December 1, 2004

• Back when I first heard that Apple was making a special-edition iPod to coincide with the release of a U2 album, I instantly thought about Negativland’s ‘U2′ EP, which was the subject of a lawsuit and subsequently pulled from shelves. The lawsuit had to do with sampling. This was back in the days before MP3s and internet file sharing.

  So it was a great irony that U2 was teaming up with the technology that enables illegal file sharing. And this irony hasn’t gone unnoticed: Someone named Francis Hwang is auctioning a U2/Negativland special edition iPod on ebay. It comes loaded with a big old selection of Negativland’s most subversive material.

  (If you don’t want to get the iPod, you could just download a whole lotta Negativland stuff here.)

  • 9:20 pm
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