Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

This may be of interest to us Beatles fans.

http://apnews.excite.com/article/20051030/D8DIH7600.html

sounds like it could be interesting.....

"Spitz believes the split was less because of the influence of Ono than the fact that Lennon and Harrison couldn't stand to be in the room with McCartney anymore."

Lots of "reviews" on Amazon claiming that the book is inaccurate. I wonder ... when even the Beatles themselves can't/couldn't remember what happened between them, how can anyone else be 100% accurate, unless it's for things such as a published concert date or the identity of someone in a photo (both of which were called into question by the "reviewers" on Amazon.) Interviews are always suspect because the information gathered is filtered through the sometimes flawed memory of the interviewee. That's why I love the "Let It Be" film: no doubt what was happening in that case.

A must have for me Dave.

Surely this much research and dedication will stimulate discussion of the Beatles' life. That is enough for me to go out on the limb and get a copy.

I don't mind revisiting something I have read before at all. If this review of the book is only half right, I can live with it.

DANG!... just reading the reviews on Amazon is interesting. Clearly this book has some real flaws, but it could still be worthwhile. I wonder how many of the errors (like George meeting Patti on the set of "HELP!" ?.... Jeeeez Louizze!...) were from the author and how many were from the editors.

Long gone are the days where I'd buy anything and everything "Beatles"..... Before plunking down my hard earned cash I'll wait until I can hold it in my hands and check it out face to face.

(apparently it's been available for a couple of weeks already, hence the reviews)

Review copies of books are always circulated, so I can understand how the reviews are out although the book shouldn't be available in stores yet. And I can even understand the errors in photo captions, etc., although they shouldn't happen. Proofreading is a dying art, and fact checking isn't far behind. It does call a writer's credibility into question, though, when obvious errors make it through to the final printing. Spelling rules don't vary (except from America to England) but fact accuracy may be harder to home in on. It could be a case of the checkers simply believing that the author should know what he's talking about. Now THERE'S a dangerous precedent!

Agreed Dave. Bloopers don't instill confidence in the reader for sure.

If you want to read what I would think would be a more comprehensive bio on the Beatles, Mark Lewisohn's Three Volume set on them is coming up......in 2016 (no joke).

Lewisohn is DA MAN!

It sounds to me like the errors cited in the Spitz book... even if limited in number... do call into question just what the HELL was going on in the writing/editing/checking/publishing process.

I've heard this book is 800 plus pages.

I guess we will find out for sure tomorrow.

Forgive me for the following diatribe: I have some background in publishing and newspaper writing, and production work is slipping at all levels. I just started reading "Ethics for a New Millenium," by the Dalai Lama, and there's a word missing in the first chapter. This was an NYT bestseller. In a trade magazine last week, the subhead of a major article about valuing employees said, "Putting PEOLE First." Where were the proofreaders? On NPR not long ago, a commentator attributed the recording of "Needles and Pins" to the Dave Clark Five, not the Searchers. Where was the factchecker? It's not uncommon to find misspellings in major website headlines (CNN for example). The guy who takes care of IS for our company printed thousands of business cards on which his title is listed as head of "INFOMATION" Systems. When our website was being revamped two weeks ago, he posted a message on the homepage saying certain functions were "TEMPORALLY" unavailable. A major manufacturer of musical instruments gave the music store I work in a product manual with the name of the store misspelled on the binder -- in three places. I could go on.
The problem is that beginning at the earliest grade levels, teachers just don't care about spelling. They think spellchecking software will save us. But there is no context checking software. It's pervasive.
Now, I suppose that in the grand scheme of things, bad spelling will not bring down modern society. But it sure is annoying. I can forgive being a bad typist and being sloppy when you're trying to post to an Internet Forum before you have to go to work, but this lack of attention to detail is maddening. It's akin to Rickenbacker putting fret markers on fret 11 instead of 12 and not noticing, or noticing and not being willing to fix it. Well, I'm done. Must go to work. I sure hope I haven't made any typos.

Dave: I've noticed the same careless disregard in publications. I remember when spelling errors in a big city newspaper were unheard of. Now you can spot several every day. I've also seen numerous typos on our company website too. You're not the only person annoyed by this trend.

I am more than annoyed by this. At times I am apoplectic.

When I was in grade school, a half-milennium ago, I was led to understand and to believe that one mark of a well-rounded person was the way that he or she represented self in writing and speaking. I took care to learn and practice this at every occasion. It wasn't about "programming for success"--it was about expression of ideas and clear communication of same.

When I joined the corporate world, I came into contact with a majority of business people whose main interest--making as much money as possible as fast as possible--forced literacy (and numeracy) to take a seat WAY in the back of the stretch limo, where there was plenty of action but the language skills were below-grade.

Rude awakening.

I used to smile at the occasional typo that I saw on a sign or banner. Obviously done by someone who needed a bit more second-grade English, I would remark to myself.

With the explosion of the written word brought about by the advent of computers and the Web, misspellings are ubiquitous, and the misuse of our languages by semi-educated people who supposedly passed English grammar, is one of my biggest irritants.

Watch the news banner running at the bottom of your screen, whenever CNN is tuned in at home. If you go for ten minutes without a typo, it's a great day.

And I want to say: "Who writes this schitt?"

Functional illiteracy is at an all-time high, and copy editing is a high-stress, low-pay job. It may never get literate again around here again, and it's a national tragedy in many countries with an otherwise high standard of living, who should be educating their young, instead of passing them on to the business world, unable to clearly express their thoughts.

Umm, noo-kyoo-ler? That's all I'll say on the topic of the so-called leader of the free world, a Yale-educated millionaire's son, and his education and language training...

Some example.

I agree with you both on the subject of literacy(Dave and Randy). I also find myself being annoyed by all too casual spelling and grammatical errors.

Paul, you know what I do for a living and so you know intuitively how much attention I have to pay to detail.

As far as the leader of the free world goes, I often wonder if that is an act. I sure hope so.

It's all being dumbed down, folks...all of it. Maybe it's inevitable decadence, Roman Empire style...I don't know. I do know that a lot of the best minds of the 'sixties' generation got disgusted with the Program, and whether they 'dropped out' or not, they moved away from participating in the Machine in general, and positions of control in particular. This brain drain left the door open, in practically every single field, for the doofuses (doofi?) to rise to the top.

Let's face it, Thomas Edison couldn't pass the drug test to work in the mailroom of today's corporate empire...

When I worked at Raytheon in the six months following The Fall Of Western Civilization (frequently referred to in the Media as '9/11'), security had become the number one concern, with things like quality work and attention to detail moving down the priority list. One day, the Head Security Goon sent an urgent e-mail to all employees, reminding us that identity badges were to be displayed at all times, and that they should be worn "above the 'waste'"...

This would, of course, be impossible without the use of ten-foot poles...