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JWZ On Music Over The Internet
kchayer writes "JWZ [?] 's current obsession includes an audio webcast. Recently he added to the site a description of what it takes to broadcast music over the Internet. Makes for an interesting read, and a good summary of the DPRA, DMCA, their relationship with the RIAA, and other issues involving music copyright and the recording industry in general. His summary at the end says it best: "What's going on here is that the music industry establishment are absolutely terrified of the internet...and are trying to [?] force things to continue to be done as if turn-of-the-century technology was all we had to work with.""
The problem is that it isn't common sense knowledge. Especially not on /., which is infested with more than a fair share or ESR acolytes who believe property is an absolute right.
As for what to do; well, the FSF have one route, to pervert the intent of copyright schemes against themselves, which is pretty effective. The problem is that large companies are bribing governments (sorry, providing candidate donations) and using NGOs (like WIPO) to tighten things up again.
At the end of the day, the only way to solve the problem is to take political action. Much as there are plenty of political actions for land reform to elimate de facto and de jure fuedalism when land was the prize commodity, people who are being disenfrachised by the formation of multimational IP cartels need to start agitating for reform. That means letters to politicians, PACS, whatever works in your locale.
Of course, it requires a bit of effort, so don't count on most people here to join in until you've nearly succeeded, and there's credit to go around.
Completely eliminate the income for the 'media' that is now equal to the cost of flipping a bunch of bits from 1 to 0, and the current music industry has _no_ model for income, yet a market remains for some kind of product, and that's not going to change- people treat music like it was a _staple_, I've seen people rating it right up there with food and water as necessities for their existence.
That said- as a previous resident of mp3.com's indie artist community I can tell you that ubitiquous music does NOT equal the current industry. It's not that places like mp3.com only have poor music- there's a mix, from the awful to the phenomenal. A lot of the stuff there is quirky but appealing- sort of unprofessional but honest. Some of it is fully 'label quality' in every sense, particularly for genres with poor record label support in the first place.
The problem is sorting through all that, and it's a problem few music listeners want to deal with. As technology advances it'll become easier to do this- but we're still talking about traditional music business models, in a way.
The thing is, musicians are not wholly reliant on IP. The biz is, but for all that IP, typically several to a lot of musicians, engineers, techs got together and produced the music that you listen to. The work they put in, to do that, is what can be charged for- and if the major label biz goes down the tubes and the world is rendered 'musicless', there will be immediate demand for something new. People won't sit around copying old music back and forth on Napster forever- they'll inevitably start to wonder what else is out there. That's the point where a performer- or studio player, or engineer- can start to earn possibly a quite respectable wage for practicing their specialised craft. If you need a guitar solo on a song you can't just hire a guy off the street- you seek out someone with that skill, and it makes a difference who you pick. You'll want someone who's got time to do the work, who you can afford, who can do just the right solo, who can work with your requirements.
It's really not that different from, say, hiring a web design professional. You could fake doing that in Frontpage or Word but it would be _awful_. How many people really need to produce- not read, _produce_- a really professional webpage? And yet the skills are in demand and it's commonly accepted that the most skilled performers get paid handsomely.
Get rid of the existing music industry and you'll see similar conditions in music. Currently things are so distorted by weird expectations and ruthless control of the means of distribution and publicity that there's little correlation between skilled music performers and wealth, but in the computer industry (particularly Web stuff- much of which is effectively public domain and a matter of taste), there is that correlation. Kill the existing industry and leave nothing but rampant 'piracy' in its place and it will quickly become more feasible for skilled musicians to practice their trade and earn money, just like web designers, on the basis of their skill.
That condition is for a web broadcast license, not a radio broadcast license. ASCAP, etc. are worried about the ability to make high-quality copies. To their mind, the loss in quality that happens because of the conversion to radio frequencies makes the copies you get non high quality.
...phil
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
Hey, does anyone know how similar those rules on Eligible Non-subscription Transmissions are to what "real" (ie, non-internet) radio stations have to abide by?
I'm talking about the "In a three hour period, you can't play more than three tracks from a given album, and no more than two consecutively" and "In a three hour period, you can't play more than four tracks by a given artist, and no more than three consecutively" restrictions.
