Here’s hoping Morris dedicates himself to a larger related project on the subject. In the interim, I could watch Tink Thompson tell stories all day long. The man can work a camera.

Outside the Limelight

Several weeks back, while listening to a podcast of Tony Kornheiser‘s radio show on ESPN 980 , I heard Kornheiser talk to Washington Post sports reporter Kathy Orton discussing her new book, Outside the Limelight: Basketball in the Ivy League.  Two topics like academics and sports intersecting caught my attention immediately. I was fortunate enough to get in contact with Orton and email interview her about the book. Before jumping into the interview, here’s the basic info on the book: “The Ivy League is a place where basketball is neither a pastime nor a profession. Instead, it inspires true passion among players, coaches, and fans who share in its every success and setback. Outside the Limelight is the first book to look inside Ivy League basketball at what makes it unique.”

Tim O’Shea: How different is the recruiting process for players in the Ivy League–do the coaches find themselves needing to focus more upon the academics of their students in terms of finding good recruits?

Kathy Orton: While it is a challenge for Ivy League coaches to find good students with equally good jump shots, I believe the more difficult hurdle for the coaches is finding players with those attributes who also can afford an Ivy League school. It can cost upward of $50,000 a year to attend one of these schools. Because of the costs associated with these schools – remember there is no athletic scholarships in the Ivy League – many middle class kids (and their parents) just can’t justify paying that much money to play basketball when they can go for free to another school. The economic aspects limit the recruiting pool far more than the academic standards.

O’Shea: Given that these Ivy League athletes feel the need to excel as much in the classroom as well much as on the court, what kind of stress level are they under during the season?

Orton: I didn’t fully appreciate the demands on an Ivy League basketball player until I started reporting the book. To begin with, Ivy League schools are extremely competitive, pressure-filled environments for all students. Throw in a Division I sport such as basketball, where you spend close to five hours a day in a gym practicing, watch game film and lifting weights, not to mention the travel to away games (on busses, not charter airplanes), and there’s not a lot of time left over for sleep. I find these kids amazing, and studies have shown because of how they have to excel at time management during college they tend to do better than their peers once they leave school.

O’Shea: You wanted to coincide this book with the 50th anniversary of the league, but the league itself opted to celebrate that the season after. How disappointed were you when you found out they had opted to go that route–or had you already found another main theme to your book by then?

Orton: I spoke with the then-executive director of the Ivy League, Jeff Orleans, before I started reporting on the book and knew then that the league was reluctant to do anything surrounding the 50 th anniversary. In fact, I was surprised the league did as much as it did the following year. Though anniversaries are important, I always thought it would be something my publisher and I could use to market the book rather than a central theme. All along, I knew this book was going to be about the players and the coaches and their stories.

O’Shea: In a recent USA Today interview about the book, you mentioned you had a wealth of information to include in the book, but had to trim some of it out for space. In the whole “leave this out, keep this in” what aspect of the book did you most champion to keep in and you’re glad that you did?

Orton: Everyone wanted me to cut the stories about the games down to almost nothing. I didn’t necessarily disagree with that criticism, but having attended many of the games in person and knowing how dramatic some of them were, it was hard to cut those down to one or two sentences. In this book, basketball was always the vehicle to tell the stories of the players and coaches. I didn’t want the reader to get bogged down reading about who did what with how many minutes left in the game. Yet, I love college basketball and it was hard for me not to go into detail with some of the games. I did fight to keep most of the Harvard game at Cornell and the Princeton game at Cornell because those were such dramatic games.

O’Shea: Speaking of the editing on the book, who was your editor on this book and how did their involvement help you to strengthen the book–and did you have beta readers along the way to give you feedback–helping you to make sure you were on the right track with what you were trying to convey?

