FridayNightListeners - July 2022

Friday, July 1: Kate Bush - Running Up That Hill

Friday, July 8:?Paul McCartney & Stevie Wonder - Ebony and Ivory

Friday, July 15:?Roachford - This Generation

Friday, July 22:?MC Miker G & Deejay Sven - Holiday Rap

Friday, July 29: Costa Cordalis - Pan?

Dear #FridayNightListeners,

The most important thing right at the beginning: All songs of the FridayNightListeners series since October 2019 are now also available on an open Spotify playlist! Have fun with it. It's still holiday season and maybe some of you will like it whilst relaxing on a pool or beach?! By the way, you can find all the posts in the archive article, which offers a chronological list and also includes the links to the respective posts (a few are no longer available for technical reasons).? The archive and of course the playlist are updated every Friday with the newest piece of music, usually at 5pm CE(S)T at the latest. Apropos: I recently asked for feedback in a survey, whether 5pm is ok - or whether another time would be better. Since the majority decided to keep it that way, it will remain that way until further notice.

But now to the summary of the month of July - a very colourful mix, don't you think?

Friday, July 1

The kick-off was a song that was successful again after some decades through a series of one of the big streaming portals, in this case Netflix. The song was first released in 1985. In 1984 - just one year before - commercial television was launched in the Federal Republic of Germany, complementing the public broadcasters. (Yes, as a child of my generation, we only had the 1st, 2nd and a few 3rd channels - and we didn't miss a thing!). Germany was late with this, other countries like Great Britain, France or Italy had it long ago. But today, for many people, the broad offer of linear TV has had its day and people stream, without advertising, at any time, via different devices. However, there is nothing for free, today you have to pay for consumption. And you have to think about what you want to watch beforehand. Because of the complicated distribution of licensing rights and the different players, there is no one portal where you can find everything - you may need several subscriptions and sometimes you have to pay extra for some stuff. We already mentioned Netflix, but there' are also Sky, Amazon, AppleTV+, YouTube, Disney, Rakuten, just to mention a few. And it's getting more and more expensive. I'm really curious how this market will develop in view of the rising prices for the really important things... because many people will no longer be able to afford it. How do you see it? But it's nice that many classics of music are becoming popular again through these series and are also appealing to a younger audience, like Kate Bush's Running Up That Hill!

Friday, July 8

The second post was triggered by a football match at the 1982 World Cup in Spain, which took place exactly 40 years earlier and whose TV broadcast I could still remember very well. And actually, we would have been rooting for our national teams again in July 2022, because a new World Cup takes place every four years in summer. But not this year. I mean, not during the European summer. (Just as a side note: although I want to be honest and say that I am not the biggest fan of women's football, the quality in all facets has increased dramatically in recent years and the Women's European Football Championship was definitely a pretty good alternative! And Congratz Lionesses!). As you know, the 2022 World Cup has been awarded to Qatar and because of the unbearable temperatures there in summer, it will be played in winter. The summers there are very hot, with highs of up to 50 degrees in the shade. The average from July to August is around 40 degrees. It hardly cools down at night either. The winter months are more moderate, with average highs between 21 and 26 degrees, but still very warm. There was much criticism of FIFA for their choice, not only because of the temperatures but also, and above all, because of human rights issues. The human rights situation in Qatar has improved since the emirate won the bid for the 2022 World Cup in 2009, but from our perspective it is still far from good. Gay rights, equality, trade unions, freedom of the press - all missing. Unfortunately, experience teaches that things have never improved anywhere after a World Cup or Olympic Games have been held there. There are quite a few in my football bubble who want to ignore this World Cup. What about you? The song linked to in this post, also addresses the issue of inequality of people, in this case Blacks and Whites; Paul McCartney's and Steve Wonder's Ebony and Ivory.?

