|
|
Dave Matthews Band has published step-by-steps on how to get around the DRM on their CDs, thereby allowing users to rip a CD to their iPods. I like one of the other comments from Pho: "[Shouldn't] they be petitioning their record company not to put DRM on their CDs in the first place?" Amen, brother.
Thanks to Donna for the tip.
Someone is going to stand up to the RIAA.
For most targeted file-sharers, the threat of paying thousands per infringed track is simply too great a risk to bear, making a quick settlement a sound compromise. But the upcoming trial [featuring a single soccer mom from Wappingers Falls NY] could be a big one for the music industry, challenging the legal foundation that the RIAA is using to sue thousands of file uploaders. From the beginning, the RIAA has pointed a crystal clear body of law on the matter, though the extreme downside risk made a challenge of this sort unlikely. Now, the stage may be set for an Erin Brockovich-style trial, potentially attracting heavy press buzz.
Thanks to Glenn for the tip.
Okay, the title may be a bit overblown, but it's rather hard to deny the impact that mp3s have had on music in general.
Thanks to David for the tip.
Sean Ryan used to work as one of the suits at Real/Rhapsody/Listen.com. Based on his experiences, he's not a big fan of the online world:
I think digital music will eventually be extremely profitable for the content providers, including publishers, but I struggle to find a business model for the middle man in this business, at least for any model which requires broad label rights. And when you consider the joys of the mobile music sector, where you have both a concentrated supply chain AND a concentrated customer base (4 -6 carriers), you begin to see why I find that sector to just be a disaster in spite of the hype.
I think I like the sound of being in the position of extreme profit.
Raghav chimes in, adding
Big retailers [Best Buy et al -- Casper] also have lots of other products to draw people in. Distribution will be key, which is why I think mobile carriers will profit from digital music (as long as they don't get greedy and continue to charge $3 for a song). Radio stations are also well placed given their broad distribution via their real estate on the dial.
...With all of that said, there are a few areas of opportunity (though I'm sure I've missed out on many):Niche aggregator/retail. While Amazon, etc. have deep catalog, their scope is broad. That leaves room for niche players focusing on a certain niche like CDBaby and others (thanks to Chris Anderson's timely post on this topic).
Filters. As the quantity of easily available music grows, the role of filters grows. There are a good number of players in this area already but no one dominates, with Amazon's closed recommendation system probably being the largest, followed by Apple's iMix. Still lots of room for innovation as neither of these are a robust solution to the problem. Musicmobs is trying to be the del.icio.us of playlists, which is an interesting approach.
- Search. Again the offerings out now aren't very robust. Blinkx & GoFish are two startsup in this category though there are probably others flying below the radar.
- Services. I'm a big believer in Web-based services. Besides music rental, podcasting-related services immediately come to mind, but there are others (one of which I can't yet write about).
I'm of the opinion that the search option could be interesting -- particularly if Google gets their act together with indexing binary files.
Thanks to Gerd for the tip.
Rick Boucher, congressman from my home town, has introduced legislation to codify the Betamax ruling.
...That ruling held that Sony's Betamax VCR was legal even though people could use it to copy and pirate movies and television shows.
>It also introduced an important concept: "substantial noninfringing uses." In other words, even if a device such as a VCR could be used to do something illegal, the manufacturer could not be held responsible, provided there were plenty of legal ways to use it.
"A hammer is great for building houses, but it can also be used for breaking into houses," said Boucher, D-Abingdon. "You don't punish the guy who made the hammer when the burglar uses it to break in."
Some more songs from Fiona Apple's unreleased third album have appeared on the web.
-- Update --
Or not. The RIAA sent a C&D (Cease & Desist) letter to the host company of the site, and the mp3s are now down.
Wil Wheaton (yes, that Wil Wheaton) has an interesting perspective on ASCAP and podcasting:
Isn't it the ultimate goal of an artist to have as many people as possible hear their music, and hopefully buy their albums and attend their concerts? Right now, Podcasters are passionate people providing all sorts of free publicity. We're not competing with any large-scale broadcasters, and we're not trying to steal music. I'm doing this as a hobby, and the more difficult organizations like ASCAP and the RIAA make it for me to just play the music, the less likely I am to jump through their hoops.
