I found a way to convert videos to flash format (like YouTube) and incorporate them into Wordpress. This is really neat. The original WMV file was 7.6 MB. The flash file is 1.6 MB.

Some background on this video… On January 4, 2005, Simpson performed “La La” at the halftime show for the Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida; when her performance finished, many of the 72,000-plus spectators booed. Representatives for the Orange Bowl stated that they were pleased with her performance and felt that it was a belated reaction to the SNL incident, while others have speculated that it may have been because the audience of the Orange Bowl was outside of Simpson’s target age bracket. Still others disagree, however Kelly Clarkson had performed before Simpson in the show to a more positive reaction and assert that her performance was poor and very off-key.

My personal take on the incident is that she got what she deserved. As was once noted by Refused, punk and hardcore music can not be anti-establishment by continuing to package revolutionary lyrics in sounds which have been increasingly co-opted into the mainstream. Ashlee Simpson takes that argument to another level altogether…. her music can’t even possibly be considered punk or hardcore, but she co-opts the punk imagery for her own purposes. (Note the huge “Anarchy” symbol in her stage set):