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Facinating, I read your links and CDBaby does seem to be a great way for musicians to make the transistion from being a Pub band to semi pro or pro status.
Your Site and Concept sell themselves well.

If I wanted to get listed on Itunes purely to get listed provided I didnt use samples and was completely original didn't do a cover of an existing song I could be there for pretty much the cost of my time producing 2 cd's and 55 dollars (pretty much vanity publishing but for music).
might never get downloaded but hey I am published ...

For those musicians that want to get further then there is still a lot of work to be done. unlikely that someone will download your song by chance. I guess a musician could try p2p and give away some songs.

legally covers you can't give them away since you have to pay the publishers for a licience although it does seem that if i covered "what becomes of the broken hearted" and only ever got 10 downloads on Itunes then I would owe the publishers 90 cents.

I wonder what my liability would be if a few 1000 copys of my performance of this song got downloaded free on p2p. If it was deliberate on my part or just released by my "Fan".

Samples/mixes seem to be another huge minefield that will incur an overhead.
mixes might never be legal and samples seem to have a dollar value that assumes a minimum quantity of 500 to 2500 copys.

if your making sales it also seems likely that tax will be paid somewhere and it also means making accounts your friendly song publisher will want to ensure you really only did get 10 downloads.

however given all that I don't think CDBaby can be held accountable for the taxman the publishers or that fox fella for taking a slice from your sales.

The only negative I could see was a comment about cdbaby taking a fixed price from a Cd Sale

http://www.gnutellanews.com/article/6830

" Author: gdZiemann
Posted: June 6, 2003 at 7:46 PM EDT
Well, I've been writing to Apple for months before they started iMusic.

MacWarehouse has called me three times in the 2-3 weeks to update their records. They keep talking about their Apple "champs."

You know, I really have nothing against CD Baby. I think they're a great deal for a lot of artists still basically going the traditional route.

But if I use them, it will double my $5 retail price, because they charge $4 per unit. I'm not doubling my price to get in the club, so I can cut the price back to $5 on iMusic.

It might be the yellow brick road, but that damn witch is still hanging around.
"

Derek can you explain what this guy is talking about?

do you take submissions by people other than musicians
say i heard a good local band or a bad one for that matter and organised getting thier unpublished recordings to you. would you deal with me as thier representative or
would they have to come direct to you?

sorry if this takes away some of the wow factor from cdbaby but i would be interested to see your reply.
please correct any inaccuracys in my understanding of what cdbaby is about and the reality of publishing via cdbaby to itunes ect.

However, whenever anybody is asked to site a case in which some poor schmuck actually got shafted by these laws, they suddenly fall silent.

Rather than them being silent, maybe you're just not listening.

Here's a repost of some relevant comments I made on this subject several months ago:

Here's a basic list of just a handful of abuses I came up:

• The PATRIOT act is being used in regular non-terrorism criminal cases . Anything beyond simple misdemenors is being passed off as terrorism , now.
• A webmaster was jailed under PATRIOT because someone had posted bomb making info on his server . Keep in mind that he didn't put the info there, he was basically a web host, and one of his clients was using his account this way. This is a particularly damning case of abuse where "Innocuous objects such as iced tea bottles and a toy car were described as terrorist devices by the FBI and a joint task force of police officers."
• A disturbing article about using the PATRIOT act to obtain warrants against doctors and scientists . Not because they've done anything wrong, but because they happen to do research with hazardous materials. Guilty before proven innocent.
• Story about someone killed by the PATRIOT act
• Several artists were charged with bioterrorism under PATRIOT for creating artwork meant to educate viewers in the dangers of the biotech industry.
• Story about a veteran being arrested for complaining too much due to the heightened terror alert.
• Shining a pocket laser into an airplane is terrorism falling under the PATRIOT act
• Article republished fromt the Washington post about American citizens held without trial
• A man being harrassed by a "joint terrorism task force" (the kind that has authority under the PATRIOT act) because of investigating Area 51
• Another "joint terrorism task force" investigating a 12 year old for doing a school paper on the Cesapeake Bay Bridge
• A photographer arrested and threatened with being charged under the PATRIOT act for taking pictures of Dick Cheney

And finally, maybe there haven't been as many abuses as there will be once all 2nd legal track the preparations are in place .

Please note that the identical AC post in this story was me, but I accidentally posted it as AC the first time.

