "Reduced output due to refinery problems" seems to mean that the crude oil bought is not being refined into gas as quickly as it usually is. If gasoline supplies have been declining for twelve consecutive weeks, a decreasing supply coupled with increasing demand (of US gas short-term, not world oil long-term) this would anticipate a rise in gas prices that was unrelated to the price of crude oil.
I still don't like that it's broken years of its pattern, though. I don't like it.
Thursday, May 03, 2007
Chart Thursday: Avril and Disturbia top low sales week
MOVIES (Last weekend, 4/27-4/29)
1. Disturbia ($9 mil, 3rd wk, $52 mil total)
2. The Invisible ($7.7, 1st wk)
3. Next ($7.1, 1st wk)
4. Fracture ($6.8 mil, 2nd wk, $21 mil total)
5. Blades of Glory ($5.1 mil, 5th wk, $108 mil total)
ALBUMS (4/24 - 4/30)
The top five:
1. Avril Lavigne, The Best Damn Thing, 121K (408K total in two weeks)
2. Joe, Ain't Nothing Like Me, 98K (first week)
3. Nine Inch Nails, Zero, 57K (246K in two weeks)
4. Various, Now 24, 55K (656K in five weeks)
5. Daughtry, Daughtry, 49K (2.3 mil in 23 weeks)
------
Some interesting albums:
108. tobyMac, Portable Sounds, 7K (156K in 10 weeks)
129. Relient K, Five Score and Seven Years Ago, 6K (158K in 8 weeks)
SONG DOWNLOADS (4/24 - 4/30)
The top five:
1. Maroon 5, "Makes Me Wonder," 244K (new song)
2. Carrie Underwood, "I'll Stand By You," 124K (new song)
3. Avril Lavigne, "Girlfriend," 116K (1.1 mil total)
4. Kelly Clarkson, "Never Again," 107K (new song)
5. Timbaland, "Give It To Me," 97K (648K total)
COMMENTARY
Last weekend no movie made $10 million. I remember articles fretting about the movie industry last year when the top movie was under $30 million. Regardless, they're up 3% on the year, and besides, Spiderman 3 will make more money this weekend than all the movies put together did last weekend.
Meanwhile, album sales, which have been dropping for several years, thanks to illegal downloading and not helped by legal single-song downloading, hit a new record low last week. Avril's latest sits at the top for two weeks in a row, although the stupid song "Girlfriend" finally fell from the top downloads, thanks to a new Maroon 5 song.
1. Disturbia ($9 mil, 3rd wk, $52 mil total)
2. The Invisible ($7.7, 1st wk)
3. Next ($7.1, 1st wk)
4. Fracture ($6.8 mil, 2nd wk, $21 mil total)
5. Blades of Glory ($5.1 mil, 5th wk, $108 mil total)
ALBUMS (4/24 - 4/30)
The top five:
1. Avril Lavigne, The Best Damn Thing, 121K (408K total in two weeks)
2. Joe, Ain't Nothing Like Me, 98K (first week)
3. Nine Inch Nails, Zero, 57K (246K in two weeks)
4. Various, Now 24, 55K (656K in five weeks)
5. Daughtry, Daughtry, 49K (2.3 mil in 23 weeks)
------
Some interesting albums:
108. tobyMac, Portable Sounds, 7K (156K in 10 weeks)
129. Relient K, Five Score and Seven Years Ago, 6K (158K in 8 weeks)
SONG DOWNLOADS (4/24 - 4/30)
The top five:
1. Maroon 5, "Makes Me Wonder," 244K (new song)
2. Carrie Underwood, "I'll Stand By You," 124K (new song)
3. Avril Lavigne, "Girlfriend," 116K (1.1 mil total)
4. Kelly Clarkson, "Never Again," 107K (new song)
5. Timbaland, "Give It To Me," 97K (648K total)
COMMENTARY
Last weekend no movie made $10 million. I remember articles fretting about the movie industry last year when the top movie was under $30 million. Regardless, they're up 3% on the year, and besides, Spiderman 3 will make more money this weekend than all the movies put together did last weekend.