Orton: Because I didn’t have a publisher when I started writing this book, just an amazing agent, Andrew Blauner, who believed in me and the project, I didn’t have an editor to shape the book from the start. That was really difficult. There were times I needed guidance and didn’t have an editor to turn to. Fortunately, I have many good friends and colleagues at The Washington Post who generously worked with me and gave me wonderful advice. William Gildea and Karl Hente were invaluable to me. When Rutgers acquired the manuscript, Beth Kressel did a fabulous job putting the finishing touches on it.

O’Shea: Of the reactions you’ve heard back from the coaches and players featured in the book, were there one or two that really stuck out in your mind–made you feel like you had succeeded at what you wanted to achieve with the book?

Orton: From the start I have said the only critics that mattered to me were the players and coaches in the book. If I didn’t portray them fairly or accurately, I have failed. The other day I received an email from one of the players featured prominently in the book, Princeton’s Scott Greenman who is now an assistant coach at his alma mater. He wrote that he thought the book was “insightful.” I couldn’t have asked for a better compliment.

O’Shea: Looking at Dana Gant’s reaction to your chapter on Khaliq Gant’s serious injury–I’m struck at how tough a chapter that must have been to write. You have a coach who almost wants to quit basketball because of the incident, you have a person whose life is drastically affected. How concerned were you with capturing the severity of the situation, without coming across as being exploitative or sensationalistic in covering it.

Orton: I always try to be sensitive to every person I write about, whether it is involving a tragedy such as Khaliq’s or a basketball game where a player’s missed shot costs his team the game. These people trust me to tell their stories for them. That’s an awesome responsibility. It never occurred to me that I might be sensationalizing Khaliq’s story. I was so inspired by him and his parents as well as by Coach Steve Donahue that I wanted to let the world know what incredible people they are. I am extremely grateful how open and trusting everyone involved was. They told me things I never expected to hear.

O’Shea: Would you say Ivy League parents are more involved with their children’s athletic pursuits versus parents and students in other college leagues?

Orton: In my opinion, yes, they are. It seems to me that they feel that since they are paying the bill they have a right to become more involved in their child’s athletic career. I don’t agree with that. There are always exceptions, of course, but I feel everyone is better served – child and parent – if the parent stays out of his or her child’s athletic career.

O’Shea: At a recent book signing, one of your childhood friends noted the hardships you had overcome to get the book published. How close did you come to quitting on the book when it hit a few snags along the path to being published?

Orton: Anyone who has written a book knows there are always moments of doubt. I certainly had more than my fair share of them. I am fortunate to have many wonderful friends who believe in me and encouraged me throughout this process. I couldn’t have done it without them. I also am too stubborn to quit. Even during my lowest moments with the book, I never completely walked away from it.

O’Shea: Goofy question, I found out about the book through Tony Kornheiser’s radio show. In his interview with you, he was (tongue in cheek) offended that you had John Feinstein Jr write the foreword, while he was relegated to a blurb. How much grief would John Jr. have given you had you gotten Tony to write the intro?

Orton: That’s just Tony being Tony. As much as I love Tony, he knows as well as I do that having John’s name attached to my book brings a college basketball audience that Tony couldn’t deliver. Besides that, Tony hasn’t written more than a couple sentences for publication in several years. As he likes to put it, he’s a full-time yodeler. Tony is one of the best writers I have ever known. (The essay he wrote on Bill Russell for ESPN’s SportsCentury book is well worth reading.) I was incredibly grateful he gave me a blurb. I wasn’t going to ask him for more than that. I don’t think John would have been offended or given me grief if Tony had written the foreword.

O’Shea: Is there anything you’d like to discuss that I neglected to ask you about?

Orton: I would only add that I think people have a stereotype in their minds about Ivy League basketball players. I hope this book debunks that myth. They are much more diverse and interesting than most people realize. Several people have told me that even though they are not basketball fans they’ve enjoyed reading the book because of the stories of these players and coaches. That pleases me enormously.

Thanks for the opportunity to respond to your questions. I enjoyed the interview!

O’Shea: Thank you!

Tim O’Shea: How did the idea for the textbook first come about?