Here's a basic list of just a handful of abuses I came up:

• The PATRIOT act is being used in regular non-terrorism criminal cases. Anything beyond simple misdemenors is being passed off as terrorism, now.
• A webmaster was jailed under PATRIOT because someone had posted bomb making info on his server. Keep in mind that he didn't put the info there, he was basically a web host, and one of his clients was using his account this way. This is a particularly damning case of abuse where "Innocuous objects such as iced tea bottles and a toy car were described as terrorist devices by the FBI and a joint task force of police officers."
• A disturbing article about using the PATRIOT act to obtain warrants against doctors and scientists. Not because they've done anything wrong, but because they happen to do research with hazardous materials. Guilty before proven innocent.
• Story about someone killed by the PATRIOT act
• Several artists were charged with bioterrorism under PATRIOT for creating artwork meant to educate viewers in the dangers of the biotech industry.
• Story about a veteran being arrested for complaining too much due to the heightened terror alert.
• Shining a pocket laser into an airplane is terrorism falling under the PATRIOT act
• Article republished fromt the Washington post about American citizens held without trial
• A man being harrassed by a "joint terrorism task force" (the kind that has authority under the PATRIOT act) because of investigating Area 51
• Another "joint terrorism task force" investigating a 12 year old for doing a school paper on the Cesapeake Bay Bridge
• A photographer arrested and threatened with being charged under the PATRIOT act for taking pictures of Dick Cheney

And finally, maybe there haven't been as many abuses as there will be once all 2nd legal track the preparations are in place.

Here's a basic list of just a handful of abuses I came up:

• The PATRIOT act is being used in regular non-terrorism criminal cases. Anything beyond simple misdemenors is being passed off as terrorism, now.
• A webmaster was jailed under PATRIOT because someone had posted bomb making info on his server. Keep in mind that he didn't put the info there, he was basically a web host, and one of his clients was using his account this way. This is a particularly damning case of abuse where "Innocuous objects such as iced tea bottles and a toy car were described as terrorist devices by the FBI and a joint task force of police officers."
• A disturbing article about using the PATRIOT act to obtain warrants against doctors and scientists. Not because they've done anything wrong, but because they happen to do research with hazardous materials. Guilty before proven innocent.
• Story about someone killed by the PATRIOT act
• Several artists were charged with bioterrorism under PATRIOT for creating artwork meant to educate viewers in the dangers of the biotech industry.
• Story about a veteran being arrested for complaining too much due to the heightened terror alert.
• Shining a pocket laser into an airplane is terrorism falling under the PATRIOT act
• Article republished fromt the Washington post about American citizens held without trial
• A man being harrassed by a "joint terrorism task force" (the kind that has authority under the PATRIOT act) because of investigating Area 51
• Another "joint terrorism task force" investigating a 12 year old for doing a school paper on the Cesapeake Bay Bridge
• A photographer arrested and threatened with being charged under the PATRIOT act for taking pictures of Dick Cheney

And finally, maybe there haven't been as many abuses as there will be once all 2nd legal track the preparations are in place.

I truly doubt that Apple would just raise prices to $1.25 without a fight...

From that, it seems unlikely that the labels could raise the prices beyond $0.99/song or force "bundling" of songs without some extensive renegotiations. Apple only recommends that whole albums be $9.99 or less, so this is where labels can (and apparently have) raise prices if they desire.

Jack Valenti, head of the Motion Picture Association of America, has suggested that consumers have no legitimate need for such software, telling The Associated Press in November, "If you buy a DVD you have a copy. If you want a backup copy you buy another one."

Going digital to analog and back might not give you the quality you expect. This, of course, is what the makers of DRM want to force on you. Distribute in crummy and lossy formats that don't copy perfectly. It's a perversion of available technology.

You mean going from digital to digital and back.

It's enough to appease the record industy because they can tighten the screws later. They first have to move people to crappy formats and make them think they are gaining something before they take it all away.

And if they tighten the screws later you can stop buying the label's music and start buying independent music with the same old non-DRM that you're used to.

Nonsense. People are already providing music that's more reasonable. DRM is unreasonable because no one asked for it and it breaks. The artists themselves are rebelling.

Really? So I guess the 150 people from the indy record labels were just there for punch and pie.

Would you please provide me one good reason not to use free software? All of the above is circular - use it because you must. I've yet to see any advantages of DRM and encumbering new technology with 100 year old limits and more.

