Expectations: Love, positivity and otherwise

 

I've been thinking a lot about relationships lately and that's a bad thing because, well, I'm really bad at them.

Not bad in sense of being selfish or abusive.

Rather, I tend to be as my 8th grade English teacher once said to me...."Hyper analytical."

Before you run off to Google it, that just means I think too much...about everything.

Seems nothing happens in my life without at least some measure of the consequences being considered first.  

At length...

The same can be said for a lot of  people but I tend to take it to another level.  Hence...Hyper analytical.

It's served me well for all those things where there was a "safer" option but relationships are all about risk and reward.

So let me put this out there right up front.  The Internet is a HORRIBLE place to find answers to your relationship questions.  Want to ruin a good thing?  Listen to some idiot try to tell you what you're feeling.  

"The first kiss should happen by the second date..."

"Sex should happen by the 5th date..."

"If she doesn't want to hold your hand it means she's not into you..."

Bull...

Love isn't an Amazon Prime purchase.  There are no customer reviews or 5 star rating systems.  Well, there are but they're worthless.

The heart wants what it wants but I can tell you from experience that the heart is, to be blunt, stupid.  This is why we have brains.  The problem is the two are mortal enemies.  Where the heart may be warm and accepting the brain is cold, analytical and far more subject to the influence of the sin of "idle hands."

Leave things unsaid long enough and those "idle hands" get busy.

The best relationship advice is to forget about expectations.  Especially those born from uncertainty.

If you look for answers everywhere BUT the person who actually has them you're doomed.


I've written about the dangers of relying on absolutes before and when it comes to relationships it seems they're everywhere.  Look for definitive answers to questions about love and you get 1000 opinions.  All of them framed as a golden truth but as worthless as cow patties.

OK, here's the wave thing again...

Remember we can only control our own actions, our own thoughts and our own judgement.  The more we ride the waves the more we learn that no two are ever the same.  Any expectations beyond "wet" and "movement" are unreliable.

Be open to what's happening in the relationship good or bad but keep your expectations out of it.

I can tell you from experience that the worst heartbreak comes not from what you think someone did to you but rather a personal expectation they couldn't and/or didn't want to live up to.  
  
That's the issue with expectations; they aren't reality, they're just unspoken demands.  Anything unspoken eventually leads to trouble down the line.  Besides, DEMANDS don't make for great relationships.

I have a close friend that I absolutely HATE going to restaurants with.  The reason is that he's never happy with his order.    An example comes to mind. 

My friend often orders salads.  Now it's not unusual that they just might include a tomato or two.   

Thing is, he hates tomatoes with a passion but when he orders he  never says anything to the waiter about his disdain for all things tomato.  So the salad comes with the offending red veggie (Supreme Court says it's not a fruit BTW) and spends the rest of the meal grumbling about how they should have known he didn't want tomatoes.  

 It's happened so often that now I won't go anywhere with him that doesn't require you to tell someone behind a sneeze guard exactly what you want.  

Subway restaurants come to mind...

Just like my finicky eating friend you never get what you want when you make unilateral judgments.   

Admittedly, that's hard to do at times.  

Gosh, wouldn't it be just wonderful if if all our relationships were like an 80's John Hughes film.  A couple of awkward meetings, love and/or friendship develops and gets tested just before the ultimate resolution rising to a crescendo complete with happy ending all in the space of a couple of hours.

Yeah, it don't work that way.

BUT!

It's easier if you're riding the wave instead of trying to dictate its direction.  Love the moment, breathe in the atmosphere and enjoy the ride.  

Just don't forget to keep your eyes open.

We get into the most trouble when we get lost in our own expectations and make blind assumptions.

Be you, be real and be open... 

Thank You! (100K views)

Thank You!

We just broke 100,000 views of this blog.  Yes, it took 5 years to do it, yes, most sites get that in a day but to me it's a major milestone so THANK YOU!

Your support is the catalyst to continue and I intend to.

So whether it's popular culture, TWIT or anything else I cover know that if it's worth writing about I'll be sure to post it here.

Tell you friends!  Looking forward to the next 100,000 views!

If you're paying a subscription you're not buying "Art"

A guy's gotta eat right?

I've noticed an annoying trend over the past few years.  It seems like everywhere I turn on the Internet there's a hand out.   I get that somebody's got to pay for all this stuff but when it comes to online, we're paying too much.