Friday, July 15

"On LinkedIn, with more than 430 million members, you can potentially find all kinds of jobs existing on our globe. But we all live in our own little universe. We are working in a certain industry or sector, a certain discipline or a certain job. Based on this, our mind sometimes tricks us. While LinkedIn is certainly not meant to be a dating site, we should not forget that people from all industries use it on a professional basis. Animal pictures can therefore draw vets to the site, or math riddles all sort of scientists. And a funny video could potentially inspire marketers to be creative. Therefore, we shouldn’t categorically ban all content that is not related to our business, just because we don’t consider it relevant. Other people might do! I recommend to respect LinkedIn as a platform for all people from all industries and job profiles and not judge the content based on our little universe." This quote was taken from an article I have written back in 2016, when more and more people said, that LinkedIn becomes the new Facebook 2.0. And more or less the same discussion we can witness these days, instead of Facebook, people are now asking whether we are dealing with Instagram 2.0. And the discussions are sharp-tongued this time. Because a completely new group has actually discovered LinkedIn: (Paid) Influencers (and those who think they are), who didn't exist on the platform 6 years ago. In my opinion (and I know, many agree), the content is often very airy, ego-related, irrelevant, "wisdom" is replicated for the hundredth time. But often other things - I won't go into details here - trigger and the resulting (inter)actions lead to a reinforcement of the whole thing. And that can sometimes lead people astray. Well... If you like that, if that's why you're on LinkedIn.... all good. But if you feel like "this isn't mine anymore".... well, two tips: 1) If your newsfeed consists of too much irrelevant content that doesn't interest you or that gets on your nerves: Reconsider the quality of your 1st degree network and possibly remove contacts or content streams (tell LinkedIn you don't want to see that stuff). Finally, your LinkedIn newsfeed is a reflection of the people you are connected to. 2) Move on your consumer comfort zone and become a content creator yourself: create content that you think is interesting for your audience - and don't forget This Generation!

Friday, July 22

At the beginning, I already mentioned the new Spotify playlist.?To promote it a bit for the holiday season - which actually started in Hesse on the day of this post - , I announced the playlist in the course of July via five posts. The posts were identical in content and were published within a week, each at 8:30 am.?However, the language was different, because the posts appeared in French, Spanish, Italian, German and English. And it was not only about the playlist, but it was also an experiment in relation to the LinkedIn algorithm. And indeed... the result was surprising.?If it is now a question of what the engagements of the posts say, then I would actually have to publish in French in future. A language I don't speak!?The experiment is again a very nice proof of how stupid data is on its own. Only when it is enriched with intelligence, with additional information and experience should we do something meaningful with it or make decisions. "Data-informed" is therefore my mantra, "data-driven" in the narrower sense can often end in fiasco. "The only statistics you can trust are the ones you have falsified yourself." - Although it is by no means proven that Churchill said this (he probably didn't!), there is a lot of truth in the sentence. Sometimes it is not even the statistics themselves that are the "problem", but the question of the different perspective, based on the parameters just mentioned, other information and experience. If you want to know more about the findings of this little experiment, please feel free to contact me. But now remember your vacations, continue to enjoy it or look forward to it: with the Holiday Rap!

Friday, July 29

Due to the international audience of FridayNightListeners, German-language titles rarely appear in the series - which is of course due to the fact that in contrast to English, but also French, Spanish or Italian titles, German-language music is rarely known or even successful abroad. So, triggered by our holiday on a Greek island, I looked for a suitable song - and got stuck with this one, my first single record, which I still own today. Even though some people might turn up their noses, I really liked Costa Cordalis' music and I always liked him as a guy when I saw him on TV somewhere. Unfortunately, he died about 3 years ago in his adopted home of Mallorca (by the way, my first adopted home after Greece was my home town of Frankfurt!) His career had pretty much hit rock bottom in the early 90s, a fate he shared with the whole Schlager industry. But then came the Schlager revival - and Schlager reasserted itself as party music at the "Ballermann" on Mallorca. And Costa also made a comeback with performances there. I mentioned in the post that he donated his cash reward as the jungle king (2004) to the children's cancer charity. But if you think he did this "on a whim" or "because it helps his image", you're wrong: Cordalis was, for example, one of the first supporters of the idea of a children's hospital director in Giessen to collect donations for cancer research with a racing bike tour. Costa Cordalis joined in as early as 1991. But now he is tuning in once again with his call for rain: Pan!

As always, thank you for listening and engaging in July! The next #FridayNightListeners post is planned for tomorrow, Friday, August 5, 5pm (CEST) - stay tuned.?A Spanish classic is waiting for you!