back to article In praise of China’s CROONING censors: Company songs NOW!

Clear the desk of work, put the phone on voicemail, set your email to auto-reply and sign that restraining order against the increasingly desperate Madonna. Allow nothing to interrupt the 3:11 of sheer pleasure that is Cyberspace Spirit, the televised performance of the official anthem for China’s web censors. As soon as I …

  1. cosymart
    WTF?

    Don't

    Don't give up your day job....on second thoughts this is your day job, oh dear.

    1. Alistair Dabbs

      Re: Don't

      You read two pages of this nonsense AND took time to write a comment. You are my ideal reader.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    My research efforts have revealed that the trick is simply to change the lyrics of a widely known song.

    Been there, done that. I didn't give up my day job then and still won't be any time soon.

  3. EddieD

    +1

    I skipped most of the article, but anything that links to Sit on my face from MPatHB gets a vote from me.

  4. ADC

    Wonderful as usual :-)

    Even here working in China this stuff makes us laugh at the same time as it frustrates efforts to work effectively in modern technology...

  5. Zog_but_not_the_first

    Joking aside...

    China really is another country.

    1. Alistair Dabbs

      Re: Joking aside...

      My atlas confirms this.

    2. Richard Taylor 2

      Re: Joking aside...

      And you too can find the IBM Company Song here - http://www.digibarn.com/collections/songs/ibm-songs/

      Others available if you have the nerve….

  6. Evil Auditor Silver badge
    WTF?

    Company song

    Back in the early noughties my then employer, one of the large professional services firms, produced a company song with their staff singing. While I elegantly excused myself from the recording event, even more than ten years later this song sometimes is still haunting me.

    Now I took two or three minutes to browse through IBM's songbook. This is outright creepy! If it was my company, I'd immediately fire any employee coming up with such obnoxious arse licking of the highest order.

    At least now I don't feel so bad about the company song I had to endure. Thank you, Alistair.

  7. Martin Summers Silver badge

    Let it go!

    Oh you swine! Just when I had that bloody Disney song out of my head you slip it in where I'm least expecting to find it (ahem).

    1. Larhten

      Re: Let it go!

      Let it SNOW, different song....

      1. Martin Summers Silver badge

        Re: Let it go!

        You're absolutely right, how embarassing. But that's how bad it is that even just seeing "Let it" suffixed with any rhyming word with snow triggers that particular reaction.

  8. Daniel B.

    The company song!

    The company song/hymn is pretty much alive and well. The difference seems to be on the company itself promoting it or not. Back when I worked at a certain bank, the "hold music" was an instrumental version of that song... in my country. If you had the "pleasure" of calling a certain South American branch, the hold music was the actual anthem, sung by an actual singer and in some other country it even had a kid chorus singing it as well!

    Forget suffering your corporate song during company events; some people in South America hear it every time they're put on hold!

  9. John Savard

    British History

    If one is going to mention "Ever Onward, IBM" and the like, what about Farey Aviation and the Black Dyke Band?

  10. VeganVegan

    That's no crooning

    That is hollering, plain and simple.

    Come to think of it, hollering brings to mind Hollerith, a nice fit with IBM etc..

  11. ecofeco Silver badge

    Bizarre

    Completely bizarre.

  12. Stuart Moore
    WTF?

    Since you mention it...

    Where is BOFH?

    1. Alistair Dabbs

      Re: Since you mention it...

      Where is BOFH?

      I asterisked a footnote to this line. The link is in the footnote.

      1. DJV Silver badge
        Meh

        Re: Since you mention it...

        No, Alistair, that's where the BOFH was nearly 2 months ago. Is he still recovering from the miracle?

        1. Alistair Dabbs

          Re: Since you mention it...

          ST moves in mysterious ways. Rumour is that he's writing a BoFH song.

  13. DerekCurrie
    Mushroom

    Another URL For This Masterpiece Of Propaganda:

    If you, like I, are running into trouble playing this article's video on our glorious Internet that inexorably flows its way to the sea of great knowledge and wisdom, try the alternative URL below. Don't forget your barf bag:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0KH8Dn4dyo

    The supine and infectionous (sic) lyrics are posted below the video for your English translational enjoyment.

    :-Q*****

  14. David Given

    Not just songs

    Back when, the startup I worked for got briefly involved with Amiga in its Gateway incarnation, at which point a bunch of us got copies of the Amiga *album*.

    Luckily, it hasn't been uploaded to Youtube, but unluckily, here's a video of the main song (lyrics: "Rising up / Like a phoenix / From his sleep // Coming out / From the darkness / And the deep // etc") being performed 'live' at a conference somewhere. With dancers. And a rather small, utterly bemused audience not dancing to it.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XctKccarzHo

    1. Alistair Dabbs

      Re: Not just songs

      Techno techno techno techno

      1. Keven E.

        Re: Not just zingers

        "Most sat there with gaping mouths, not sure what to do. Around me, international colleagues were scratching their heads, turning red with embarrassment; some began to rock back and forth with panic in their eyes; some giggled nervously; others looked close to tears; all of us willing the three-minute dirge to end and put us out of our misery."

        After the first 1.1min. yous realized this *was being recorded and started sing along with it, after all I'm sure you really wanted to get invited to the next staging!

        http://www.amazon.com/Sing-Along-Mad-Al-Jaffee/dp/0451063945

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Oh ahhhhhh!

    When we got borged by Fujitsu we checked to see if there was a company song. There sure was

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    RSA Conference

    Obviously you have never been to the opening of the RSA Conference in San Francisco where a bunch of musicians murder a well known anthemic pop song with IT security Lyrics.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=deqcMl3K0m4

  17. Cacophonous Cowhorn
    Alert

    On the corporate song front, remember this one?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2YrwzxRZxY

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