Meanwhile, album sales, which have been dropping for several years, thanks to illegal downloading and not helped by legal single-song downloading, hit a new record low last week. Avril's latest sits at the top for two weeks in a row, although the stupid song "Girlfriend" finally fell from the top downloads, thanks to a new Maroon 5 song.
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
Health Care, Haircuts, and A Republican Actor (553 days to go)
One poll says Obama is ahead of Hillary in Democratic polls. Not that you can't find one poll that says almost anything you want.
Hillary has said she has a universal health care plan for a while now, without admitting where the money will come from. Obama has pretty much said, me too. Now Edwards says, "Me three... but it might take more taxes." At least he's honest. Apparently all the Dems are for this Universal Health Care thing.
Not sure whether it's better to take even more money from the wealthy just because they can afford it (the fundamentals of socialism) or leave the poor hard-working folk in debt from hospital bills. Not sure whether the President has much say over health care, either... I need to check my Constitution, but I would've thought that was more of a Congress thing (which Obama and Hillary are supposed to be a part of when they're not campaigning for an election 18 months away). Maybe Congress should just regulate ridiculous hospital bills ~ that might solve a lot.
Meanwhile, conservatives are having a lot of fun with the $400 haircut that John Edwards took out of our tax dollars or his campaign funds or whatever... He said it was a "mistake." Ad hominems are so much fun in politics, because the character of the person is just as important as their arguments.
On the Republican side of things, the latest rumors are that Fred Thompson will be entering the race (what's with this "enter the race" colloquialism anyway? If you don't enter soon enough, will you be too far behind? Not if the race hasn't even started yet.) Apparently he was an actor turned senator. *shrug* Everybody seems to have fond memories of Reagan. But everybody's also glad that Ahnold doesn't qualify.
Well, that's about all we have for now. I can't say much more because I just can't bring myself to do in-depth research into the qualifications, viewpoints, and policies of anybody when we still have 553 days to go.
Edmond the Hun
Hillary has said she has a universal health care plan for a while now, without admitting where the money will come from. Obama has pretty much said, me too. Now Edwards says, "Me three... but it might take more taxes." At least he's honest. Apparently all the Dems are for this Universal Health Care thing.
Not sure whether it's better to take even more money from the wealthy just because they can afford it (the fundamentals of socialism) or leave the poor hard-working folk in debt from hospital bills. Not sure whether the President has much say over health care, either... I need to check my Constitution, but I would've thought that was more of a Congress thing (which Obama and Hillary are supposed to be a part of when they're not campaigning for an election 18 months away). Maybe Congress should just regulate ridiculous hospital bills ~ that might solve a lot.
Meanwhile, conservatives are having a lot of fun with the $400 haircut that John Edwards took out of our tax dollars or his campaign funds or whatever... He said it was a "mistake." Ad hominems are so much fun in politics, because the character of the person is just as important as their arguments.
On the Republican side of things, the latest rumors are that Fred Thompson will be entering the race (what's with this "enter the race" colloquialism anyway? If you don't enter soon enough, will you be too far behind? Not if the race hasn't even started yet.) Apparently he was an actor turned senator. *shrug* Everybody seems to have fond memories of Reagan. But everybody's also glad that Ahnold doesn't qualify.
Well, that's about all we have for now. I can't say much more because I just can't bring myself to do in-depth research into the qualifications, viewpoints, and policies of anybody when we still have 553 days to go.
Edmond the Hun
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Just Say No to Crushing That Baby's Skull
So yesterday the Supreme Court voted 5-4 that it was not unconstitutional to ban partial-birth abortion. I guess that's a good thing. Maybe it's just me, but I'm not so sympathetic of a type of second-trimester abortion that involves cutting open the baby's (excuse me, fetus's) skull so you can suck out the brains and collapse the skull to make the dead thing easier to remove. What about the baby's rights?
But I digress.
The bottom line is that I don't really like the method of this decision any more than I do the original decision that made abortion OK in the first place. Sure, I'm all for it, just like I'd be all for the Supreme Court deciding that it's unconstitutional to play Nickelback on the radio (cruel and unusual punishment). But that's not the way these decisions should be made.