Because, on Australian radio I've heard some great specials on particular artists, where many many more than 4 tracks get played in 3 hours. I've heard new albums played in full. So obviously APRA (the Australian version of ASCAP) doesn't enforce such conditions. I'd hate to think that radio stations in the USA missed out on the chance of such quality programming because of these rules..
Obviously, that depends on which century you're talking about :-)
The century from 1891 to 1990 turned a decade or
so ago. But yes, by the conventional usage of the word, it'll turn at
the end of next month (even if common usage implies it turned 11 months ago).
Tet (currently tearning his hair out trying to kick dg_xtrace(2) into giving an accurate return value for a traced process' system calls -- anyone with DG/UX knowledge, please help!).
"The invisible and the non-existent look very much alike." -- Delos B. McKown
Thanks - My mix is now number 1 again!
Justin Frankel was impressed enough to copy the idea and create shoutcast ;-)
Hmmm lets see - isn't is possible to post uuencoded mp3 data in DNS records???
You could stream audio using a shitload of Digs...
They let you 'legally' share music across accounts by making 'DJ Mixes' - Virtual compilation tapes of you favourite stuff which anyone can listen to. (One of the reasons why myplay.com was always better than my.mp3.com ;-)
s p?plid=312651&start=1)
The thing is they've clearly gone for the basic compulsory license because they have a rules checker which enforce DMCA compliance and tell you when your sequencing is illegal, it'll even fix it for you.
People should try it out because it's a nice working example of the DMCA sequencing rules in action.
(and you can also go listen to my latest 'mix' at
http://www.myplay.com/mp/playlist/now_playing.j
Streaming over the internet is even easier...
- my first server went something like this...
soundcard -> mp3encoder -> file.mp3
then in my cgi-bin directory I had
#!/bin/sh
echo "Content-Type: audio/mpeg"
echo
tail -f file.mp3
Standard libertarian property theory, derived from John Locke, primarily, though it has earlier antecedents. Its a deontological ethics in which humans have certain "natural" rights (its not clear where these come from: God and human nature are the usual options), one of which is the right not to be coerced into labouring for others benefit. From this you can derive in order that:
1. Taking something after someone has laboured to create it is essentially the same as coercing them into labouring for you.
2. Persons can claim unclaimed natural resources by "mixing their labour with them", providing "as much and as good" is left for others.
3. People are entitled to give away or exchange their property.
4. Taking another person's property, thus defined, is never justified.
Of course, there are other ways to justify property, and this one has 2 major flaws. Firstly, its based on a unscientific claim about human nature, and subtly reasons from is to ought in the process. Secondly, no existing property was acquired purely by the mixing of labour and fair exchange. It was all stolen from someone at some point in time.
You go into a diner, put a nickle in the nickleodion - how's that paid for? Certainly the diner owner doesn't have to negotiate a licence for each and every recording in there.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
and you'll see how natural property rights are. Pre-industrial people definitely had hunting/grazing/farming territorial disputes. The idea is to settle it in a somewhat civilized manner where nobody gets hurt. If that fails you have war. Just watch robins in the spring guarding their worm territory. If you want to imagine a world with no possessions join a friggin monestary.
:))
My information wants to be expensive
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
the old folks home on 75mtrs :))
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
There are a lot of ways to promote your band without a record company, Even if you are a world-scale artist, it might be better to hire a PR-firm
That's a really curious idea... I know a lot of indie artists who promote themselves... but this distinction is interesting. You can get help -- not just agents (who apparently actually work FOR them... some say Flemming and Tamulevich are good) -- but PR firms.
Anyone know how much a good PR firm charges?
And the interesting issue is: do you work for someone else and build THEIR assetts, or do you work for yourself and hire other people to build yours? With something as important as your own music, the former seems much better.
Tweet, tweet.
>>And the interesting issue is: do you work for
>>someone else and build THEIR assetts, or do you
>>work for yourself and hire other people to build
>>yours? With something as important as your own
>>music, the former seems much better.
>You do mean the other way around, right?
Oh. Yep. I do.
