“Fancy” v. “Problem” – Which is the Real Song of Summer 2014?

In the early part of the summer of 2014, “Problem,” by Ariana Grande feat. Iggy Azalea sat in the #2 slot behind “Fancy” (Iggy Azalea feat. Charli XCX) for five weeks, and ultimately was declared the runner up Song of the Summer. When Fancy managed to hold onto the #1 slot for two additional weeks after “Problem” fell out of the top two, I was forced to concede that “Fancy” was definitively the stronger hit. But, if you look at the youtube view counts of the two music videos today, you will notice that “Problem” has recently overtaken “Fancy,” and that its lead is rapidly growing (to the tune of 300,000 views/day).

So, is “Fancy” really the bigger hit, in hindsight? 

To answer this question, we are going to need to look at what has driven the view disparity. But first:

The story of the view battle.

“Fancy” was released in early March, and it steadily built radio airplay, sales, and streaming until it neared the apex of the Hot 100. Just as it was about to claim the throne on the strength of a substantial 222,000 sales, Ariana Grande released her new single, “Problem,” and garnered an astonishing 438,000 sales in the span of a single week, the most since Katy Perry’s “Roar” had debuted at #1 a year earlier. As “Fancy” narrowly fended off “Problem” for the crown of the Hot 100, “Problem” ‘s star-powered start at youtube quickly eclipsed “Fancy” ‘s budding view-count.

But all was not lost. “Fancy” had clawed its way to the apex of the Hot 100, and on the strength of established radio airplay, it clawed its way ahead of “Problem” on youtube, and slowly regained its air of superiority.

For five weeks, “Fancy” held the top spot on the Hot 100 over “Problem,” despite rapidly increasing radio airplay for the latter and continued strong sales. But then “Problem” ‘s sales finally began to falter as its airplay peaked, and it succumbed to ascendant hit “Rude” by Magic!. After holding the top slot for two more weeks, “Fancy” was able to claim the prized title of “Song of Summer 2014,” over respective runner-ups “Problem,” and “Rude.”

Iggy Azalea later released a fitting song called “Iggy SZN” (pronounced Iggy season). It really was Iggy season. She had taken her first two Hot 100 hits to #s 1 and 2 concurrently for numerous weeks. Then, she starred in a followup single, “Black Widow” feat. Rita Ora, that peaked at #3. Her “Fancy” co-collaborator, Charli XCX, meanwhile, released another top ten hit, “Boom Clap,” while Ariana Grande enjoyed the spotlight of several more hits. Iggy was hot. Until she was not.

Iggy had several singles flop. She had numerous social media beefs and flare-ups that garnered negative media attention. She was accused of being racist, or at least racially insensitive, partly due to her assimilation of a “blaccent” for her hit song “Fancy.” She canceled her tour because she “wanted it to be perfect.” But some people insinuated that it was due to low ticket sales. Then, her intended recovery hit single with Britney Spears, “Pretty Girls” flopped. To top off injury with insult, her prized single, “Fancy,” which had once accumulated about a 40 million view lead over “Problem,” was finally surpassed in views by the runner-up song of the summer of 2014.

Of course, Iggy gets the consolation prize of having been a featured artist on “Problem,” but really, it was an Ariana song. So, maybe the negativity surrounding Iggy helped depress her view count a bit, mostly, I think that is just by preventing her future singles from becoming smashes that could drive continued traffic back to “Fancy.”

“Fancy” views were boosted by “Black Widow” and maybe “Boom Clap,” but Iggy and Charli haven’t had any hits since then. Ariana has had several hits since then, the most recent peaking only a few months ago.

If you have a music video on your page that generates 1 or 2 million views/day, then it should come as no surprise that the other videos on your page might see a small boost because of it (say, 100,000/d). In a collapsing major hit like “Problem” or “Fancy,” you might not notice the bump much, as it might simply keep the song afloat at current view levels longer.

Iggy and Charli each had a second top ten hit on the Billboard Hot 100 last summer, with “Black Widow,” and “Boom Clap.” But, since then, they haven’t really had anything majorly successful. Iggy teamed up with Britney Spears for a “Pretty Girls” video that got strong initial views, but after the song flopped at radio (with seriously terrible audience ratings), the youtube views collapsed. Still, it was generating over 1 million views for quite a while, and it likely helped “Fancy” ‘s view-count a bit.

Ariana Grande, on the other hand, has had a steady stream of hits. “Bang Bang” and “Break Free” peaked in the top 5, “Love Me Harder” peaked at #7, and “One Last Time” peaked at #13 as recently as early May. She also released a Christmas song, “Santa Tell Me” that was getting about 1 million views/day before the season ended.