Why not work *with* Podcasters to develop an agreement? Why doesn't ASCAP create a license that allows zero revenue podcasters to play music in their shows for free?
Well worth the time to take a read through.
A page of nothing but Mr. Bonham pounding the drums.
Just when you thought the RIAA couldn't get anymore ridiculous, they file suit against a grandmother. A dead one.
So, why would you pay money to listen to silence? I can understand wanting to actively not hear anything, but there's another solution for that -- the off button. But, silly me.
Among the hundreds of thousands of downloadable songs for sale at Apple Computer's online music store are at least nine tracks of silence, a fact that has prompted quite a bit of discussion
And, yes, John Cage's 4'33" can be purchased as well.
They lost again. The RIAA is finding out that they are not actually a police force, and they can't force ISPs to divulge information about their clients.
Simon has a wonderful observation on the subject:
The RIAA sniff they don't care anyway:
"Our enforcement efforts won't miss a beat," spokesman Jonathan Lamy said.
But if it's not a major setback for them, you might wonder why they've bothered to spend so much money trying to get the appeal courts to overturn lower court judgements that said much the same thing.
Ah, Simon, you are clearly looking for the RIAA for logic. A fool's errand if ever there was one.
Thanks to Brad for the tip.
Ed Felton is reporting that the recording industry may be deliberately spreading harmful files in place of a actual mp3 file.
The files are encoded in a Microsoft file format. When the user plays such a file, the user's browser is forced to visit a URL contained in the file. For the files at issue here, the page at that URL uses various spyware-insertion tricks to try to infect the user's machine with standard spyware programs. Ben Edelman reports that when he clicked on one such page, "My computer quickly became contaminated with the most spyware programs I have ever received in a single sitting, including at least the following 31 programs..."
So, a question that I have about this is -- Does this open a label so acting to legal vulnerability? Some jurisdictions are either considering criminalizing virus production or have already done so (US and Canada).
Nominally, a person who is downloading a file from a P2P network is almost certainly skating the boundaries of the law -- if not out and out breaking one or two. It would stand to reason that most lawbreakers aren't going to turn to an authority for help when and if they are the victim of a crime while commit one on their own (much like violence or theft committed against a prostitute and/or john during an assignation). Still, if any lawyer-type person might want to comment on the legalities, I'd be interested to hear more about it.
761 more for the RIAA.
Thanks to Brad for the tip.
Literally, in this case. The RIAA files suit against a 10 year old boy.
Bravo, guys, really. Top drawer work there.
Rumor has it that AOL has let go all but three of the employees at NullSoft -- the good folk who brought you WinAmp, the lightweight, fast mp3 player.
-- Update --
It's confirmed.
Actually, it's gone beyond that now. Sony and Grokster have inked a deal for legal P2P distribution.
Another 750 users find a bit o' extortion lawsuit in their mailbox.
The Induce Act, if it becomes law, would make the providers of digital services wary of developing any product that might generate lawsuits from the recording industry, which has shown it can be aggressive in pursuing copyright infringement cases in the courts, adds Hunter. "Innovation may be bad for the content industry, but it's almost certainly good for consumers. The stance of the industry is just to sue absolutely everybody to death. This will have a chilling effect."
Fader suggests that the content industry has turned to the courts and now Congress to protect a business model that is changing as a result of new technology. "Imagine if the horse-and-buggy manufacturers had legal loopholes to prevent the development of the automobile. They would use it, but would society be better off?"
The recording industry might engender more sympathy if it had made a better effort to incorporate some form of digital distribution in its business model, he adds. "It has never even run an experiment. It wants to have legislators come in to help it avoid the need to ever do so."
A think piece from a Wharton professor that should be required reading by anyone at a label.
Ringtones, the annoying variant of music that I rather abhor, are getting their own Billboard chart.
Tim Oren, VC out in CA, makes some observations on DRM and it's impact to consumers.
- Copy protection DRM always destroys end user value, in both convenience and robustness. When you see DRM in a business plan or analysis, it is always there to benefit someone other than the end user. Find out who, it will indicate where power lies in a content value chain.