The commenters and bloggers are all dissecting this decision and arguing about women's rights and child's rights and all the hashed and re-hashed arguments. But frankly, the Supreme Court decision had nothing to do with any of that. It all came down to the personal opinions of whoever happened to be presiding at the time of the decision, just like the first decision did.
The problem with the judicial system is that they have to decide between constitutional and non-constitutional. This is an either/or fallacy because sometimes events are simply a-constitutional, not mentioned one way or the other. And thus, our conservative victory yesterday is a shallow one, because in the future a different set of judges could use the opposite arguments to make the opposite decision. Much of our law has been reduced to an oligarchy of nine.
But that is all the stuff of old conservative rantings. What's new here is that we feel the need to get the feedback of all the presidential candidates. As if their opinion would really make that much difference if they were elected (unless a justice happens to die and they get to pick a new one that agrees with their abortion views AND gets confirmed by Congress. But we just replaced two). As if their statements are any more meaningful than the decision itself, since they are only saying what will appeal to their potential voters. In case you hadn't guessed, all the Republican candidates supported it, and all the Democratic candidates opposed it. (see http://blogs.usatoday.com/onpolitics/2007/04/high_court_upho.html for specifics)
In other words, things have become so politicized that we can't even know what the candidates really think about anything. Everything they say will be dissected by the media and public, so every response has to be carefully orchestrated. Even the sincerity of something like sending condolences to Virginia Tech loses its meaning because... well, what else are they going to say?
Supreme Court making laws... Presidential candidates forced to say things... we are simply experiencing the inevitable results of massive-scale democracy mixed with the corruption of power. I guess Carmen (don't you remember, back in the day, when he was cool?) got it right when he said, "The only hope for America is Jesus..." Let's humble ourselves, turn from our wicked ways, and pray for God to hear from heaven and heal our land. May corruption be removed, and may truth be made known and set us free.
Edmond the Hun
But I digress.
The bottom line is that I don't really like the method of this decision any more than I do the original decision that made abortion OK in the first place. Sure, I'm all for it, just like I'd be all for the Supreme Court deciding that it's unconstitutional to play Nickelback on the radio (cruel and unusual punishment). But that's not the way these decisions should be made.
The commenters and bloggers are all dissecting this decision and arguing about women's rights and child's rights and all the hashed and re-hashed arguments. But frankly, the Supreme Court decision had nothing to do with any of that. It all came down to the personal opinions of whoever happened to be presiding at the time of the decision, just like the first decision did.
The problem with the judicial system is that they have to decide between constitutional and non-constitutional. This is an either/or fallacy because sometimes events are simply a-constitutional, not mentioned one way or the other. And thus, our conservative victory yesterday is a shallow one, because in the future a different set of judges could use the opposite arguments to make the opposite decision. Much of our law has been reduced to an oligarchy of nine.
But that is all the stuff of old conservative rantings. What's new here is that we feel the need to get the feedback of all the presidential candidates. As if their opinion would really make that much difference if they were elected (unless a justice happens to die and they get to pick a new one that agrees with their abortion views AND gets confirmed by Congress. But we just replaced two). As if their statements are any more meaningful than the decision itself, since they are only saying what will appeal to their potential voters. In case you hadn't guessed, all the Republican candidates supported it, and all the Democratic candidates opposed it. (see http://blogs.usatoday.com/onpolitics/2007/04/high_court_upho.html for specifics)
In other words, things have become so politicized that we can't even know what the candidates really think about anything. Everything they say will be dissected by the media and public, so every response has to be carefully orchestrated. Even the sincerity of something like sending condolences to Virginia Tech loses its meaning because... well, what else are they going to say?
Supreme Court making laws... Presidential candidates forced to say things... we are simply experiencing the inevitable results of massive-scale democracy mixed with the corruption of power. I guess Carmen (don't you remember, back in the day, when he was cool?) got it right when he said, "The only hope for America is Jesus..." Let's humble ourselves, turn from our wicked ways, and pray for God to hear from heaven and heal our land. May corruption be removed, and may truth be made known and set us free.
Edmond the Hun
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)