Jennifer Holt/Alisa Perren: We both teach classes about the media industries and were frustrated with the lack of course materials devoted to this subject – especially materials approaching the topic from a humanistic perspective. We also saw that the study of media industries had been growing and expanding but it had not yet been mapped as a field in an academic text. So we enlisted some of the people who have done formative work in this area as well as those doing new scholarship to help us put what we saw as the emerging field of media industries into context for our readers. (To view the book’s table of contents, click here.)

O’Shea: How did you divvy up the editorial duties on the textbook?

Holt/Perren: This was truly a collaborative effort. We worked together in recruiting contributors, editing all of the essays, and writing the introduction. And amazingly, we remained friends through it all.

O’Shea: How did you determine the topics covered and how many abstracts were submitted for you to consider?

Holt/Perren: We had to pare down to what was a reasonable and manageable table of contents for one book. That was one of the most difficult parts of this project. We wanted to provide readers with an understanding of the historical foundation of various media industries, and also look to the future. We also sought to look at the many ways these industries have been theorized, and consider the various methodologies that have been employed in their study.

After much discussion, we finally settled on four main sections. We decided to keep our focus mainly on visual media (with the exception of radio which is fundamental to television’s history and industrial traditions).

Choosing the proper scope proved to be one of the more challenging tasks in developing the book. There is no question that the media industries expand far beyond film, television and new media (the focal points of our collection). We chose the scope we did for a few key reasons: first, we thought that looking primarily at audio-visual media would offer a greater degree of coherence and specificity across the essays. Readers would not only be able to learn about concepts, but also about the operations of these industries in greater detail, from a variety of perspectives.

Second, we felt this approach would make the material more accessible for those undergraduate and graduate programs oriented toward film and television studies – programs that are often less likely to have extensive course offerings on the media industries than those based in communication departments, for instance.

Third, this focus offered a means of differentiating our book from others already in print. The emphasis on audio-visual media enabled us to address a key tension in studying the media industries: namely, that these industries are at once distinct (in many respects, the film industry differs from the cable television industry, for example), and yet they also are and always have been deeply interdependent and interactive.

Thus, while focusing primarily on the audio-visual risks overlooking the important relationships and contributions of other industries such as comics, music and publishing to film, television and new media, were we also to examine all of those other industries as well, we would likely have a book both too general and unwieldy (not to mention several hundred pages longer!). We believe that the case studies offered by our contributors explore concepts that, though most directly applicable to audio-visual media, can also be extrapolated to other media as well.

It is worth adding that, on several occasions, our contributors do weave in examples from other media forms to make their points. Should we pursue a second edition of this book, one of our goals would be to further expand our discussion to other media. We see the current book as but an early step in what we hope to be a much more extensive conversation about what theories and methods are most productive when studying and writing about the media industries.

After deciding on the chapters we wanted, we commissioned various authors to write them. We were fortunate enough to have most of our writers sign on pretty quickly. Their enthusiasm for the project reinforced the demand and desire for this kind of book.

O’Shea: I was struck by the scope of the textbook, given that you cover historical data like Depression-era advertising to advertising trends in You Tube. Are there topics you wished you were able to address, but were unable to, due to time and/or space constraints?

Holt/Perren: Oh yes! We have enough left for three more volumes! Figuring out what to leave out was probably more painful than deciding what to include. As noted in our answer to your last question, we could easily have entire chapters (or sections) devoted to video games, comics, the music industry, and publishing, just to name a few that we had to leave behind. We would have loved to have issues such as intellectual property rights, labor and emerging marketing practices discussed at greater length, too. We are well aware that there is much more that can be discussed…but we are also proud of how much we – and our contributors – managed to explore. From our perspective, this is but an early step in what we hope to be a longer conversation about how and why the media industries need to be studied.

