Johnny is getting the quickest wash up in history. Yesterday, forever young A lister with broad mass appeal and cred. Even a steady relationship.
Now,  foolish old man who's losing the studio money, getting dragged through the mud by a sweet, blonde honeypot.

There isn't any need to work as much as we do now. A few guys operating machinery can produce the food we need and any engineered product can be made mostly automated. Even medical surgeries can be done by computer. We went from a 12 hour work day to an 8 hour one and prosperity has only increased. Theoretically there shouldn't be a problem to decrease that even further as technology advances.

Once we get robots with the proper agility and a power source, humans can kiss all non creative work goodbye. And that would have been a great thing if we didn't live in a society where generating profits is the only game that matters. Unless something is done the majority of us will end up as slaves to government assistance. Or perhaps even worse, a communist dictatorship were people are forced to work in redundant jobs for shitty pay just to keep up appearances. I'm increasingly worried that a communist program will be sold as the way forward when things start to go tits up with the "free market".

It had to be anti climatic. The album was hyped up so much and for so long that even if the sound layers could heal cancer there would be disappointment. Factor in that most of the songs had been heard for years and it was an impossible mountain to climb. Amazingly it still got good reviews and sold decent enough for the time. Could have been like Duke Nukem Forever which I think fizzled out completely.

In the end I'm glad we got it. Some great songs on there, some iconic moments. Definitely not a bad album, but the hype and the leaks killed everything that should have been good about it. Fans could probably have lived with the hype if TWAT was dropped on us completely fresh, but when people have heard your best song for 2 years already it doesn't matter if it's great.

Another thing is the saga coincided with the internet revolution. About when Slash left and the old band fell apart is when the internet started for real. In the early 00s it was still in its infancy. The users, or their parents, were people who were a little more current than the rest, and with the cost, probably mostly middle class and above. Dare I say there was more class and civility on the web in those times?

06 was when everyone and their grandma was getting it. It had become as common as having a phone. In terms of forum activity it was also the peak. Everyone coalesced on the forums, a great mixture of characters. But innocence was definitely lost. For years there had been scams, leaks, scandals. Cynicism was taking over. Jarmo turned his site into a police state, and the refugees started their own sites where they could, well, bitch and moan in peace.

Now the net comes with your phone. So widespread a segregation had to and has taken place. In some ways the forums are back to where they were, mostly populated by a sub set of people. It's not the same, you can't recapture the start of something, but at least the twitter crowd found their own homes.