- The mere presence of DRM indicates a failure to deliver end user value. If the information object were to lose value when extracted from the bundle or service from it was derived, DRM would not be felt necessary. Therefore the presence of DRM suggests a vendor that is behind the curve, failing to find a new value to deliver as their chokepoint disappears in the digital world.
- DRM almost always means there is trouble afoot for aggregators ('infomediaries'). If it's an aggregator inserting the DRM, their value added is in question. If it's information originators mandating DRM, then they feel they can damage the aggregator's value with impunity, and will likely try to drive end users' attention to themselves.
Jason Schultz has an interesting take on all the legal wrangling over INDUCE.
Why were the RIAA and MPAA so insistent during the negotiations on a broad technological definition? Why not just write a bill that narrowly targets P2P companies by name and be done with it? (For example, one could simply make it illegal to write a software program that utilizes the GiFT, FastTrack, Gnutella, Bittorrent, or OpenFt protocols and that would effectively ban most current P2P apps).
The reason, of course, is that INDUCE is not really just about P2P apps. It's about the future of all distribution technologies and in particular, about what I like to call "Me2Me" apps. As network and distribution technologies evolve, they offer consumers and computer users more and more control over their own media. P2P technology broke into the mainstream as a mechanism for distributing files amongst different people, but the same architecture is becoming popular among technologies designed to distribute one person's content amongst his or her various platforms.
For example, consider iTunes and the iPod. iTunes allows one to stream music to any computer on your local area network. It also allows you to transfer files to any number of iPods. It also allows you to rip, mix, and burn CDs. In essence, it allows massive distribution of content, albeit primarily to one's self, family, and friends. ...
The next generation will go even further. Imagine a wireless iPod that can synch with any iTunes application within 75 feet. Or a MP3 player for your car that automatically syncs with your home computer when you pull into the driveway. Or a media player on your laptop that automatically syncs with your TiVo to download the latest episode of your favorite Prime Time addiction.
This is, of course, the RIAA and MPAA's worst nightmare. Both industries have based their business models on controlling each and every permutation of playback for their content. The RIAA wants to make you pay when you buy the CD, when you download the iTune, when you listen to an Internet webcast, etc. The MPAA wants to charge you at the theater, for every copy of a DVD you buy, and (via advertising) for every show you watch on TV. Yet the more and more we as users and consumers are allowed to control and choose our own form of playback, the less Hollywood can justify charging us for each one. The more utility we get out of Me2Me apps, the less we're willing to pay someone for an extra copy or delivery mechanism. In the end, Me2Me technology may pose a larger threat to Big Cotent's bottom line than P2P ever did.
I have to say that this is a variant on the process that I hadn't considered as of yet, but it does make sense I'm a huge fan of TiVo, and if I could link it in with my PC (in a no-hassle, supported way), I might never leave my house.
Well worth the read.
The hopes of media companies were dashed today when the Supreme Court declined to hear a case in which the privacy of ISP records is partially at stake.
All in all, this is a good thing.
The latest example of grasping claws comes from Florida, where Erika Emanski's kids downloaded 634 rap songs - five hundred bucks worth on iTunes. The RIAA claims that it's due USD475,000. Seven hundred and fifty bucks per song. Of course, once again they're going after poor people who can ill-afford to stand up to them, and so will end up "settling" for a few thousand. We know the RIAA believes it has to make some sort of point, but is this the point it really wants to make? That the people who run the music industry are such greedy assholes they'll claim songs are worth nearly 1,000 times their actual value to shake some cash out of people already making ends meet?
Just a little extra helping of injustice from the RIAA in their latest suit straight from Simon.
Grouper is a new application allowing you to share files with a limited number of people (nominally, you and 30 or so of your friends). The more interesting part here is that the software may have the ability to circumvent copyright restrictions by streaming files back and forth (instead of copying them). Something to keep an eye on.
Thanks to Brad for the tip.
Karlheinz Brandenburg, the man who invented the mp3 format, offers some advice for the music industry:
The alphabet soup of technologies is meant to prevent fans from rampantly duplicating and transferring songs to others.
Brandenburg said he twice warned manufacturers and music labels that they risk alienating fans and driving them to unsanctioned file-sharing networks, where the songs are free and encoded in the unprotected MP3 format.
"They didn't listen. Maybe they thought it made commercial sense not to have a standard. It's very strange," he said.