O’Shea: In teaching students, how hard is it to get them to fully grasp that in order to properly construct theory, they must fully grasp history? This question came to me in looking at Prof. Perren’s dissertation topic (“Deregulation, Integration and a New Era of Media Conglomerates: The Case of Fox, 1985-1995.”) and finding out Prof. Holt is “currently finishing a manuscript entitled Empires of Entertainment, which examines deregulation and media conglomeration from 1980-1996″.

Holt/Perren: As our contributor (current CEO of Generate and former WB network executive) Jordan Levin notes in his essay, executives immersed in the media industries often face strong institutional and economic pressure to “think in the now.” Similarly, at times it can be easy for scholars to get caught up in the proclamations by the press and industry that what is happening in the present is unlike anything that has ever taken place before.

But we have both been trained as historians, and thus recognize that the more you know about these histories, the more similarities and parallels you can find between past practices, behaviors and assumptions and present-day activities. From our view, an historical perspective is crucial because it forces you to more profoundly consider what is in fact new, or the specific ways in which something is new. Certainly policy shifts, the rise of new technologies, media consolidation, and the growth of niche markets have dramatically altered how media are produced, distributed and consumed. Yet we think it is important to move past the broad generalizations that are often made in top down approaches to consider more precisely how and why these changes have taken place.

On the one hand, looking closely at media industry history can lead one to look at the present more closely, forcing one to question the latest marketing or journalistic claims about how “this new technology will change the way media is produced” or how “this new corporate strategy will reshape how media is consumed.” We can see that, in fact, much of what we take to be so novel has been around for years (if not decades). On the other hand, contemporary developments can also lead us to reexamine and rethink historical processes in a new light. In recent years, talk of the rise of “convergence” has led many media historians to look back at what were previously conceptualized as “distinct” media forms (not just film and television, but also comics, music, radio, magazines and newspapers).

O’Shea: I find it interesting that in a book about Media Industries, newspapers get mentioned on one page out of 280+ pages. How much of newspapers’ current struggle stems from the fact the industry did not effectively embrace new technologies?

Holt/Perren: Yes, newspapers were certainly neglected in our desire to focus on the television, film and new media industries. Perhaps if they had adapted better, they would have made it into the book! On a more serious note, the problems facing newspapers are certainly also being faced by all other sectors of the media industries to varying degrees. Every industry – film, TV, newspapers, etc. – is scrambling to find a workable business model. So far, there are many compelling ideas, but few solutions. Right now the situation facing the newspaper industry is especially dire, but other sectors of the media industries – including broadcast affiliates and indie film distributors – are also struggling as their long-standing ways of doing business are faltering.

Having said that, we both agree that much of the current crisis that the newspaper industry is facing is a result of their inability to compete with and adapt to new digital technologies. Primarily, it is their failure to come up with a workable business model that can be reconciled with the very expensive business of reporting news and with the dwindling supply of advertising dollars for publishing, along with the new habits and expectations of so-called digital natives. Add in the fact that traditional media outlets have used up their supply of investor goodwill in this economy, and there are major problems. New media ventures seem to have more latitude for failure at the present moment. Consider this: Google is on schedule to lose $470 million this year on YouTube alone, which is almost five times more than the Boston Globe’s anticipated losses. You don’t hear people talking about the disappearance of Google, though.

There is an excellent interview with Walter Isaacson on The Daily Show that addresses this very question. Isaacson thinks it is the notion of “free” that has killed the business.

O’Shea: How much do you expect the future of the media will be shaped by scholar-activists?

Holt/Perren: One of the unfortunate consequences of the free fall going on in both the newspaper and magazine industries is that there is less money to support more in-depth research and reporting. However, on the flip side, something interesting has begun to occur within the academy: a wider range of media scholars are indicating a desire to communicate with the broader public. The ease of communicating through the Internet has enabled and encouraged some scholars to disseminate their work in a wider range of platforms and venues. The types of activism take a variety of forms depending on the scholars and organizations. Many of the most prominent scholar-activists are interested in addressing systemic policy issues (such as Lawrence Lessig, Patricia Aufderheide and Robert McChesney).