Either you've got a pay wall in your face when you try to consume content or you're constantly getting pitched an "upgrade."

If I go to the online version of a local newspaper more often than not I'm greeted with a demand to purchase a subscription to see their content.  Yeah, I know, newspapers have it rough these days what with all those tablets and smartphones floating around.  At some point, however, I start to question their value when they want me to pay for the same dubious content I can find in the average blog post.  (of course I exclude myself...tee hee hee)  

For example, my local paper's online extension AZCentral.com now requires a paid subscription to access more than a few articles on the web.

In the old days I could just pick up a paper when I wanted it or suffer a few ads to read the same content online.  I didn't have to take out a subscription to get today's hot news story or have a pile of wasted newsprint lying around in the corner of my house. 

Now I have to pay not only for that story but the digital equivalent of the clutter than comes with it.  You just know that the minute you sign up your inbox is going to be flooded with pointless garbage until you turn it off in your subscriber "Profile."

So why did all this happen?  Why does it seem that every digital highway now has a toll booth? 

The claim is that the ad-supported media model has failed with the rise of the Internet.  Advertisers have too many choices for their ad dollars these days and have to spread it around to get their pitch across.  That means declining revenue for traditional media sources or so they claim. 

It's the justification behind the rise of "premium" services like Hulu, Pandora and even TWITCH.TV some of which still show ads even with a paid subscription.  Yes there are free levels of these services but they're usually a shadow of their premium counterparts and cluttered with intrusive ads.

The latest entry into the subscription model is Jay-Z's new "premium" music service, Tidal.  It's claiming CD quality audio over the Internet and exclusive artist tracks to subscribers.   There's no pretense here.  The service unabashedly demands a minimum of $9.99 per month for access to a glorified Internet radio station.  The argument being, " We're not for everybody."  Meaning people who pay are somehow of a different caliber than all of those poor people. 

Classic marketing trick.  Buy your way into the "in crowd." 

The simple premise of the service (minus the marketing fluff) is that starving recording artists (like Jay-Z and Madonna) can make more money and subscribers can get an exclusive experience with premium-only content. 

Hmmm, The last I checked Madonna wasn't eating out of garbage cans and Jay-Z could use $100 bills to wipe his ass with reckless abandon.

Ok, here's where this crap has to stop...

At what point do we just admit that the whole "artist" thing has gone off the rails.  Hey, I firmly believe that you have a right to make a living off of doing what you're best at.   You do not, however, have a right to fleece me to pay for a new coat of paint on your private jet by offering me the artistic equivalent of post-it notes.

And what about all those "little" people like the engineers, producers and song writers?  You can bet Madonna and Jay-Z aren't hammering out hits in their back bedroom with an IPad and some old amp.  C'mon now, someone has to make those middle-aged fading vocals sound passable.  

One thing is for sure.  The people that make these "artists" sound good aren't flying First Class.

But we must protect those poor, suffering "artists." 

In a country where the top 20% of the population controls 85% of the money, you can't sell me on how my $10 a month to Tidal is helping Main Street. It is, however, keeping Easy Street paved with gold.

The problem with the current definition of "Artist" is that it's intermingled with the "business" of art.  It's all about the money and somehow having one hit song on ITunes entitles you to a lifetime of privileged status.

When art becomes business then the result of all those "artistic" efforts is nothing more than a "product."  Mass produced, packaged and disposable.

Art was never meant to be a commodity.  It was meant to be an expression with its primary reward being the appreciation of the work itself.  The great societies of Greece and Rome recognized this and while they may have "commissioned" great works of art, they were never meant for resale.  Rather the intent was meant to enrich a culture and advance a society. 

I can guarantee Krewella will never do either of those things...

In the context of what Jay-Z considers to be "Art" (aka: products)  the great works of a Michelangelo or Beethoven would be held in the same light as a toddler banging on pots while scribbling on the wall with a crayon.  All of which would be behind a pay wall.

In that light, today's popular "artists" are frauds.  They produce commodities for no purpose but their own gain regardless of claims to the contrary.

Art is meant to be shared freely and has no intrinsic value in a vacuum or behind a toll booth.  Which means what Jay-Z and ITunes sell is not art, it's a product and products don't deserve such exalted status.