Thanks to Jason for the tip.
A bill has passed the House (HR 4077) yesterday. This particular piece of legislation would
...send people to jail for sharing 1,000 songs, or just one unreleased album. That's right, up to 5 years in jail for sharing one album.
I'd be curious to know how they made the connection between one album (averaging ten to twelve tracks per) and one thousand individual songs. Did they just say "well, they both start with a one. Close enough."?
-- Update --
HR 4077 is also known as the Piracy Deterrence and Education Act.
Virgin with VirginDigital.
What's interesting is that Virgin is putting its biggest emphasis on its subscription service, rather than on selling songs one at time for 99 cents a track, as Apple and Microsoft do. It is betting that new customers will join its Virgin Music Club for a $7.99 monthly fee to listen to an unlimited amount of music from Virgin's one-million-track library on their computers.
A premium subscription service that will allow those tracks to be moved to a portable music player, for a slightly higher monthly fee, will be introduced soon.
It'll be interesting to see how Jobs reacts to Branson's foray; Branson clearly has the cash to make this race interesting.
Green Day is offering professionally printed CD-R labels for five of the albums. Only for legal downloads, naturally.
Thanks to Xeni for the tip.
David has some interesting observations from his experience with media mavens at the World Economic Forum.
...[T]he Entertainment and Media group met in downtown NY. Thirty-five us sat around tables formed into a large square. No PowerPoints, just discussion among senior people in the recording, movie and media industries.
The conversation doesn't lend itself to detailed retelling. But it sure was fascinating for me. I came away with four overall impressions:
First, these people are thrashing. They're floundering. They're desperate to find a way in which their organizations still add value. ...
Second, they don't understand what the hell we're talking about. I can't say that I made any inroads. To them, the Internet is a transport for distributing bits they own. Its lack of DRM is a hole that they will plug. They have no doubt that strong DRM is on its way and that it's a good thing. ...
Third, they believe they're responding to the market. They do not recognize that their market has abandoned them. They think that file-sharing is an aberration. ...
Fourth, they're going to win. They own Congress and neither Congress nor the entertainment cartel sees any reason to compromise. Their Lakoffian frame tells them that they're stopping theft, end of story. So they are going to kill the Internet and they don't even know it.
Yahoo may be paving the way for this to be a reality.
Yahoo's plans are still sketchy, but sources close to the company say instant messaging will play a key role. While the popular IM software already lets people listen to online radio, new versions will let people share and interact with one another's digital playlists.
Given the high consumer penetration of IM and the immediate user friendliness of the application, this could be a very big trend.
Thanks to Brad for the tip.
Not that this is a huge surprise, but the mp3 format beat out Sony's proprietary format.
Sony confirmed on Wednesday that it is working to add native MP3 support to its portable music players--a major strategy reversal that could help it compete more effectively with rivals such as Apple Computer.
The shift from reliance on its proprietary format will begin with flash memory-based players, the electronics giant said...
Fred at the EFF examines how Microsoft's new online music service.
Tech support for Microsoft's new MSN Music service is responding to the incompatibility between its downloads and the iPod by advising its customers to burn the downloads to CD, then rip the CD to a compatible format:
Although Apple computers and Apple iPods do not support the PC standard WindowsMedia format for music, it is still possible to transfer MSN Music downloads to an iPod, but it will require some extra effort. To transfer MSN-downloaded music to an iPod, you need to first create a CD with the music, and then you need to import that CD into iTunes. This process will convert the music into a format that can play on the iPod. We're sorry that this isn't easier - unfortunately Apple refuses to allow other companies to integrate with the iPod's proprietary music format. If you are an iPod owner already and unhappy about this policy, you are welcome to send feedback to Apple requesting that they change their interoperability policy.Now that's what I call freedom of music choice, in contrast to Real Network's misleading campaign of the same name.
Thanks to Donna for the tip.
Microsoft's online music store went beta today. I poked around a bit. Just like Sony Connect, the selection in jazz is rather lacking, but I suppose thats probably to be expected.
Songs run $.99 per, right in line with Apple, and full albums are $9.99. Files are WMA, all nice and spiffy with their DRM built right in. The only nod to useability/freedom is
MSN Music allows you to play your music on up to five Windows PCs, burn playlists to CD up to seven times, and transfer to an unlimited number of portable audio devices.