It is worth adding that, along with these scholar-activists, there are many others who are increasingly acting as public intellectuals. These people are communicating with a wider audience about current topics in accessible and engaging prose. Among those who are doing so on a regular basis (through blogs as well as other venues) are Henry Jenkins, Jason Mittell and Chuck Tryon. In addition, a number of sites have launched in recent years that serve as places where diverse conversations take place between scholars, journalists, and the wider public. For examples, see Flow and In Media Res.

O’Shea: Every month seemingly brings the premiere of some form of new media. Are there certain types of new media that you have been surprised to find have gained in popularity or potentially did not click with consumers as much as you initially expected?

Holt/Perren: Generally we both try to avoid playing the prediction game for, as you note, these days one technology or platform is quickly being replaced by another. Twitter, of course, is all the rage these days, and after spending some time on it, one of us (Alisa) can see its value. However, we both remain skeptical as to whether it will take off in the same way that Facebook did, or whether either one of these platforms will be around in a few years.

One problem right now is the sheer bounty of both technologies and content. Many people working in the industry and studying these developments agree that there will soon come a time when the computer and television will “marry.” They are most definitely already in a serious, committed relationship. Companies have tried to push this relationship forward for years now (remember WebTV?). And there is no shortage of technologies available now (see Slingbox, Roku, AppleTV, Microsoft Xbox, etc.). Yet we wouldn’t be willing to make a bet as to how they will take the final plunge. Till death do they part? …Not yet.

Tim O’Shea: What attracted you to teaching in the first place and math in particular?

Zak Champagne: First and foremost, I was going to be a rock star. Teaching wasn’t really in the plans until college. You see I had everything ready for rock superstardom except for the talent of playing or singing music. Now I was in a band…but we were much more into the superficial things about being in a band rather than actually being a band. But…I sort of knew towards the end of high school that I wanted to teach. Once I got into college (University of North Florida) I thought I wanted to teach high school. It seemed rather logical to me. But while I was preparing to become a teacher, I took a job at a youth center here in town and ended up working with K-2nd grade students. And it was during that time I had found my calling.

Now the math thing is a bit more interesting. Once in elementary school I saw a need to make mathematics meaningful to my students. I encountered so many young students who already hated mathematics. And to me that was not okay. I have to find a way to inspire my students to love mathematics for what it is. And I found one of the best ways to do that is to make it meaningful and fun.

O’Shea: In a Florida Times-Union article written about you last year at Jacksonville.com. it was said that “students are taught to explore and build their own understanding of mathematics” in your class. What do you do that you find makes your classroom an effective environment for teaching?

Champagne: Well I think it starts with trying to break down some barriers in mathematics. So many students come in with an attitude that mathematics is not accessible to them for whatever reason. I’ve heard them all…And after we get past some perception issues about why they find mathematics so horrible, I try to make it meaningful and accessible to them. As far as allowing them to explore and build their own understanding…I believe it begins with understanding that ALL students bring something to the table about every concept. It is the teacher’s job to understand what that something is and how to assess where that student is and then getting them to the next level. A good example of this is solving multiplication problems. When I start a unit on multiplication, I allow students to solve a problem in whatever way makes sense to them. So if they wanted to solve 32 X 12 by adding 32 twelve times…well it may be inefficient but it can be successful. And after all the essence of multiplication is just repeated addition. So after I find that a student wants to add that long strand of numbers I carefully guide them into understanding the next steps in solving that problem in a more efficient way. It’s tough when you’ve got 22 students to work with and they all are at different stages of their understanding, but I believe it is part of the profession and it should be an expectation of all teachers.

O’Shea: Back in 2007, you received the Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching. In addition to meeting President Bush and the First Lady, you participated in a series of events in Washington for a week. What were some of the highlights of the week (other than meeting the president, I mean)?

