Issue : People : Small Buisness

Issue Summary:
America is broke. This state is a result of a complex system of decisions and events occurring over time that add up to bad spending. America has also run out of stuff that only it can do, as other countries have caught up in terms of doing things like agriculture, technology, movies, and everything else.


Step to Reproduce:
To repeat this state a country has to be around for a while, and be spending money it does not have on things that are not the people. Another way to get here fast is to invent stuff and truly believe that someone somewhere else will not be able to improve and profit from what you made, instead of expect and encourage it.


Expected Results:
The people are broke and angry again, and business are a bit closer to broke and panicking. The entertainment industry is panicking in particular, because of the internet. The internet has the entertainment industry scared because they are beginning to realize that the internet has been quietly outsourcing the United States only true unique natural resource, the constantly evolving culture of a diverse group of people. We have never been the smartest lot, or the kindest, but we have always been the freshest.

America plays Jazz, the world is playing jazz a few years later, america decides to rock a fitted cap with a sticker on the bill, oh look what they on now over in Barcelona! Angelina Jolie is a world famous actress, Aishwarya Rai is an every country but America famous actress. America has always lived on the cutting edge of entertainment but for the first time in the history of our country, America is falling behind in swag.


QA Observations:
The Entertainment industries idea to turn off the internet will be the nail in the coffin for American swag dominance, putting the American entertainment industry in danger of becoming an isolated and boring niche market, as the world will soon tire of dealing with our bullshit rules.

Youtube has recreated Vaudeville, and in that rebirth it has become a conduit for American small business. Dancers, singers, actors, and comedians circumvent the entertainment industry by posting directly to the public, and live quite well off advertisements and individual purchases of their intellectual property. I think that is what has the entertainment industry angry.

But what they may not realize is that Youtube has been keeping our country on life support, giving opportunity and motivation to kids that have no idea what their talent is worth yet, but are brave enough to roll the dice and show it to other people anyway, with the added benefit of not having to deal with A&R gatekeepers, who's main concern is how to monetize it, or distill it for the demographic they believe may want to pay for it.

Unless the American entertainment industry figures out how to play nice with the internet America will get really boring, when America stops entertaining and inspiring other countries, our usefulness will expire, and we will become the assholes that are just assholes, no longer funny and interesting assholes. Assholes that are just assholes and nothing else are fair game, they are no good to anybody. Also, the entertainment industry really really doesn't want it with the internet, but if they keep knocking on that door soon it will be open.

Fact: You cannot win an argument against the internet. Just give it what it wants, let it keep what it makes, leave it alone, and it wont bother you. It might even help you out if it likes you, the internet can be very random at times, but its heart is always open to help out an old friend on the ropes. Happy new year.  

The Protoculture Mixtape V.21

Issue : People : Barley

A long time ago I was an alcoholic. Nah, I am still an alcoholic,  just haven't had anything to drink in a long time. If I went out and drank again I wouldn't be an alcoholic right away, but I would keep drinking until I became the alcoholic I was a long time ago all over again. I can be very persistent when it comes to something I like.

I like getting drunk because it makes stuff go away for a couple hours. It's like a mana buff, and if you drink enough you get to a sweet spot where everything feels ok and you can speak and the panic attacks are gone and you are friendly and wise and strong and cool. But the new me is a lot like the old me in persistence. I would black out, and the new me would take the wheel for the length of time the elixir was in my system.

It's like that old book where the guy drank something and would wake up on a busy street covered in his own vomit, or would have to figure out where everything he owned was all over again, one thing at a time, like a detective, or people in his life would get in touch to ask who stole his body last night for a joyride, because sure as sunshine it wasn't him in there. That type of thing.

The first time I blacked out I was stoked, because I was hurting. Some guys jumped me while I was skating over a bridge and worked me over pretty bad. They had been stalking me for weeks due to umbrage taken in my graffito name being on a wall they had claimed earlier. It was a wooden overhang bridge over a Levi, three guys stood on the end of one side of the bridge, and when I got into the middle, I realized there where two guys approaching behind me.

I recognized the guys in front of me and knew there would be a problem, eh, I just figured they wanted to posture and let me know who was boss of the bridge, until some guy punched me in the back of the head. Then yelling, something sharp against my rib, yelling, and other loud sounds that sounded really far away. I swung my board wildly, convincing myself that I might live if I could swim past the fists and get off the bridge.