I'd tell you more, but that would mean I'd have to use MS Passport/Hotmail, and I'd rather peel off my toenails than voluntarily join the spam/virus sewer known as Hotmail.
Just like Amazon, Apple now allows people to resale iTunes. The commission is 5%, but you have to have at least one thousand visitors per month to be eligible. That, and your users have to have iTunes installed on their local machines.
Thanks to Brad for the tip.
If you're not reading Ernest Miller, you have been missing out -- he's absolutely turning into the go-to guy when it comes to the legalities of online music. Head and shoulders, he has the best roundup of opinion on the latest court case over the DMCA (Chamberlain v. Skylink). This particular case dealt with whether or not a 3rd party (Skyline) could produce additional garage door openers made by the manufacturer (Chamberlain). The ruling itself is not an out-and-out win for anyone, but it's a good start.
More and more artists are welcoming P2P with open arms.
Most recently Sananda Maitreya, the artist formerly known as Terence Trent D'Arby, has made three songs from his "Angels and Vampires" project available via P2P. The soulful singer's career never again reached the 1987 heights of "Wishing Well" or "Sign Your Name," but he still has hard-core fans who are avidly following his artistic evolution.
Maitreya chose Weed technology to distribute his project.
With that distribution choice, Maitreya joins rock veterans Heart.
Some other artists using Weed include Sir Mix-A-Lot and DJ Drunken Master, along with a massive list of lesser knowns.
The US government moves against file sharers, raiding several computers in three states. The feds targeted the hubs of a P2P network.
The same articles goes on to mention that the RIAA filed suit against another 744 people for uploading files (grand total: 4,891). The difference here is that the US Government is acting in accordance to the law -- indeed, they are enforcing the written law. The RIAA, on the other hand, seems to be more focused on tryng to scare people into submitting to their agenda.
Which one do you think is more legitimate?
Madonna leads the way, allowing her music to be downloaded to cell phones without needing a credit card. As the commentary from Pho says
...[This approach pretty much has] all the right elements for a successful formula:
- Easy-to-use interface for the customer (just dial 1-900-blah).
- Direct billing interface (cell phone bill line item).
- 'Closed' content playback architecture: cell phone.
The RIAA is all pleased with themselves on their plan to combat piracy. So, the small detail that the lawsuits from the RIAA are not supported by the public (57% against) indicates what...?
Coolfer Glenn once again proves why he's indispensible to music on the web. His tips for using P2P and staying legal:
- Educate yourself on the matter and know what constitues legal and illegal behavior.
- The RIAA, to my knowledge, has not yet sued a person for downloading songs. Uploading is the issue here.
- Don't make public songs by RIAA artists.
Microsoft will be starting up their own version of iTunes. Lucky us.
I'm late to the party -- day gig work and all, so there's not much I can add to this rather momentous case that other people haven't already said time and time again. So, instead, I think I'll just do a link farm on what some other people have said.
The EFF
Cory @ Boing Boing
Rebecca @ Conspiracy of Sound
Katie Dean @ Wired
Jason Schultz @ Copyfight
Donna Wentworth @ Copyfight
Brad Hill @ Digital Music
P2P United @ Digital Music
Ed Felten @ Freedom To Tinker
Actually, I started to do this, but I realized pretty quickly that Ernest Miller is all over this. Go there for all the links you could ever want.
Now, having said that I wasn't going to add anything to this, I'm not going to add something to this. Basically, this is a huge win for file trading. The impact to the music industry will probably be positive, but it can't be seen for now.
The best possible analogy I can draw is the Betamax case back in the 80s. The technology was ruled legal, and a thousand flowers bloomed as both new inventions expanded the horizons (and markets) of the film industry, created whole new industries (video rental is the obvious one; the less obvious ones are the entire Direct-To-Video industry, the ancillary spill over into data storage once the DVD proved popular with consumers, etc.) and basically grew the pie for everyone involved.
I rather suspect that will be the end result of this decision here. Well, it will after it goes through the Supremes. We don't know how it will affect the music industry, but I think that it will cause the pie to grow, and give out more opportunities.