Real art is only sold once in awhile with its value dependent on a market's interest in that unique article.  Copies, on the other hand, are sold in the millions and their value reflects their status. (aka: fake)

When you pay for streaming content or a newspaper article online with anything but a few seconds to watch an ad you're attributing excess value to fake product.

Would you pay millions for a Van Gogh knockoff? 

Then why would you pay full price for access to the online equivalent of a Redbox rental?   Does anything available on Tidal really rise to the level of being art?  How exclusive can a work be if it's distributed like a magazine subscription?

I'll answer that, it's not.  Art is given freely, products are sold.

So if popularity isn't enough to bring adequate compensation for your (product) efforts then maybe it's time to look at who's got their hand in your pocket.  That or you just suck...

I know, for example, that for all the ads that run on my YouTube videos I make the princely sum of .001 per view on average. 

But then I create content, not "Art" and the market (and YouTube) decides the worth of my "product."

What the FCC's ruling means to you

So for the past year the battle has raged between the proponents of a free and open Internet and corporate interest.

It seems everyone had an opinion from podcasters to John Oliver and most of them rose in opposition to the flimsy pleas of poverty from the likes of multibillion dollar corporations with names like Time Warner and Comcast.

To listen to the ISP's you'd think that Net Neutrality or at least Netflix would be the death of them.  "They use 30% of the bandwidth!"  and "Somebody's got to pay for this"  All the time failing to mention the thousands of miles of "Dark Fiber" sitting unused for decades.   

And what of the promises not kept?  When AT&T threatened to curtail its services if the FCC changed its rules, the company seems to have conveniently forgotten its own obligations.  Time and time again they promise 100% broadband coverage if only they were allowed to gobble up another competitor or get another tax break.  They rarely deliver.  When it comes to ISP's you need to have a conversion chart to figure out what they mean by 100%

But that's all in the past now and and Wednesday's FCC's ruling makes a free and open Internet all but guaranteed, right? 

After all, the FCC has changed its rules and barring a successful legal challenge (unlikely as the changes follow court recommendations from their last go-around) ISP's are now just like your local power or water company.

Maybe...

Of course there'll be the requisite court battles waged by the ISP's where every "I" will be checked for the appropriate dot and every "T" scrutinized for the correct cross.  But in the end, it will happen.

But to you and me, it really doesn't matter.

The argument has been all about Internet Fast lanes with current rules allowing the "theoretical" throttling of services who can't "pay to play."  Treating ISP's like any other public utility puts an end to such a prioritization of services.  

Of course there's merit in that but for the average consumer it's the argument of an idealist.  Yes corporate interests should always take a back seat but if you're really expecting more competition and lower prices for your Internet services I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed.

Here's why...

ISP's are either regional monopolies or down-level customers of services from those monopolies.  That means no matter what, they still hold all the marbles ( or fibers ).  If Google comes to your town that's great but if AT&T, Verizon or Comcast have a lock on the right of way Google's out of luck.  

You need look no further than other regional utility providers currently under Title 2 for an example.   In many parts of the country your choice of a power company is dictated entirely by your geography.  Meaning the only competition consumers enjoy comes from a moving truck.  It also means that with little oversight, rates can be set on a whim.

It's true that there are no fast lanes in water and power utilities but there's also little to no competition.  Where you are dictates your service and your bill.

The same can now be said of ISP's with many areas only having one or two providers who more often than not have completely different offerings ultimately negating any equivalency.  Worse, due to the broken promises of coverage from companies like AT&T and Verizon, millions of customers are still lacking the barest minimum of broadband capability (now 25Mbps.)

So in the end, Netflix may come to you as quickly as Hulu but that's about the extent of the FCC's ruling.  You're still at the mercy of geography and you won't have much recourse when they jack up your Internet bill.

This was a ruling based largely on a "potential" injustice not a current one.

The FCC may have allowed us a moral victory but we have a lot further to go before consumers see any real benefit to their own bottom line.

What is wrong with these people!

In a world where talent is manufactured rather than cultured I suppose it should be no surprise that nobody bothers to look past the superficial anymore.

Case in point, GoDaddy's now pulled Super Bowl commercial.  In it we see what can only be called a ripoff of the Budweiser tearjerker commercials of the past few years featuring an adorable pup.  This time, however, GoDaddy went below the belt with the cold twist of a lost puppy returning home only to be sold online by a puppy mill.