That should have read the LATER seems better.
Sorry.
Tweet, tweet.
I'm more interested in the new floorplan for the club.. I especially like the "leveling of the bottom floor", something I think is due from my visit there before JWZ owned it. I like some of the ideas, like piping beer upstairs instead of lugging kegs, and a dj/band stage on a half-storey to accomodate trainspotting. If the opening night featured Carlos spinning, I'd make a special junket out there for just that..
Lowmag.net
Is it really property if you can't sell/trade it? Don't confuse territory with property.
;-)
But aside from that, this doesn't really refute the original poster's assertion, that property is a social construct.
Anyone who claims "natural rights" or "rights by God" is grasping at straws. When it comes down to bare essentials, you own whatever you can keep your hands on, just like in the natural world. The only difference is we humans are capable of organizing rules to determine who controls scarce resources, rather than fighting each other like animals. Society believes in property rights because the average individual believes he has more to gain by them, even if others stand to gain more. If someday this is no longer true, then the system better change, or violence will eventually make it change.
Ever heard of the feudal system?
Exactly.
--
Bush's assertion: there ought to be limits to freedom
Bandwith may be infinite, but creativity and time are still finite. Finite resources must be valued.
Even with this argument it is only the time of musicians that has value, not what they produce. The multiplying nature of digital media makes the effort of one artist supplying an amount of creativity to one person the same as supplying it to all people. Any value that becomes inherent to digital media will be directly proportional to the amount spent protecting it. Only by enforcing an unnatural scarcity (outlined excellectly on one side by JWZ) can the "music industry" continue to gain profits and guide the musical culture of this country.
--
+&x
Albert Einstein once said: "Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the the universe." By your logic, then, we shouldn't value human stupidity, which is what capitalism essentially does.
From his leaving Netscape, and his neat little utilities he codes on the side, from a nightclub to this little tutorial about music law, JWZ is one keen cat.
It's nice, and refreshing to see people with high visibility in the computer sphere showing backbone, and talking HONESTLY about music law. Sure, there are plenty screaming "napster, napster", but few break it down this well.
What we really need to consider is just how fast technology is moving, and how easy it is becoming to circumvent laws, not on purpose, but on accident.
I look forward to the day when artists get paid fairly, and I can click a link for any song in the world.
GPL'd web-based tradewars themed space game
Wonder if they'll successfully go after telnet, ftp and then CGIs.. laugh.. KILL the enemy.. All of them!!! Even your little dog uucp too.
-Michael
Unfortunately, unless congress passes leglislation that prohibits the restrictions quickly being imposed on the internet by entertainment industries (limit( 1/x: x -> infinity)), our civil society will let the Music industry do whatever they want with their copyrights and licenses.
:) Key point, keep a low profile. I can't believe that slashdot hasn't been flagged yet (with varoius posters submitting 'illegal' links, or saying 'naughty' things).
The law is on their side. The record company's had all the artists first borns signed over, and the atrotious "what if's" can scare enough business people (across most industries) to support legislation that enhances copyright restriction in the new digital age.
On the one hand we have the Wild Wild Web, which is still lawless, and vandels can run around anonymously producing whatever mischivousness (or lawlessness) that they desire. For example: Kiddi pr0n, nuclear bomb blue prints, pirated software (including music), DOS attacks, generally accessible objectionable material by minors...
The average person, when faced with these might get a little scared and say, "oh yeah, we should try and stop those". In the next decade or two, we're going to see the Internet infultrate our lives, which will require it's regulation. Sadly, we, the techni's, will be a minority influence on what we will and will not be allowed to do on the global network. Most likely, there will be licenses, jailable laws, monitors at every node, etc.
The regulations involving copyrighted music distribution on the net are really too soon to see the outcome. On the one hand, hands off government (aside from contractual enforcement), will allow the music industry to keep their cash cow. I don't think the general public is all too concerned if one industry looses revenue, but as with the above, I think the general public is concerned with autonomy and security on the internet - They'll vote on what-ever they have to.. Or whatever they're made to believe that they have to.