John Gruber has a somewhat contrarian point of view as to why Apple is not making the same mistake with RealNetwork's Harmony that they did with Microsoft's DOS.
I’m here to tell you this is utter bunk. Apple’s position with the iPod is significantly different — and much stronger — than their position with Macintosh 20 years ago. There are admittedly a few similarities, first and foremost of which is that both products are much better designed than any competing product. Second, uh, they both use 12-point Chicago as the system font. (Except for the Mini, which uses Espy Sans, the Newton’s system font.)
The gist of my parlay argument is that the biggest difference between Apple and Microsoft — and the biggest reason for Microsoft’s lucrative monopolies in operating systems and office software — is that Microsoft built upon their previous successes, and Apple did not. Windows parlayed off MS-DOS, and Office parlayed off Windows. The Macintosh didn’t parlay off anything.
I think their goal is to try and collect a million legal mp3 online.
Brad Hill's onsite at the Jupiter Research Plug.In conference. Good reading, giving overviews of the panel discussions on digital music. And thanks to Brad for sharing the knowledge...
Well worth your time to read it.
Electronic termites are chomping out the support beams of our music culture, whether we're prepared or not.
The termite is the MP3 player, led by the iPod -- Apple's handheld jukebox capable of storing the equivalent of 1,000 CDs, or 10,000 or more songs -- that's stashed in your front pocket.
That's right. Those hundreds of CDs you've been hoarding since the '80s, for which you've spent huge sums for stereos, entertainment centers and decorative CD racks, are going the way of reel-to-reel, 78s and eight-tracks.
Eight-what? Exactly. The CD, as a mass-produced physical entity, is dying.
Thanks to the Pho mailing list for the tip.
There's been a raft of stuff written on this topic, most of which I've covered before. Here's another bit o' evidence; in this case, the 9/11 report is selling quite briskly at Amazon, even though it's available for free.
Even if you play along, you might not escape the wrath of the studios.
Hollywood studios and the National Football League are seeking to block the maker of the popular TiVo television recorder from expanding its service so that users could watch copies of shows and movies on devices outside their homes.
In filings with the Federal Communications Commission, the organizations say the new technology could compromise the copyrights of shows that broadcasters send over the airwaves in digital form, which offers much higher sound and video quality than what viewers typically get today.
Sometimes you can't win for trying.
Thanks to Donna for the tip.
A MIT professor takes a look at the two cultures and how they each approach the issue of online music piracy.
...[W]hile the American industry has responded by seeking legal actions against its own consumers, no such law suits have been filed in Japan, where industry leaders are seeking to understand why music fans think it is ok to share music. CD rental stores are so common in Japan that the industry has no hope of shutting down this alternative distribution outlet. Industry leaders have suggested that the aggressive commodification of music had led a generation to ignore its status as someone’s expressive output. They are seeking ways to rebuild consumer loyalty rather than demand customer obedience.
What a concept -- instead of treating all prospective customers as criminals and suing grandmothers, find out why people do something and then scratch their itch for them. That's just crazy enough to work.
Thanks to Donna for the tip.
George Washington University (in Washington DC) will be offering Napster to students living in the dormitories, free of charge.
If you want a one stop shop to really insightful writing on the INDUCE act, check this out. Earnest Miller's work is top notch and completely leading the way.
Remember that horrible piece of legislation that Orin Hatch introduced? Well, the RIAA has (surprise, surprise) come out in support of it.
First off the bat, Earnest Miller goes through the RIAA's letter to Congress, fisking as he goes. Then Brad Hill restates the letter in a short but sweet, straight-to-the-point version. Either (or better yet, both) are worth your time to read.
The new Velvet Revolver album released without DRM protection in Japan. Yet more brilliance from the labels.
Will Smith comes out (sorta) in support for music downloads.
...[T]he actor and singer says he doesn't see why so many other musicians are furious about illegal downloading.
[Smith] said: "My take is, 'OK, there were pirates 1,000 years ago - there is no reason for us to think that we'll live without them in the year 2004.'
I use Gracenote rather regularly; it's the database in the backend of most CD ripping software. Wired has a nice review on the service and it's origins.
Thanks to Brad for the tip.