Champagne: Wow…what an experience this was. My wife and I spent a week in Washington D.C. with 97 other awardees from around the country (The award is given to up to 108 teachers…two from each state) and it was singlehandedly the most important week in my professional life. And barring the birth of my children and marriage to my wife, probably one of the most amazing personally as well. I met some of the most amazing mathematics and science teachers from around the country and still keep in regular contact with many of them. I spent a day at the National Science Foundation and was privileged to work with the world’s leading mathematicians and scientists. I meet with government agencies, heard from the National Mathematics Advisory Panel, had a private tour of the Air and Space Museum, went on a private tour of the White House (no ropes!), and of course met with the President and the First Lady. We also got to watch the President and First Lady leave on Marine One from the balcony of the White House. Oh and I received a $10,000 check in addition.

O’Shea: Every year, you start with a new group of students each with their own skillsets–some who love math and some who fear it, and by the end of the year you’ve been able to convert those who feared it and to those who loved it. Can you describe how gratifying it is to see the transformation a child in your classroom undergoes in the course of the year?

Champagne: Quite frankly, its the very reason that I continue doing what I do. I really don’t think I have the ability to put it into words. Perhaps the most gratifying part of it is simply seeing them at the end of the year or a few years later. And sometimes it’s the parents who come back and make it all worthwhile. I’ve heard from parents who credit their child’s love of mathematics to my class (and one of those kids is now on his way to becoming an architect!). It is the most important goal I have when I start a new school year…I want those students to leave understanding and loving mathematics.

O’Shea: What are the biggest challenges you face in the classroom in particular or the teaching experience in general?

Champagne: Probably the biggest challenge for me comes from the public opinion about teachers. In my mind (at least generally speaking) there is a lack of respect for classroom teachers. And I’m not necessarily talking about pay (although that is of great concern). I cannot tell you how many people have asked me when I’m coming out of the classroom to become an adminstrator, college professor, mathematics specialist, etc. It’s like being a classroom teacher isn’t good enough. In other’s minds they think I’m selling myself short. When in fact, I know that I have the most important and amazing job I could ever want. And why would I want to leave that?

O’Shea: Since receiving the award last year, am I correct in thinking that you’ve had the opportunity to give speeches about teaching around the country–can you talk about that experience?

Champagne: Yeah, its been a little trying to travel so much…I never intended on that part of this job. I really don’t enjoy leaving my family as much as I have been…so that part’s been a bit drab. But on the flipside, I’ve been able to work with many other schools, districts, and states to share my experiences in the mathematics classroom and hopefully inspire them to become better teachers. There is a part of me that really does enjoy working with other teachers…but my true passion remains in the classroom.

O’Shea: In the past you’ve been involved in two blogs that supported music, The Two Mirrors and A Better Offer. How much new music did you become aware of through the blogging? Do you plan to return to blogging about music at some point?

Champagne: Now you see why the rock star comment was so important. My other passion in life is music. I love listening to, reading about, writing about, and talking about music. I absolutely loved writing for both of those blogs…in fact I miss it quite a bit. But, because of time demands in work and my family I had to let those go. It hurt…but it was for the best. The Two Mirrors began when a friend of mine, Richard Dudley, and I decided that we had enough to say about music that we should write for a blog. However, Richard and I are very different when it comes to our personal lives. I had a family with kids, and steady job, etc…and Richard is sort of the opposite of that. He is a musician…he writes and composes music, but he is not married, and still wants to be a rock star (and I am a bit jealous about his dedication). But we thought it would be interesting to write from those two perspectives about music. And it worked for about a year. Then we realized that we were just like every other blog…we were constantly on the lookout for the “next big thing” only to move on to the “next next big thing” a few days later. It was like independent musicians had become disposable…the very thing that those guys don’t need. It was like you could watch a band pop up on all the big blogs with glowing reviews and they maybe only recorded two or three songs and they were going to change the world…so we decided to go another route. I decided (and Richard contributed some) to start a blog that focused on covering a band exclusively for two weeks. That is all I would write about. I strove to get some exclusives from those bands, like interviews, contests, etc. And I absolutely loved it. And I think the musicians did too. It was sort of how I grew up listening to music. Once you found a band you loved, you did everything you could to get everything they ever put out and know everything about those musicians. And I feel like that is missing from today’s music fan…

As far as new music. I certainly found a lot more when writing for The Two Mirrrors…just because of the nature of that blog. And I certainly hope to return to blogging one day…but I can’t quite see it happening anytime soon…unfortunately.