History would suggest that the net is going to become beurocratic to the point of unproductivity. The "Free lunch" we've been given will be abused and spoiled for the whole lot of us. Industry will win, resistance will be futile, you know, the whole bit. Might as well enjoy it while it lasts.
Can we form an anti-corporate party yet? Or is it too soon?
-Michael
-Michael
For example, most tribal societies didn't believe in the idea of owning land. Before the Industrial Revolution, the idea of somebody else owning the tools that they didn't use personally was also a bit counterintuitive. Eventually, people in society decided it might be beneficial to let those property rights exist, and they put them into place.
What does that have to do with copyright? Simple: Copyright is a system that we as a society set up to balance conflicting interests -- for the good of society as a whole. And if the circumstances change, we can change them, too. We should: I'm a firm believer that art, like software engineering, is extremely hard work, and that people should be compensated for it. (I studied both in college, and thought art was ten times asdifficult.) But I also believe that hamstringing new technologies just for the sake of preserving an outmoded system of compensation would only serve the best interests of corporate attorneys.
Do domain names matter?
What's going on here is that the music industry establishment are absolutely terrified of the internet...and are trying to[?] force things to continue to be done as if turn-of-the-century technology was all we had to work with
That's unusual. All five of the major record companies have started aggressive ramps of online distribution, most particularly, BMG, who has allied with Napster. Do you think Napster is 19th century technology, or have you just been completely oblivious to all news in the past 18 months?
You do mean the other way around, right?
A good PR firm is really expensive, of course, but if you are, like Madonna (or metallica) it's not much compared to the income from music sales.
The Britney-wannabes needs an old style starmaker record company of course, but that's just because they are the ones who gets screwed in the end anyway.
All opinions are my own - until criticized
Stopping artists from webcasting their own work might be beyond the powers of even the RIAA
All opinions are my own - until criticized
The real threat to the record megacorps lies not in users downloading songs instead of buying CD's.
It lies in artists bypassing the record companies.
A studio can be rented for a resonable amount of money, distribution can be done over the net.
The only remaining service that the record companies provide is promotion.
There are a lot of ways to promote your band without a record company, Even if you are a world-scale artist, it might be better to hire a PR-firm rather than a record company.
All opinions are my own - until criticized
The Australian alternative radio station Triple J does a netcast 24/7, but IIRC they killed that for the two weeks the olympics were on, because people in other countries would have heard news on the Sydney Olympics before their local IOC licensee got to it, and that would have raised hell.
but, turn of the century technology is all we have to work with!
Well duh, obviously these organisations are afraid of the internet, they are totally reliant upon traditional distribution and marketing channels to enforce their control over their market. It's hardly a suprise that given the means to implement totally different models they're not going to embrace them with the same fervour we see here.
The way I see it is that there are two issues here which contribute to the RIAA's crusade against online and digital music in all of its many forms. The first, and most obvious, is that they're not geared to operate in this way, and that it would take a lot of the profit out of their hands if they did. These organisations have built up multi-billion dollar business structures, and they've set them up to profit at every step. But online, many of these steps are irrelevent, and indeed all of the steps for which they are currently required (marketing and distribution being the main ones at the moment) may not be required. They're terrified that artists and customers may directly hook up.
Secondly, there's the fact that current efforts to implement online music have been headed by such blatent thievery such as Napster and Gnutella, systems in which the only winners would have been Shawn Fanning and co. Rather than allowing the RIAA to adopt online music gracefully, Napster has forced it to act before it loses all control over everything it has ever produced. At the moment, very few people in the music business seem to want this.
Unfortunately, between the ossification of the RIAA and the damage to online music that is Napster, it's likely that the advancement of digital music will slow to a crawl, and that only independent artists, with little to lose, will take full advantage of the internet.
Jon Erikson, IT guru
It seems that from a legal standpoint, we are *perpetually* behind the times. The law slowly drags its feet, and more often than not, it seems that big business takes advatage of this fact to maintain current holdings. For the moment it seems best to go do what you want! However, it's best to do this without getting to popular. If this plot fails due to legal reasons in the near future, the real future will be in independant bands who aren't seeking pay-to-play royalties.