Finally, you have to keep in mind that everything Iggy Azalea has done has benefited the “Problem” music video (on which she was featured) as well as the “Fancy” video, whereas Ariana’s star power has been focused on “Problem” ‘s success.

So, the driver of “Problem” ‘s youtube view-count success is more “Ariana Grande post-hoc star power” and less “strength of ‘Problem’ as an actual hit.”

Conclusion

My verdict: “Fancy” is still the bigger hit.

“Fancy” pulled two largely unknown artists from oblivion to international stardom through its shear awesomeness. “Problem” was a huge it, and deservedly so. It capitalized on Ariana’s pre-existing popularity perfectly, and started a sequence of hit singles for her. It is easily her biggest hit to date. But, ultimately, it sat behind “Fancy” on the Hot 100 for five weeks in a row before collapsing. It has managed to pull into the lead on total youtube views, but that is due primarily to post-hoc star power, not due to the strength of the single itself. And, Iggy’s star power has been split between the two competing singles, so it was never really a fair race to begin with.

In hindsight, “Fancy,” by Iggy Azalea feat. Charli XCX remains the Song of Summer 2014!

Mormon (LDS) Church to Continue Boy Scouts Because They Can Still Discriminate Locally.

The Deseret News reported simply that the LDS Church had decided to continue its boy scout program (despite its recent decision to stop discriminating against LGBT scout leaders). But this is not the progressive, enlightened move that it might seem on first glance. The Church states:

In the resolution adopted on July 27, 2015, and in subsequent verbal assurances to us, BSA has reiterated that it expects those who sponsor Scouting units (such as the Church) to appoint Scout leaders according to their religious and moral values ‘in word and deed and who will best inculcate the organization’s values through the Scouting program.’ At this time, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will go forward as a chartering organization of BSA, and as in the past, will appoint Scout leaders and volunteers who uphold and exemplify Church doctrine, values, and standards.

In other words, the LDS church can still pick local scout leaders based on its own standards of morality. Hmm… I wonder what the Church’s standards are on the morality of homosexuality. Has that changed recently? No? Oh. Ok. So, the Church is conceding only that it is not going to throw a tissy fit about gay scout leaders in other people’s troups.

I’m proud of you, Church, for not acting like a spoiled child. Congratulations. This is absolutely the moment that we have all been waiting for. 

This is seriously breaking, headline news. Church did not throw tissy fit. Seriously?

 

Why Can’t the LDS Church be Progressive?

The LDS church claims to have over 13 million members worldwide (although that figure counts people like me who simply haven’t yet bothered to tell them in writing that we think it is a bunch of BS, so a more legitimate figure is probably less than half that). It has been around for almost 200 years, now. That is nothing compared to, say, Catholicism. But even in that period of time, the Church is already doing logical summersaults to try to keep its story straight and to therefore retain a semblance of legitimacy.

Mormon theology depends on absolutes. The Church is either true, or it is not. Either everything that they “know” to be true is true, or it is ALL a bunch of BS. Either Mormon men actually channel the power of the priesthood, or they do not. The leaders of the church put themselves in a foxhole when they made homosexuality absolutely immoral. Now, either homosexuality is immoral, and should continue to be fought against, or Joseph Smith was never visited by two pillars of light that solidified into holy beings. The Church can’t take it back and still retain legitimacy in the eyes of any rational human being. Luckily for the church, it has a lot of irrational believers. But, it would still take a pretty big hit.

Category-Specific Mailing Lists Coming Soon

I will be adding category-specific mailing lists in the near future so that loyal readers can be notified only when a post comes out that they care about. For now, if you would like to be placed on one of these lists, please email me privately at sometimesprofound@gmail.com.

The #1 Way Donald Trump is Helping Hillary Clinton

There are a lot of ways that The Donald is helping The Hillary in her quest to become the first female POTUS. For starters, he makes the GOP look pretty gawdawful to low information moderate and democratic voters who see only “current Republican frontrunner” coupled with “lots of crazy positions and offensive comments.” But, the thing about low information voters is that they don’t pay very much attention to politics, or the news in general. Consequently, they tend to have short memories, and they are ultimately unlikely to punish Jeb Bush or Scott Walker on election day for what Donald Trump said more than a year earlier. No, The Donald does something far worse for the GOP’s electoral prospects than to be a Republican saying all the wrong things — he gets other people to say them too.