When you buy a tune from iTunes, you should probably be aware that you're not getting quite what you think you are:
Customers are led to believe that they are getting a CD in all respects except the trouble of going to the mall. The iTunes store does not warn about the permanence of its method of compression; once freeze-dried, there is no way to reconstitute the music into CD quality for playing through a good stereo.
Ah, for simpler times, when we never had reason to look up the bit rate at which music is digitally sampled for CD's: 1,378 kilobits per second. The bit rate for iTunes, 128, is so low that when played side by side against the original, the difference is audible not only to audio enthusiasts, but also to mortals with ordinary hearing. Wes Phillips, contributing editor at Stereophile, says "128 is like an eight-track," and he describes the combination of iPod and iTunes as "buying a 21st-century device to live in the 1970's."
More details on the process can be found here.
Or is this just part of the strategy of the RIAA? We'll let you buy "music" online, but we'll give it to you at less quality (over ten times less, to be accurate), so that you'll probably go out and buy the album anyway. The industry gets to sell the same song twice, the consumer ends up not being all that happy with the online experience (which also fits with the RIAA model) and, well, at least the label walks away happy.
A good word (or two) of caution about those seemingly legal mp3 services.
What these sites sell is something you can get for free from any number of Web sites: client software for accessing P2P networks such as Kazaa, WinMX, and Gnutella, along with some simple instructions on how to use them. As for the $25 charge to your credit card? None of that goes to the record labels, as some users might assume. That money generally goes to Internet entrepreneurs (actually, they're closer to parasites) who developed none of the software or the networks their so-called products use. As for you? The fact that you paid $25 to some guy in Romania changes nothing except your bank account balance. Your potential legal risk of being sued by the RIAA for making music available for sharing is unchanged.
Hopefully, the day will come when record labels start licensing their music to P2P networks so that those services can sell legal access to them. But for now, sites such as My-Free-Music.com are 100 percent bogus.
A little slideshow for your edu-fi-cation.
Thanks to Gerd for the tip.
ARIA (Austrailia's version of the RIAA) has started to step back from the hard line on digital music.
Australian Record Industry Association chief executive officer, Stephen Peach, told ZDNet UK sister site ZDNet Australia: "We certainly don't agree consumers should have the statutory right to simply make copies, we think that right should rest in the copyright owner. However, the industry is exploring a variety of means where controlled copying by consumers can be implemented".
They're not quite there yet, but it's positive motion, and that's a good thing, right? And do you think I could get a few more commas into these sentences?
Today, I finally got around to trying out Sony's online music service Connect. A few days ago, I was in a McDonald's, eating a Big Mac, and they are giving out free songs from Connect as a promotion.
First off, the installation went fairly well, a pretty clean install process (and I've been through many software installs that were not). The software seems to bind itself to a specific machine through some mechanism (I'm not immediately sure as to how -- perhaps to the Intel processor identification code?). Accordingly, I don't think that anything I would download using Connect would work on another Connect-enabled machine I would also happen to own.
Opening an account (which seems to be required if you were to want to actually download any music) asks for credit card information. This wasn't required, but it bothered me that they were even asking. I would think you might ask for a credit card if a customer actually tried to buy something -- I know I don't hand my Visa to a cashier as soon as I set foot in my local record shop.
I entered the free coupons I had from McDonald's (I had been back once or twice since that initial outing), only to discover that you could only redeem two coupons per day. I didn't know that there needed to be a waiting period for music downloads; the guy from Super Size Me must be furious.
With my coupons in hand (2x$.99!!), I started to hunt for some music to download. Not a lot of luck, though. No Victor Wooten at all; some Flecktones, but nothing that I didn't already have; Norm Stockton is not represented, nor was David Dyson or Oteil Burbridge. Connect doesn't seem to be all that bass player friendly.
I decided to check out how Connect would do with some more standards. There were some tunes from the Beatles, but not the one for which I was looking. I did grab a song from Mike Stern which I hadn't heard before (Play, although once I did hear it, I realized that Stern had played the piece at one of the shows I have attended) and a different version of the Sting song I'm So Happy I Can't Stop Cryin'.
Once the two songs were downloaded, I found out that I can only play it within the Connect software -- I can't use my usual player. The player built into Connect is good enough and all, but Conn