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Remember when the excitement of new music meant risking your computer's well-being with every LimeWire download? Or the days when Netflix was just a stack of red envelopes waiting in your mailbox? Buckle up, nostalgia buffs, because Tommy Heitz is here on the Observation Station to whisk you away to a time before instant gratification ruled our entertainment choices. We're talking the rise and fall of music piracy, from the pioneering days of Napster to the wild exploits of artists like Soulja Boy, who gamed the system to skyrocket to fame. It's a laughter-laden trip down memory lane that might just have you dusting off your old MP3 player for one more spin.

Gather 'round, fellow time travelers, as we reminisce about the simpler times when waiting for a DVD to arrive felt like an eternity, but oh-so-rewarding. We'll explore how platforms like iMesh attempted to clean up the messy world of online music, making buying tunes for 99 cents the new normal. So plug in those earbuds, hit play, and prepare to relive the thrills and spills of our digital past. This episode isn't just a trip—it's a full-on festival of forgotten joys that defined a generation's approach to music and movies. Join me, Tommy Heitz, and let's get weird as we celebrate the quirks of our digital heritage on the latest episode of the Observation Station.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Do you ever lift your head up from your phone, look
around and think to yourself myGod, everything is weird.
Well, we do A lot.
This is the Observation Station, a unique, entertaining and
hilarious podcast.
If we observe it, we talk aboutit.

(00:25):
Anything and everything,anything and everything.
Let's get weird and let's havesome fun.
This is the Observation Stationand now your host, tommy
Heights.

Speaker 2 (00:46):
Hey, hey, hey, hey, everybody, welcome back to the
Observation Station.
I'm Tommy Heights here to takeyou on a nostalgia ride back to
the time when tunes weren't justa tap away and the movies came
in the mail.
Well, guys, ready to jump backinto the old time machine for
the 90s kids out there Wanted tostart off by trying to give an

(01:12):
ode to only things that certainpeople would know about, and
that would be LimeWire lime wire.
So if you had a family computer, anybody out here that used
lime wire basically just tookyour computer and destroyed it.

(01:33):
It really just made it uselessafter you were done using that
software.
That was the old schoolpirating of.
I think everybody had thatwhere no one even was like
thinking and they were likedoing, they're like, oh my gosh.
You know, this is awesome.
We get the music to put on themp3s and stuff like that.

(01:55):
But you go through here andlisten to how how limewire like
came about.
So you look at soldier boy backin the day when he did that
cranked at when he put all thesongs out on LimeWire he put the
titles of the top 50, you knowwhatever the top charted songs

(02:17):
were on LimeWire, and he wouldkind of slip this song but have
the name of the top charted songin there.
So if you download that songand you're not even you know
looking and it just comes up on,you download that song and
you're not even looking and itjust comes up on your MP3, and
you just hear that cranked-atsong, you're thinking who is
this?
You just keep hearing that songover and over and over and over
again.
Man, who is this cranked-atsoldier boy?
Who do this soldier boy?

(02:39):
And then it's like he's alreadyname-dropping himself so much
in the song.
That's like he's alreadyname-dropping himself so much in
the song.
That's how he kind of gotdiscovered in a certain sense.
I don't know if that's folkloreor that's kind of how you know.
I remember it was that Ithought he was explaining it on

(02:59):
a talk show.
So anyways, kicking off thingswith another old school
streaming service was Napster.
It was launched in 99, and thisis where it all began for
online music sharing.
It wasn't technically streaming, but it was a revolution
because people were sharingmusic from all corners of the
globe like a digital musicfestival where everyone is

(03:24):
invited.
It's a little wild.
It was, I think, a bit illegaland totally changed how we
thought about accessing music.
So the whole LimeWire thing isyou know you could have a decent
chance with a nasty virus andit's the equivalent of eating
street food it's delicious butpotentially dangerous.

(03:44):
So you know, that's kind of howstreet food it's delicious but
potentially dangerous, so it's.
You know, that's kind of how itwas.
So who could forget the charm ofNetflix's red envelopes when
you got the DVDs in the mail?
I mean, we don't even no oneeven knows what a DVDvd is.
So before it was the streamingbehemoth it is today netflix

(04:06):
mailed dvds to the door and itwas an instant.
But the anticipation of waitingfor like a movie, something
like die hard or something likethat, it just made it so much
better.
And when you pulled it out ofthat red envelope finally got it
, it outside of the mail slotTalk about delayed gratification

(04:28):
.
Now it's like man, you couldjust kind of fumble on there on
Netflix and go well, I want towatch a Western with Clint
Eastwood.
You know, it's so much easier.
Another one for like musicvideos.
I didoo music for music videosand tried to put more legitimate

(04:49):
face on, did the digital music.
So that came out in 05.
It was part of that new wave ofmusic services that let you
either stream or just buy thesongs outright, usually for like
99 cents, was what things wouldgo for, and this was the era
when paying for music online wasbecoming normalized.
So it cleaned up those wildwest early file sharing days.

(05:12):
So, speaking of paying, youcan't overlook the iTunes 99
cent song.
Apple stepped in.
They made buying easy and,importantly, legal.
So when you click, you boughtand that song was yours forever.
It's clean, it was simple, it'scompletely reshaped the music
industry and it basicallybrought the record store to you,

(05:36):
and it was revolutionary at thetime.
So we get to the video aspect ofit.
Fast forwarding, here comesYouTube also in 05.
It seemed to be that specialyear.
It began just as a place forcat videos and dance-offs, but

(05:56):
it quickly became a vital musichub also.
So suddenly you weren't justlistening to music, you were
watching it too.
The music videos, live shows,those cover songs by artists in
their living rooms those aresome golden things that we don't
even get anymore with theoverproduction stuff.