Donald Trump is Making Republican Candidates Take Hardline Stances on Immigration That Will Haunt Them in the General Election

1) Deport the undocumented en masse. 2) Seize the money they try to send home. 3) Deny citizenship to their U.S.-born children. These are some of the policy positions that Donald Trump has now embraced in his new policy paper. Jeb Bush has thus far resisted Trump’s ideas, calling them impractical and unrealistic. But in Iowa, Scott Walker has now started to call for a wall along the southern border. He has also started to question the wisdom of the Constitutional provision for “birthright citizenship.”

In order to win the primary, you have to appeal to the base of the party. The base of the Republican party currently disagrees vehemently with mainstream America on a handful of issues, most saliently for present purposes, immigration. Donald Trump, in riding a wave of anti-immigrant fervor in the base of the Republican party, has brought the issue into the spotlight of the Republican primary issue sphere, and now all of the candidates are being forced to talk about it, and to take hardline conservative stances on the issue — that is, if they want to have a shot at getting the nomination. For someone who wants to see Barack Obama replaced by a Republican, this is a nightmare scenario.

Recall early 2012, when Mitt Romney took hardline stances on immigration, and started talking about self-deportation in order to pull in stubborn conservative voters. This year, the Republican establishment wanted desperately to avoid the topic. When it comes up, Republican primary candidates are forced to take hardline stances that please primary voters, knowing that those stances will make it difficult to win the general election.

Mitt Romney performed worse amongst latino voters than any other Republican candidate since 1980 not named Bob Dole. 

 Conclusion

The biggest present Trump has ever handed to Hillary Clinton has been this: sucking up all of the media coverage with an all-out assault on immigration, an thereby forcing mainstream and establishment Republican candidates to talk about the issue and take stances that will come back to haunt them.

Winners and Losers from the First Republican Presidential Debate

We can now compare Republican candidate’s performance in the four most recent pre-debate polls with their performance in Rasmussen’s first post-debate poll and thereby see who the big winners — and losers — really were.

Quick note: Rasmussen has occasionally been implicitly or explicitly accused of being an untrustworthy pollster with right-leaning political motivations by, stats guru Nate Silver, electoral-vote.com, and by me.

Winners

1) Carly Fiorina

Pre-debate polling average: 1.25%

Post-debate: 9%

Gain: 7.75%

2) Rubio

Pre-debate polling average: 5.25%

Post-debate: 10%

Gain: 4.75%

3) Carson

Pre-debate polling average: 5.75%

Post-debate: 8%

Gain: 2.25%

Cruz

Pre-debate polling average: 5.5%

Post-debate: 7%

Gain: 1.5%

Kasich

Pre-debate polling average: 2.75%

Post-debate: 4%

Gain: 1.25%

Losers

1) Trump

Pre-debate polling average: 24.25%

Post-debate: 17%

Gain: -7.25%

2) Huckabee

Pre-debate polling average: 6.75%

Post-debate: 3%

Gain: -3.75%

3) Bush

Pre-debate polling average: 12.5%

Post-debate: 10%

Gain: -2.5%

Everyone Else

Walker

Pre-debate polling average: 9.5%

Post-debate: 9%

Gain: -0.5%

Paul

Pre-debate polling average: 4.5%

Post-debate: 4%

Gain: -0.5%

Christie

Pre-debate polling average: 3.5%

Post-debate: 4%

Gain: 0.5%

Perry

Pre-debate polling average: 1.75%

Post-debate: 1%

Gain: 0.75%

Santorum

Pre-debate polling average: 1.5%

Post-debate: 1%

Gain: -0.5%

Jindal

Pre-debate polling average: 1.25%

Post-debate: 1%

Gain: -0.25%

Graham

Pre-debate polling average: 0.5%

Post-debate: 1%

Gain: 0.5%

Keep in mind that Trump still came in with a 7% polling lead. Fox News may be kindof affiliated with Rasmussen. Both may be kindof extensions of the Republican party, or at least the establishment wing of the Republican party. Both may be biased towards getting a Republican president elected. Both may realize that Trump wouldn’t have a shot in hell against Hillary, and both may therefore have an interest in portraying Trump as a loser and in biasing polling data and presidential debates to turn Republican primary voters away from him.

Early in the debate, Fox displayed the number of golf courses Trump owns on the screen briefly while he was answering one of the many tough questions the moderators threw at him. They asked tough questions of every candidate, but none more so than of Trump. To be fair, Trump has said a LOT of things that would ordinarily be expected to end a campaign. Additionally, Fox was likely able to boost its ratings by focusing on the many crazy things Trump has said or done in the past.