What the hell was the ad agency thinking?  Was there any scenario where this was funny to anyone, anywhere but a drunken stupor in some dive bar?

And what of the GoDaddy management team?  They approved it.  Did they actually think it would bring in more business?

I suppose if you have no social conscience such things are trivial.  After all, it's just a commercial.  But is it?  Is there a segment of the population that something like this appeals to?  Apparently the ad agency thought so or it would never have gotten out of the bar.

GoDaddy isn't exactly a premier provider so biasing toward the slimy is nothing new.   Titillating Super Bowl commercials with female models in various states of undress are the norm.  

But really, what does T & A have to do with selling Internet domains anyway? 

 So maybe this latest ad was just GoDaddy coming clean.  Maybe they've decided to drop all pretense and just admit that it's all about the money.  Maybe this is a reflection of modern sensibilities.

Maybe they should have just let the ad run...

How to get more visitors to your blog, e-commerce site, YouTube channel...blah blah blah

I know why you're here...

I got lucky and somehow Google determined I had just the right metadata to put me higher in the list of search results. 

Yup, I'm right up there with all the sites that promise Internet millions and no-down real estate deals.

Well, at least that's my hope but with Google selling AdWords to drive traffic and sponsored links chances are this article wasn't in the mix.

I've been blogging for around 4 years and been running a YouTube channel (now 4) for 3.  In that time I've never managed to get more than 150 subs on Youtube or more than 50K visitors to any of my blogs. 

In other words, I'm just like you. 

The little bit of information you'll get from the "experts" out there will  try to pound it into your head that the key to success is comprised of a few key tenets.  Most of the time they'll bury them in a bunch of vague marketing speak designed to get you to ante up the plastic to get the "secrets."

I'll save you a few bucks and spell them out minus the long-winded sales pitch.

1. Have interesting content!
2. Be consistent and post/upload on a regular basis
3. Collaborate with others
4. Use social media and cross promote

Great, now you know exactly what you need to do right? 

Of course not.  It's all ambiguous and misleading as hell.  

What you need to realize is all those sure-fire strategies are nothing but link-bait.  None of it is any more useful than a late-night infomercial.  They're selling a fantasy and making money with every duped visitor to their page.

So what's wrong with the "Tenets?"

Let's go by the numbers...

   Have interesting content!  -- Ok, define "interesting"  some people think knitting is interesting others think Pewdiepie is a phenom.  What does that make you?  The cold truth is that most of the popular people on the web were already popular somewhere else.  There's very little "organic" fame to be had meaning you might be the next Spielberg or Hemingway but nobody is going to know who you are unless you find popularity somewhere else.

   Be consistent and post/upload on a regular basis -- This one annoys me the most.  How many mindless blog posts or boring cat videos have you seen just because somebody followed this advice?  If you have something to share then by all means share it but don't put crap up just to fill space.  Nothing turns off an audience faster than having to sift through a bunch of half-hearted crap.   

   Collaborate with others -- It's nice to share but to be honest I can't stand 90% of the content creators on the Internet so why the hell would I want to collaborate with them?  Really now, If  I'm just going through the motions then why am i bothering at all?  Hey, if you've got a friend with similar interests great but otherwise leave it alone.  Nobody collaborates out of the goodness of their heart, they're looking for more traffic just like you and if you don't have anything to offer you're not going to get many opportunities.  It's kind of a catch-22 in that you need exposure but nobody is going to help you unless you already have it.

   Use social media and cross promote  -- This one kind of goes with #3.  Everybody thinks they're going to get on Twitter or FaceBook and suddenly have 100's of followers.  Except that most social media is siloed meaning you're going to spend most of your time communicating with people you already know.  Spamming other peoples pages with "Come see my stuff" posts will get you the opposite result.  Social media really isn't that social and unless you're already famous nobody is going to come looking for you.

So is all lost?  Am I just a Debbie Downer to your Internet dreams?

I sure hope so but not because I want you to fail, I just want you to get real. 

Look, it's really simple.  There's no such thing as get rich quick in the real or online world.  If you're just doing it to turn a buck then I hope you do fail.  I mean that.  Not because I'm some vicious troll but rather because I'm tired of content for content's sake. 

It clutters up the Internet with the online equivalent of junk mail and infomercials. 

