A few days ago, I lost my wallet.  Understandably, I was pretty bummed… but I was also grateful that I had taken some steps ahead of time to minimize the damage.  So, without further ado, let me share with you some suggestions so you, too, can suffer less when you stupidly lose your wallet.

1. Don’t keep more than what’s necessary in your wallet.
This is the easiest way to avoid headaches.  You may have 10 credit cards, gas cards, etc., but how many do you really need to use on a daily basis?  Putting less in your wallet not only means less hassle when it’s is lost, but also less heft that you have to sit on (if you’re a guy) or carry (if you’re a woman, or a guy who doesn’t like to put his wallet somewhere other than his back pants pocket).

2. If you do keep gift cards / stored value cards on your wallet, make sure they’re registered!
Addicted to Starbucks and got a Starbucks card, for instance?  Make sure it—and all your other stored value cards—are appropriately registered so that when they’re lost, you don’t lose the money on the cards.

3. Start a document or note that you can access electronically where you can put critical wallet-related info… ideally something that also syncs with your phone.
You should write down what’s in your wallet and be able to access it from nearly anywhere.  You could use Google Docs or Google Notebook or even a (very, very secure, password protected) file on your Web server or file server.  Here’s what I do:  I have an “In my wallet” Outlook note that I update regularly.  I use Plaxo to reliably sync my Outlook notes between home, work, and laptop computers, and then I use my Treo’s software to regularly place that same info on my phone.  I don’t put credit card numbers or similarly private info in this note, however, since it’s possible my phone could get stolen, and I haven’t gotten around to passwording it yet.  I store that more detailed info on a file on a network drive.

4. Actually update this document.
Yes, you actually have to remember to update this document (or these documents) regularly.  Given how often I’m putting things in and out of my wallet (particularly since I travel internationally), this is more important than you might think.

Have you heard of the movie Metropolis (the anime one)?  No?  How about film scorer Toshiyuki Honda?  No, again?  Well, you’re missing out!  It’s a delightfully quirky and surprisingly touching film, despite a somewhat slim plot and cursory characterizations.  And the Metropolis soundtrack is especially charming and catchy… in particular, it’s surprisingly jazzy, providing a sometimes-stark (and undoubtedly intended) counterpoint with the dark feel of the film.

Here are three different ways to listen to this great music, and I’d love to hear your feedback on which you find best overall:

1) Click on the “Metropolis soundtrack” link above to go to the Amazon.com page, and listen to clips there.

2) Listen to Metropolis on Rhapsody
NOTE: You’ll have to download a small plugin.  Non-subscribers (free users) get 25 free full-length track plays per month.  No registration required.

3) Listen to the title track below on Napster.
NOTE: Registration required (but it’s pretty fast and painless).  You can listen to an unlimited number of songs (from blogs and directly on Napster’s site), but can listen to any particular track a maximum of three times total.
EDIT:  Dang, for some odd reason, I’m not able to embed the Napster player in my blog, so you’ll have to make do with a Napster popup player that plays Metropolis.

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For more info on how I think these options fall far short of ideal (and a glimpse into what my ideal is), feel free to check out my post from yesterday if you haven’t already (”Fair use, mashups, and profits” )

And of course, there’s always the easier way… er, easier for users, pain in the ass for me.
Visit my entry on humorous a cappella ditty Aunt Sue’s Aunt Soup to see what I mean.

Anyway, I look forward to your thoughts on embedded music and sharing music in general!

Lots of us love music and we love to share it; I think that’s even more powerful than simply “grab lots of music for free”—it’s the sharing that excites us, motivates us.  Music is a shared experience!

Why, then, hasn’t anyone made it easy to share music snippets legally from a simple iframe, a simple widget that someone can cut and paste or even drag and drop into their blog?

Let me give an example of how painful it is to share (within, IMHO, fair use) a music snippet:
1) Identify song you want to share with others.  Determine that it’s DRM’d.  Ack!
2) Remove DRM (yes, I know this may technically be illegal, but frankly I don’t give a damn.  Call it civil disobedience)
3) Use software to grab a relevant thirty second snippet and save it as an mp3.  Make sure tags are still embedded.
4) Upload to server.
5) Before all of this, download and install a good flash player so others can listen to your snippet whether on a Mac or PC.
6) Embed the appropriate code into your blog entry.

Check out this entry on the emotional wallop of strings for an example of the result. 

I think it took me at least 20 minutes just to prepare, upload, and post this one clip.  Does that sound very conducive to sharing to you?!

So you know what massively puzzles me?  Why on earth hasn’t any major player (Amazon, Rhapsody, Napster, Apple, etc.) made this process easier… not only facilitating the discovery and sharing of music by the increasingly powerful blogosphere, but increasing subscriptions and download sales?!  Let me explain how I envision this working…