In the end, take everything with a grain of salt.

Conclusion

In the end, the big winner is Carly Fiorina, who went from almost 0% of the vote to being tied with the likes of Bush, Walker, and Rubio, for second place behind Trump. Fiorina is now likely to be considered a serious candidate for the nomination. It remains to be seen how her debate bump in popularity will continue through the coming weeks, but one thing is for sure: she is no longer a candidate to ignore. Rubio has also risen back to the top tier of candidates following his brief hiatus. Trump’s bubble may finally have popped, and he could now be facing the same fate as other bubble candidates before him, like Michelle Bachman and Herman Cain. I am particularly inclined to think Trump’s bubble has been popped because he is facing legitimate fallout over his Megyn Kelly feud and over the fact that he essentially used to be a democrat (primary voters who previously supported him may not have been fully aware of the extent of his democratic allegiance before Fox News so carefully pointed it out during the debate).

Other than that, though, the overall race remains virtually unchanged, with Bush remaining the best bet.

8/6/15 Thought of the Day

The plural of faux pas (foe paw) is actually still faux pas. The only difference is that you pronounce the final s (foe pawz).

The word was imported from French, and that is the pluralization rule for the rare words that already end in “s.” Interestingly, English incorporated a large number of grammatical constructions from French, including most of our silent letters and our standard pluralization rules. So, why didn’t we incorporate this particular pluralization rule along with the rest? We don’t have any native words that end in silent “s”es. When we end a word with an “s,” it is pronounced, so, in order to differentiate the plural, we have to add “es.” Hence the interesting constructions that later occur when we import more words directly from the French language.

Isn’t this all so fascinating?

“Ghost Town” rises #16 to #2 in the Land Down Under

Following his performance on the Australian version of The Voice, Adam Lambert’s new single shot to the top of the Australian iTunes chart, where it is still standing strong. As a result, “Ghost Town” leapt from #16 to #2 on Australia’s premier singles chart, ARIA, for the tracking week ending Friday, August 7th. One Direction’s new single, “Drag Me Down The Original High, meanwhile, returns to #6, near its #4 debut/peak.

“Ghost Town” has spent 11 weeks on Australia’s singles chart. It has also peaked in the top ten in South Africa, the Netherlands, and Poland. It is currently charting on iTunes in 37 countries. For the week ending July 31st, “Ghost Town” ranks at its peak-to-date of #67 on the US Billboard Hot 100 while The Original High ranks at #98 on the Billboard 200. Lambert ranks at #88 on Billboard’s (US) Artist 100.

Lambert’s prior singles, “Whataya Want from Me,” and “If I Had You” are also tracking in the iTunes of Australia and New Zealand. Lambert is slated for performances in both countries when he goes on tour starting in early 2016.

Can One Direction Steal a #1 Debut on the Hot 100?

With it’s first single since the loss of Zayn Malik shocked One Directioners the world over, the band is facing a test of the continued devotion of its fan base. The verdict? More enthusiasm than ever.

“Drag Me Down” is currently headed for the highest debut of the year on the Billboard Hot 100 with perhaps 340,000 downloads.

So, how high will 1D debut?

Billboard says it will likely debut in the Top 5. But, could it debut at #1? Let’s look at the numbers.

Per Billboard, we have an insider estimate of at least 5 million US streams and perhaps 340,000 sales. Radio airplay in its first three days of availability totaled 10 million audience impressions. I estimate that billboard figures will show about 21 million +/- 2 million audience impressions for the radio tracking week ending Sunday, the 9th. You can create your own estimate from publicly available information for free here, here, and here.

Other possible contender’s for the #1 slot:

Omi’s “Cheerleader,” which has been #1 for four weeks.

Last week’s performance – 

Sales: 148,000; down 9%

Airplay: 140 million; up 5%

Streams: 16.1 million; up 17%

This week’s estimated performance – 

Sales: 128,000; down 13%

Airplay: 145.85 million; up 4.18%

Streams: 16 million

The Weeknd’s “Can’t Feel My Face” which has been #2 for three weeks. 

Last week’s performance – 

Sales: 148,000; up 21%

Airplay: 144 million; up 5%

Streams: 13.1 million; up 21%

This week’s estimated performance – 

Sales: 150,000; up 1%

Airplay: 151 million; up 4.9%

Streams: 14 million

The Formula

Billboard doesn’t publish its actual formula as a matter of course, but it does allude to it frequently enough that we can generate a reasonable estimate. We know, specifically, that 13.7 million streams is approximately equal to but greater than 172,000 sales is approximately equal to but greater than 122 million radio audience impressions. So, let’s assume that 13 million streams actually equals 175,000 sales actually equals 140 million audience impressions. That implies that 1 million streams equals 13,462 sales equals 10.77 million radio audience impressions equals 1 chart point.