Put up all the content you want but do it because you want to not because you're following some formula you read about from a Google search.   Blogs are great for creating a body of work.  Take it seriously and it may even spawn a career.  YouTube can be a great outlet for budding filmmakers, educators and new media content. Social Media can be a powerful tool if used wisely.

I've been creating content for awhile now and I can say with conviction that I never have nor would put up anything I didn't believe in.  Even if it never got a single view.  I can stand being unpopular, I can't stand adding to the cruft.

I may not be a "success" story but at least I'm genuine.  Forget the Leo Laporte's and Pewdiepie's of the online world.  Hell, even old Leo is getting a hard dose of reality these days and once Pewdiepie hits 30 he's over with.

So keep this in mind.

Do what you do but make sure it's really coming from you.

...consider the soapbox put away.

Net Neutrality loses its appeal and so do you...

Originally published on Kupeesh!

Who owns the Internet?

Apparently it isn't you at least so far as the latest rulings on Net Neutrality go...

With phrases flying around like "commercially reasonable" and "competitively threatening" one has to wonder if the free and open Internet is soon to be relegated to the status of those quirky public access channels you used to see on cable.

Biker Billy (legendary public access star) may have cooked with fire but he never had the opportunity to set the airwaves ablaze like Discovery channel's American Chopper.  He just didn't have the access to a bigger audience.

Which is exactly the scenario the Internet is facing.

The latest development in the battle for an unhindered Internet experience finds F.C.C. chairman (and former telecom industry lobbyist) Tom Wheeler at the center of the storm.  Coming after his bid to codify Net Neutrality under the F.C.C. umbrella was rebuffed by a Federal appeals court in January, Wheeler's latest olive branch appears to be anything but.

In the latest set of proposed rules, broadband providers like Comcast and Verizon would have the right to prioritize Internet traffic from those who pay for the privilege over those who don't.

Now, If you're someone who gets their news from the New York times,  your movies from Netflix and only plays games on your XBOX then you probably don't care.

But you should, here's why...

At its core, the primary argument against these new rules swirls around the concept of "commercially reasonable."  A term invented by the F.C.C. but so poorly defined that the agency will spend the next few months trying to come up with a definition.  The popular consensus is that it lies somewhere between a toll bridge and extortion.

Not only does the possibility (if not outright probability) exist for smaller content providers to be crowded out by deeper pockets but consumers could be in for sticker shock as content providers try to recover priority access fees.

Netflix and Hulu are going to get a lot more expensive...

On its face Wheeler appears to be trying to please everybody but his history as an ardent supporter of telecom industry deregulation makes such overtures suspect.

In January, the F.C.C. was told by the Federal court in no uncertain terms that the Internet was not currently considered a critical utility like water or electricity and therefore couldn't be regulated in the same manner.

Which was probably music to the old telecom lobbyist's ears.  Wheeler's statements this week have amounted to little more than lip service to Net Neutrality.

In what appears to be an about face since the court's ruling (despite Wheeler's denials,) the F.C.C. now embraces regulation "along the lines of the court's decision."  Meaning that every challenge is met with that phrase.  So-called Fast lanes, as the F.C.C. refers to them, cite the ability of premium content providers like NetFlix or Amazon to prioritize their traffic.

For a fee...

To be clear, nobody is saying you have to pay if you want users to be able to access your content but there's nothing in the F.C.C.'s proposals that require anything more of an ISP than a promise to play nice and submit a few reports.

It might as well be the F.C.C.'s version of Chamberlin's 1938 Munich agreement.

With an edict handed down from the Federal courts, Wheeler is now free to move the F.C.C from a regulatory agency responsible for protecting the public interest to a service window for telecom industry lobbyists looking to cash in.

Pop Culture is no longer popular or culture

There's no accounting for taste...

Well at least not on the Internet.  Maybe I'm just a grumpy old man but all these new creative outlets have left popular culture in chaos.  What else can explain over 2 million YouTube views of a flatulent dog let alone that Miley Cyrus gets even one ITunes download. 

Even commercials are senseless.  I mean c'mon, 80's hair metal to sell a Honda Minivan?  I may be old enough to remember what MTV was like before Rap music but even I'm not that lame.  The rise of Reality TV in the last century certainly didn't help either.  Maybe it's the cause of all of this. 