You can only be young once, but you can be immature forever.
Consider for a moment the record companies' dilemma.
On the one hand, they have their existing business model which, though not merely morally questionable but actually despicable, they are in full control of it, and they are using it to make money hand over fist.
On the other hand, there is the Internet. They don't have control of it. They don't know how to make money off of it. They certainly don't know how to make the kind of money off the Internet that they're making now.
And if they see what we see in the business dailies, I can't blame them. Companies putting off IPOs. Venture capital drying up. Replacing hundreds of dedicated technicians and staff with two web designers and a rhesus monkey. These are documented and documented in a variety of sources.
These days, people reread business models containing the word 'internet' twice, because there is not yet a set formula for success online.
This is why they're not switching; they'd have to be fools to switch away from the model they have now, which is extremely profitable. Even if it is despicable.
The only way they'll even consider changing given the above is to untrench them -- use legal means to make their current way of doing business so unprofitable that they'll grab for another way. The first (and least practical) way that comes to mind is rehabilitating a nation of music junkies. That, or popularize a new form of music that the Old Guard doesn't have any control of. (I hear there aren't many commercial techno mixes. Perhaps something could be done there?)
---
You cannot truly appreciate Dilbert until you read it in the original Klingon.
The idea that..."...what's going on here is that the music industry establishment are absolutely terrified of the internet...and are trying to force things to continue to be done as if turn-of-the-century technology was all we had to work with...." is absolute garbage. Any business enjoys when their task of promotion, distribution and production is simplified. The music industry is licking their lips when it comes to the "new" technologies; it is the ignorant or egotistical audience member that believes their dinky mynameiswhatever.com streaming audio has a chance to foil Universal or Sony.
If you look at the breakdown of how a record company makes it's living, singles do not even make the radar. Napster is the greatest promotional tool and the labels are starting to realize it. Trouble is, they can't say they realize or else it opens the floodgates for everyone to accept pirated, viral transmissions of their audio content as the norm, even though it is not and will not make a dent in their own sales. Even the thought of encryption hackers making the world's produced music free for all of us no matter what legislation comes down...well since when is the music industry the one we all want to injure? It certainly isn't a great one, it's full of horrible top-heavy leadership and tons of manipulated, exploited, abused artists but at least it's people pushing art, expressing themselves and so on. I personally know the CEO of one of the largest hip-hop labels (Priority) that was bought by EMI, and he is not a cool guy. I don't really like knowing him in fact. But even in his arrogance, he still finds some time to enjoy the music, and I'm not sure he's the first crooked CEO I feel like attacking. What about guns? Where are all the discussions of new "smart-gun" technologies that are actually more dangerous? What about the real crippling topics other than our snide, sarcastic feel that WE Slasdotters and techies and filesharers (oh my!) are toppling the hated industry? I'd rather topple Brown & Williamson before BMG any day.
O P E N___S O U R C E___H U M O R
great comedy company.
Or take mp3's. It is much easier to download them than perhaps travel a long distance to the record store (although I prefer CD's for the quality) and we already have a huge number of people who are accustomed to getting their music that way. Of course, I realize, the artists need compensation or soon we will not have any new music. Some people, like I, would certainly use a system like www.fairtunes.com it it was well established and usable worldwide. However, not everyone is as honest. (I even suppose that non-mainstream artists would get proportionally better compensated that way than mainstream). One solution, which would eliminate Giant Evil Record Companies(tm) is a government art/immaterial work fund (and people would pay by taxes). But it has problems, like whom to support and by how much.
Price is, after all, an artificial concept. For material, some kind of "price" is however necessary, because there are limits on how much can be produced (natural resources, manufacturing process) and if there wasn't price, we'd soon be fighting over the last item of Product X or Food Y. For immaterial, however, such constrains do not exist, except in the form of media on which it is stored. (Don't take this like I wouldn't appraciate immaterial works. On the contrary, infact.) In the past, one had to buy the media with the immaterial work, so it was practical to pay for the work with the media. With stuff moving to networks and all, such is not the case anymore.
The system must change, and a new system devised for compensation for authors of immaterial work, but big corporations are holding on to the past.