Let's see. It appeases the gate keepers while everyone figures out a better way of doing things? I know everyone loves to plug the caring and sharing underdog but the fact is the major labels hold the people and the expertise that makes music sell and they also have the huge back catalogues that the people want to buy.

Much as I think Apple have created an amazing proof of concept in the Apple Music Store I am not convinced it qualifies as an invention.. Downloading music off the internet is not new and paying for it is not new either...

It's not that they did it. It's that they did it RIGHT. It's an elegant solution which people actually enjoy throwing money at.

Now if they radically opened up the distribution to bypass the majors... now that would be rather revolutionary... but we'll have to see how far they take it..

Hello, we're Apple and we want to sell your music

Or maybe they're counting lines mulitple times in FOR loops, a la the RIAA overestimation

Maybe they're using RIAA-math? They might mean that one file is typically 50 lines, so any file with say 2000 lines counts as "the equivalent of 40 files"

(for those who don't get it, see here)

Apple iTunes is paying the label 65 cents per download, (as reported many places). Of that we can pass almost all of it to the artist, since we're not a record label, and have no up-front expenses.

You can see my notes on Apple's meeting with independent record labels here (pt 1) and here (pt 2).

Price of music on iTunes

• Songs must be 99 cents each.
• Full albums are recommended to be $9.99 or lower.
• Album price must be less than or equal to the sum of their tracks. So if you have a 5-song album, it can't be more than $4.95 to buy the full-length album.
• Apple strongly recommends going even lower than $9.99. They'd like to see that price drop to make the full-album purchase even more desirable.

Interesting that they pulled the "details" because they seem to have been reminded that they were confidential (see note at bottom of page). Do we see the shadow of the Long Arm of Apple or a case of sudden recall?

It doesn't look that way. It looks like the author misunderstood the purpose of the meeting according to this.

I also believe a mirror of the original text on CD baby lives here.

As always, good old MacSurfer toi the rescue with a link to the Gnutella News story.

Lots of interesting details; it looks like Apple is being fair and genuinely trying to help out independent artists as much as possible.

Here

Try the Gnutella network. You can find a list of clients at Gnutella News. Also, try KaZaA. Don't use the official client; it has spyware and adware. Use KaZaA Lite instead.

One way to solve this problem is to archive all information in the data storage pool created by networked computers. With current peer-to-peer file sharing systems (e.g. freenet, gnutella) we have an ever growing pool of information, which is distributed and continually transferred to newer media (e.g. users upgrading their hard disks). As this concept grows in the coming years, and data storage gets cheaper, it may become common to have shared data automatically replicate between nodes in a peer-to-peer network. The result would be an information pool that never becomes obsolete, because the data exists on many nodes in the system, preserving it as each node is replaced with newer hardware and storage mechanisms.

• censorship-resistant publishing systems, why they are important
• Freenet, vs. Publius
• Gnutella, vs. Publius
• HTTP, Publius implemented over protocol
• Publius, documents, deleting/updating
• Publius, implemented over HTTP
• Publius, vs. Freenet
• Publius, vs. Gnutella
• Publius, why it is important
• Publius URL, tamper-check mechanism
• tamper-check mechanism (Publius URL)

There has been some recent public criticism of Gnutella because it might give child pornography a place to thrive. I am happy to report, however, that those who traffic in child porn will be no safer using Gnutella than they are anywhere else. That's because the users are not anonymous.

Gnutella requires IP addresses in order to make a connection between a site with a file and a site that wants a file. The host IP address is shown as part of the search results in Gnubile, and probably in other clones as well. Ergo, anyone offering files with names that identify the files as child porn is bound to attract the attention of the authorities

I don't know that it's legal to share files only with your buddies, per se, but it's certainly harder for the RIAA to track, for the reasons you cite. That's becoming increasingly important, too. Evidently, the MPAA has already started hiring companies to track individual Gnutella users' downloads and proceeded to "re-educate" them, even at places like Harvard, see here.

The RIAA can't be far behind. Bring on Aimster & Freenet!

GnutellaNews, Gnotella, Gnutella(.wego.com), Gnutmeg, AudioGnome, MyNapster, FreeNet, Jungle Monkey, Scour Exchange, Spin Frenzy Exchange, ChartBox 0.91, Gnutella MP3 Search, Gnute, Metallicster, CuteMX, IMesh, Hotline, FileSwap, OpenNap