It's got to be tough to be a TV writer these days.  The opportunities are few and far between when the big networks are crowded with such "gems" as Survivor and Big Brother.  

I guess we didn't know how good we had it when we were wondering who shot JR or whether Fonzie was going to make it over that shark. 

Maybe that's when popular culture jumped the shark.  Oh yeah, in case you don't know, the Happy Days episode where Fonzie jumps a shark on water skis is commonly regarded as the point where the series finally lost popularity with viewers.

It seems that was also the point where popular culture developed a severe case of ADD.  Take a look at your local TV schedule these days and you'll soon find that if you want something other than reality TV or infomercials there's going to be a monthly charge attached.

Ok, ok I know.  Ol' Grandpa hates that evil rock and roll and Elvis is corrupting our youth and you can get pregnant from sitting on a public toilet. 

Though before you judge me too harshly, let's look at a few examples of popular music  from the past few decades.  I happen to believe an era's music says more about its popular culture than any other medium.

1960's - Let's spend the night together, The Rolling Stones.   Risqué for its time but harmless.

1970's - Go Your OwnWay,  Fleetwood Mac.  At least we were thinking above the belt on this one.

1980's - I Still Haven't  found what I'm looking for, U2.   Maybe a bit cerebral ,not that it's a bad thing.

1990's - Smells likeTeen Spirit, Nirvana  A Ha!, there it is, I mean with a chorus of ...

Here we are now, entertain us
I feel stupid and contagious
Here we are now, entertain us

Hey, it's a great song and all but it might as well be the ADHD anthem.  Soon to be followed by a pop  culture confused by its own identity or a lack thereof.  Gender bending pop-stars pushing limits nobody cares about anymore and talentless hacks that even their peers can't stand.  I'm lookin' at you Bieber...

I'm not even going to bother with the 2000's, they're part of the problem with so-called popular tracks like "Poker Face" and "Give it 2 u" which never get above the bikini line let alone the belt...

Oh but the great equalizer that is the Internet, where anyone with a YouTube channel can be "discovered."  It's led to gushing pundits proclaiming the end of the "gatekeepers" and "curated" entertainment.  Evidenced by 2.7 million views of a bad fart joke.

Funny thing is that you're never going to see anyone get a Grammy or an Oscar based on YouTube views or ITunes downloads.

Maybe we need the gatekeepers.  For all their rumblings over piracy and copyright their real problem is that they  don't know how to read the public anymore.  It's true that business  concerns should never trump talent but we've gone too far in the other direction.  The entertainment industry has become  more flaky than a Wall Street broker with oil futures.

However, it's still a fact that nobody becomes successful without the blessings of the gatekeepers no matter how fickle  they are.  Some of them have even moved into the "New Media" space but in the end the new media is really just an extension of the same old construct.

That's a problem, because the gatekeepers have lost their focus by trying to entice a popular culture that doesn't know what it wants.  The result is a product only marginally better than YouTube fare.  It caters to the lowest common denominator and that part of the equation has gotten lower.

We're literally awash in cat videos, Jackass wannabes and bad movie trailers.  Hollywood is clueless, stuck in an endless cycle of formula sequels and kid friendly animation that would be better suited going straight to video.  They've become so bereft of creativity that any recent list of the top ten movies will undoubtedly include films based on either comic books or games.  

The rest usually involve vampires, werewolves or somebody's organs violently being removed from their body.  Let's not forget the new trend of "reboots" that Started with J.J. Abrams "Star Trek" and has moved on to 80's slasher flicks.    

Maybe I am too old but it seems I've managed to find a lot of things to like about every generation of popular culture.  Even those I wasn't around for. 

Something's different now.

Even with the overwhelming quantity of content it seems the quality has become insignificant.  Make no mistake, every era has had crap.  Face it, there was good reason why most of the hair metal bands didn't  manage to get past their first album.

Now imagine if all those bands were still around clogging up Pandora or Spotify.  You'd waste a lot of time wading through crap just to hear what you like. 

Art needs curation and entertainment deals with artists.  Pop culture is inextricably intertwined with art.   That means there needs to be some level of quality control.  Even if it runs against the whole "free and open" argument . 

Imagine the alternative. 

Would any museum be worth visiting if any hack with a paintbrush could throw up their paint by numbers portrait of Elvis?