O’Shea: Can you give us a glimpse of your “love of music” history? (For me, it started in the mid-1970s when I first heard Loggins & Messina’s Your Mama Don’t Dance and continues to today with music like Griffin House’s The Guy that Says Goodbye)?

Champagne: So I am a product of the early 1990s independent music scene. That is what I grew up with. I mean my parents had REALLY great taste in music. I grew up surrounded by the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, etc..but at the time that stuff didn’t interest me. What did in fact interest me was independent bands who worked their tales off to get there music heard and did it in unique ways. I remember Fugazi shows for $5 and countless shows at a little club at Jax Beach (Einsteins-A-Go-Go). But something happened when I first heard Diary from Sunny Day Real Estate. It was late 1993 and I heard that record, before sup pop picked it up and it was like I understood life a bit differently. I still remember just listening to it over and over again. And that passion still resonates with me today.

O’Shea: What music have you been listening to lately–and in a larger sense, what’s the best music of 2008 and/or music that you wish was getting more attention?

Champagne: Currently I can’t stop listening to the Fleet Foxes record, as well as the Conor Oberst solo LP, Wild Sweet Orange, Tokyo Police Club, and The Dodos. I really wish people would just turn off the radio stations, go into a record store and buy some music. There is so much good stuff out there…people just need to wake up and realize they are being force fed a bunch of crap on the radio…okay so that’s a bit harsh…but it seems so true.

O’Shea: Where do you discover new music mostly? (I’m a product of my time, so I still love to wander into a CD store and chat up a good music store employee–sure I have an ipod and a computer, but for me nothing beats good old human interaction)

Champagne: I LOVE RECORD STORES. However, I do find a lot of tunes on good blogs and websites, and podcasts too. But one of my favorite indulgences is to walk into an independent record store find someone with good taste in music and let them pick out a few cds that I have never heard of. I do have a set of bands that I just love and I follow them, and many times I’ll find other bands that are stellar just by association with bands I already enjoy. But the most important thing to me is to go a record store and just talk…

O’Shea: Will the convenience of digital music ultimately put brick and mortar music stores out of business?

Champagne: I don’t know how to say this other than yes. I don’t think it’s too far off either. If I had my way I’d never buy anything digitally. Unfortunately you and I are the minority here. Unless something is released only digitally I will always buy a physical copy of the cd or lp. Now I own an IPOD and I have a computer full of music. But it will be a sad day if my son can’t walk into a store a store and buy a cd. I love the experience of opening the cd and reading the linear notes, reading the lyrics, looking at the artwork, seeing who the band thanked, and then putting that cd in the player and waiting…waiting for that moment where your life sort of stands still and the music just sort of washes over you. My wife refers to it as an IV. It’s like you are hooked up to an IV and the music just flows through your veins. I can’t see that love transpiring while you are impatiently waiting for it to download.

O’Shea: Do you see any particular new successful trends or technology on the horizon for digital music?

Champagne: The only trend that I really find exciting with digital music is the free digital download with some LPs that you purchase. I know a few record labels are doing this with their vinyl purchases and I think it’s a brilliant idea. I mean as much as I complain about digital music…I love my IPOD. I really do. And love the convenience of being able to listen to just about anything in my music library at any given time. I mean that’s amazing. I remember carrying the CD case around and having 20 or so CDs to choose from. And now I’ve got hundreds of albums to listen to. Currently I could play my IPOD for 20.7 days and never hear the same song. That kind of freedom is amazing to me.