The Weeknd: 14 + 14.02 + 11.14 = 39.16 chart points

Omi: 16 + 13.54 + 9.51 = 39.05 chart points

One Direction: 5 + 1.95 + 25.26 = 32.21 chart points

The Weeknd – One Direction: 6.95 chart points, or 21.58% of One Direction’s expected points.

Conclusion

One Direction is probably not going to debut at #1 on next week’s Hot 100. Assuming they got an almost fantastical 31.77 million radio audience impressions and 7 million US streams, they would still need about 392,000 sales to take the lead, unless the other two contenders were to do markedly worse than expected, or unless my estimate of Billboard’s formula is way off the mark. Instead, it looks like The Weeknd’s “Can’t Feel My Face” will eek into first place on the strength of a headlining spot at Lollapalooza 2015 and a music video debut.

One Direction should debut inside the Top 5 of the Hot 100, but almost certainly not higher than #3.

How to Tie Every Tie Knot

Triangle. Over and through. Voila. 

Now you know how to tie a tie.

That wasn’t so hard, was it?

Triangle.

Every tie knot is triangular. Some slant off to one side. Some are smaller, or larger. But every tie knot forms some kind of triangle. The first step to tying a tie is to figure out what you want your tie knot to look like. If you want it bigger, or more even, then give yourself a little more slack to add a few loops to your knot.

The small end of the tie does not move. Pull it down to the desired length minus the expected slack (At the end, the small end will be as long as it is now, plus the distance between the knot and the neck). Then craft the desired knot with the big end of the tie.

Over and through.

The final step in every tie knot is over and through. Take the large end and loop it over the knot you have crafted and then pull it up behind the knot and through the loop you just made. The simplest tie knot actually consists exclusively of this step.

Voila.

This is the part where you pull the knot magically up to your neck, tighten, adjust, and straighten.

Journal 8/5/2015 – Dreams and Reality

In my dream, I clung to the numbers. I clung to the reality of the thing, the string that tied the story together. The dream dragged on at length because finishing even a simple task can be nearly impossible when your brain must construct and reconstruct the entire world because you stubbornly refuse to let go of the story that hasn’t yet properly ended. In my dream, I subconsciously demanded order and continuity. I wanted resolution. But resolution was lacking. In the end, I still ended up with a meaningless series of images and feelings that can scarcely be remembered in my waking state.

A simple task of counting, or measuring, is the most difficult of all, because your brain must quantify the imaginary subconsciously before allowing your semi-conscious side make the discovery. Dreams are inherently a-logical. Their order derives separately from their source, the human mind. The counting, which in reality would have been simple, takes on an extraordinary quality in the dream, where the actual ideas which spurred the substance to be counted may not have had any actual quantifiable element.

Occasionally, the dream mirrors real life, in that many possible threads are presented, but as one is pursued the others are forgotten and their resolution is never to be had. The story becomes immensely complicated while appearing boringly simple, and it leaves me with the impenetrable feeling that I am forgetting many things very quickly.

In the world of reality, I remember so little. Ideas that strike me fade into nothing and are forgotten. Threads that I might have followed are subsumed into the concerns of the present. The ideas of friends and family members past are cruel jokes the universe plays on a mind now living in a world with different and older faces and personalities. What once was had is gone, never to return again without the aid of an imaginary time machine.

I feel as Thoreau, living in a strange and simple place outside of society, dipping my toes into the vortex of modern life but remaining, in spirit, in a trance, devoid of understanding, but fully aware of my lack.

Relationships, for me, form slowly and selectively. It is hard to grow attached to something you see as an inanimate object responding merely to stimuli. Attachment comes from long experience of a thing. We cling to the present, even as it slips into the forgotten past. Continuity is ever-desired. Our antipathy to change, our longing for the nostalgia of the past, these are our true drivers of remorse when a loved one suddenly perishes. It is the sudden shock of the thing, all at once, that afflicts us with grief. Those same feelings, spread out over time, slowly creep into us every day of our lives as the memories of our youth fade, as the people we have come to know and cherish grow into strange beings. But, when so spread out, we can cope with our loss, we can subsume ourselves in our daily activities, clinging to the continuity that we have.