(06:20):
Back in the day we used to betaking the videos and it wasn't
as many distractions as there istoday.
So the thing is, when the liveshows were on YouTube, it was
like, wow, the concerts we canbe in, now live shows.
Nowadays you can see sportingevents live on YouTube.

(06:40):
It was like, wow, the concertswe can be in, now live shows.
Nowadays you can see sportingevents live on YouTube.
They have YouTube TV.
You weren't just watching oldvideos, it's now live
entertainment.
So that's the best part of itnow is everything is on demand.
So now the big behemoth in themusic game is Spotify and it

(07:05):
entered the scene.
It changed the game again andit took the idea of streaming it
and ran with it.
But it offered millions ofsongs at your fingertips for
just one monthly fee.
There was no advertisements, nopurchases, just it was non-stop
music.
So Spotify was having theworld's biggest record
collection and you didn't evenhave to buy any individual song.

(07:30):
It was a one flat fee premiumthing and I remember first
getting it it was like back inthe day, $9.99.
Now I think it's $16.
Who knows what it is More andmore.
It's totally better thanspending $0.99 on a song,
because what you spend in amonth you only would get kind of

(07:54):
like 16 songs.
Now you can listen to whateversong you want.
Podcast too, on Spotify.
That's the whole big thing fromYouTube.
They took Joe Rogan's audience,tried to move it to Spotify so
that it would bring all of theeyeballs and listening people to

(08:14):
Spotify instead of YouTube forthe Joe Rogan podcast, making it
exclusive, great idea.
That's definitely a way to haveit, where the podcasting
becomes more into the limelightof saying this is a legitimate
business.
It's not just some kind offly-by-night deal where it seems

(08:35):
like me speaking into amicrophone.
We do this to be giving youcontent.
My hobby is to be making thepodcast, seeing what kind of
different things are out in theworld, and as the person that
takes the host wheel on thisshow, you have to say, okay, how

(08:56):
can I give better and bettercontent to the people that are
listening and not have the samestale blah, blah, blah, which
people are always constantlyrecycling and putting a little
bit of a spin so they can justbrand their own name on it?
So having it where I mean likeGoogle Podcasts, there's

(09:20):
different things.
Now for streaming.
Sometimes you're like wholistens to dot-to-dot streaming?
And apparently a whole lot ofpeople, because it's not.
The whole world doesn't revolvearound the United States.
You can look at China or Japanand different countries.
They might use a lot moredifferent streaming services

(09:41):
that we have really no idea thatit exists.
So now, with these platforms,there's definitely some
trade-offs.
Sure, I mean, music became moreaccessible, but artists were
now facing new challenges.
And how do you make money whenpeople can listen to your song a
million times but pay afraction of a cent each play For

(10:02):
us, the listeners?
While we gained convenience,some are arguing we lost the
connection that comes withphysically owning the music.
There's no artwork to hold,liner notes to read.
It's a different experiencealtogether.
But you have these hipsters outthere that still want to play
their record vinyls to show howmuch superior of an audiophile

(10:25):
they are to each their own.
So as we're zooming back todayfrom our digital journey, it's
clear we've gained a lot inconvenience and access, but
every now and then it's fun tolook back at the simpler times.
Every new song on your playlistfelt like a treasure hunt,

(10:47):
thank you.
And that's our trip down memorylane, from the chaos of
LimeWire to the streamlinedsimplicity of Spotify.
But hang tight, because nextweek we're switching it up a
little bit here.
We're diving into the glossyworld of credit cards.

(11:08):
So American Express versus Visa.
This is going to be a big one.
It's like Mike Tyson versusMuhammad Ali here.
So we're going to explore whatsets them apart, how to choose
what's best for you, the perks,maybe pitfalls, of each of them.
So bring your curiosity andthat's just kind of how it's

(11:33):
going to be going here.
We're not going to be having itjust having it where you don't
bring your wallet because wesort of kind of threw what these
financial giants have to offer.
It might have it where, if youare not in deep crippling debt,
we can try to steer you into aplace that's getting you some
trips and having it where it'slike okay, well, why am I going

(11:56):
to be using one versus the other?
What's the customer service Oneto the other?
Let's make this happen.
So don't have it where yourcredit score is under, you know,
like 600.
Coming to this, you might notunderstand what's going on, but
catch ya, I don't think.
I think I made a mistake nottrying to tell enough people

(12:22):
about these credit cards before.
They made it so stringent onapproving people with the debt
limit being so high with them.
I mean, people are justspending until they max them out
just to go into bankruptcy.
But that's not what this nextepisode is going to be about.
It's going to be about makingit happen.

(12:43):
What's one to the other?
Why you'd use one Maybe you canuse both Just depends on what
the uses are going to be.
So, with that being said, takeit easy, stay safe, keep a smile
on your face, Keep observingand never stop having your eyes
open for what's next out there.

(13:03):
All right, bye-bye.

Speaker 1 (13:06):
You've been listening to the Observation Station.
We find everyday life andeveryday situations hilarious.
We hope you've enjoyed the show.
We know we had a blast.
Make sure to like, rate andreview, and be sure to tell a
friend about the show.
That would help too.
See you next time on theObservation Station.