And I did, I got past them and bolted, until one of them tripped me. I remember thinking, "what the fuck?" Everything was in slow mo. Then all of the sudden I hear a loud voice say "WHAT'S GOING ON OVER THERE!" It was some dude working on his lawn. The guys heard him and bolted, I was going to bolt as well, but when I started up it hurt too much to move. 

The guy took me into his house and cleaned me up, he asked if I wanted to get the police involved, I politely declined. Then he gave me a beer, said "shit happens, shake it off," and let me go. I couldn't go home because my mom would lose her shit if she saw me in that state, so I walked my board to my buddies house and drank Seagrums 7 until I blacked out, and woke up on the bathroom floor next to a chick I had never seen before. It was a pretty bad day, but I'm still alive, so I can't really complain. 

The Protoculture Mixtape V.20

Issue : Games : Fish Tacos

San Diego is funny in that everybody living here thinks they know where the best Mexican food is located, but here is the thing, unless they are talking about the taco truck that stops by the car wash up El Cajon over by Pancho Villa's, they don't know what they are talking about.

The confusion gets deeper when these people begin speaking on separate dishes that make up the ultimate Mexican joint, tending to create pillars by which to judge another's selection. Most hang their hat on the burrito, some the taco, it varies. Many progressives speak to a plate as a whole, the taco, beans, presentation, fixins. Not to mention red versus green salsa, as that is a whole separate debate.

The fatal flaw in all of these worthy dishes is that they are super hard to fuck up. The danger is mostly in too much salt vs. I can't even eat this without my tongue shoveling to the back of my throat. The real litmus test of a taco joint is and has always been the fish taco, and this is where the taco truck over by Pancho Villa's soars. It gets it in, the damn thing, it does it.

I ended up chatting with the owner one day while on a pilgrimage to the promised Winnebago. He told me at first he just rocked for the love like everybody else, a block party here, a quinceañera there, but when people got a taste of the goods they wanted to know where they can get that piff regular. And then he got to thinking about it, and  the weird thing was he actually enjoyed making the food for them, the process, the looks on peoples faces when they enjoy what he made. He was sold, he decided to open up his own spot.

Only problem was his credit was jacked, he tried to go to banks to get loans but they weren't trying to hear all that good vibes jazz, they deal in bulk units of guap, and burritos don't trade on nastaq. He was getting hit with rejection left and right and nobody would fuck with him, until he stumbled on this local non profit. He told them what he was trying to get into, they ran a credit check, and got back to him in a week saying he was accepted, he was floored.

They said "Yeah whatever, you good." and had him fax over some stuff, then had him go to their offices to demonstrate his chef steez by hooking up some food in a manner not unlike a business plan/stage. They had his fish tacos, a few months later a Winnebago rolls up to a parking lot outside a car wash everyday and runs Bartertown, yeah, that good. Go have a fish taco there, then come back and tell me about a California burrito. I bet you can't. Best you could say is "well, other stuff is aiiight, but that taco truck though..."

The Protoculture Mixtape V.19

Issue : People : The Avengers

The avengers is a fictional team of superheroes. The original team was made up of Iron Man (Tony Stark), Ant-Man (Dr. Henry Pym), Wasp (Janet Van Dyne), Thor, and the Hulk (Bruce Banner).

Iron Man was born a billionaire playboy, and mean drunk, who also happened to make stuff. He became a superhero by using the money his father made to put together a big clunky metal suit to protect the person within. It could fly, and shoot big lasers out of little lasers, and all types of ill shit that whoever inside of it could control remotely. The suit was so well made that it beat anything it went up against, it was pretty good tech.

Everybody thought the suit was badass, but nobody could stand the guy inside it. They couldn't stand him because the guy inside that big clunky thing had it so good for so long he forgot how to treat people. He lost it, and began to see the suit as a right, and not privilege, or better yet, a blessing.

He got so comfortable living high in the shadow of the suit that one day he talked slick to a person that wanted to know more about it. The person politely asked Iron Man about a version of the suit he had pre-ordered.

In response Iron Man said, fuck you, it's done when Iron Man says its done, and don't come round here no more, because I will call the Avengers and the rest of my powerful buddies if you want to get it popping, because I am Iron Man, and you are a fart in the breeze, and that is how it is.  

Later on  Captain America was discovered in some ice, which began cracking due to Iron Mans reckless mouth. Then Captain America woke up, and everybody stopped listening to Iron Man. But for a while there Iron Man was a big deal in the Avengers.

The Protoculture Mixtape V.18