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CDDB No Longer Allows Grip Users to Connect UPDATED
ezln23 writes: "I have been a regular user of Grip for CD Ripping and MP3 encoding for quite a few months now. Today when I attempted to rip a new CD I bought, I received this message. "Your CD player application is either not licensed to use the Gracenote(tm) CDDB(tm) service or its license has expired. If you are unsure what this means, please see our web site at http://www.cddb.com/lic/Grip. If you are a developer and feel you have received this message in error or wish to get your application licensed, please contact support for assistance." I guess the predictions in
this article were correct." We've also received submissions about kscd and other applications that query CDDB, so it looks like CDDB has cut off everyone who didn't pay up.Update: 03/10 02:28 PM by H : It looks like it was a short-lived thing - I can connect fine to it this morning - and I can assure you, I haven't paid.
From reading the notes, I doubt this will affect many people. I just ripped a few CDs tonight from SoundJam and it worked fine.
However there is an irony regarding the Napster/RIAA lawsuits if this was extrapolated out and the CDDB started restricting access to their database. In very measurable ways, the CDDB is helping the RIAA to filter Napster. Of course there is still the FreeDB (thankfully), but play along for fun.
The RIAA's injunction against Napster works by filtering file names, most of which come from the CDDB. Consistant file names make the injunction workable. Removing the CDDB would cause a large number of people to input their own names with all the associated inconsistancies, making filtering all the more difficult. I find this quite funny. It's only too bad the RIAA didn't target the CDDB and only later realize how much it was helping their jihad against their customers and themselves.
joe maller
However, the free (beer) license is still nasty, as it requires you to use cddb exclusively. So if you let you users have a choice between freedb and cddb, you can't be licensed. Also, you have to put their logo on your program.
As a side note, I wonder what this does to people with firewalls that strip/mangle/replace the User-Agent HTTP header? or is the filtering only on their cddb protocol, not http?
There's a lot of non-trivial work involved with running a database like this, and it seems like it might not scale well. If FreeDB ever gets extremely wide adoption, won't the costs of running it become nearly insurmountable? CDDB can finance this because it charges fees. IMDB is (I believe) owned by Amazon, and because its data is mostly dispensed via a web site and it can slap ad banners on the top. None of these options would appear to be available for FreeDB.
I am not posting as a nay-sayer: I'm quite ignorant about a lot of the logistics & financial considerations. I'd appreciate it if somebody more intimately familiar with the workings of FreeDB -- or any similarly large, free online DB -- would comment on this.
Do domain names matter?
CDDB has a service that it provides - a database of CDs, songs, and artists (btw- a database that they built of the labor of volunteers). Connecting to their servers to get the information is at their discretion. Grip doesn't have that discretion. Grip tries to establish a connection to CDDB servers that CDDB doesn't want. The information is available elsewhere, namely FreeDB. This isn't a result of a bad law, it's a result of CDDB being an ass and changing the rules of how an application can connect to it.
While I dislike CDDB and their restrictive agreements for developers and end-users alike, and while I think this action is kinda low, they are within their rights as a service provider. Would an ISP be justified to cut off a deadbeat account? This is a similar situation.
-sk
As of yesterday, Gracenote has posted a *free* (FREE, NO COST) license to freeware developers. As long as your application makes you no money directly or indirectly, then you won't have to pay anything to use the CDDB service.
I believe even Grip would be eligible for this, assuming it really is revenue-free.
FYI, the CDDB blockage is not targeted at Grip, but rather only allows licensed applications.
You sir, have no clue what you are talking about! This companies' database was built on the backs of people like myself who freely contributed to it, WITHOUT compensation. You are critical of us for wanting something for nothing, but turn a blind eye to the fact that the CDDB owners did get something for nothing! They didn't have to pay a soul to compile all the CD information, it was given to them, and now they expect us to pay them to get back the very same data that we contributed for free! I say screw them the same way they have screwed us! It's only fair.
Shop Smart, Shop S-mart!
We're using Gracenote's CDDB2 service in one of our commercial applications and we don't pay Gracenote a dime. You only have to pay Gracenote if you charge for your software and have a very large number of users (more than 250,000 or something like that). There is a "free" license that states that if you don't make money off your product in any way (including but not limited to banner advertising), you don't have to pay, no matter how many users you have.
I suppose that the software the story mentions makes use of the original CDDB1 service; Gracenote has said that they will someday terminate this service and move all of its users to CDDB2. I'm not sure that this is what happened, though.
Also, I'm not certain that Gracenote has released the CDDB2 UNIX SDK yet. The Win32 SDK has been available for quite some time now and consists of a well-defined set of COM interfaces. The Win32 SDK is well-documented and supported by Gracenote. We've been very happy with the level of support we've received (again, for free).
Provided that the UNIX/Linux SDK has been released and there are no license issues, any free software (as in beer at least) could make use of CDDB2 and Gracenote's servers free of charge.
Note that I don't touch on whether it was right of them to use the community-entered data in the first place; most discussions on Slashdot seem to center on this issue.
-- David Polberger Computer Science major, University of Lund, Sweden
Considering Grip uses FreeDB by default, it shouldn't affect too many people.
But I guess that's why we have free alternatives like freeCDDB.
and the problem is?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
You idiots! All you /. people ever scream is FREE FREE FREE. You want the world and you don't want to pay for it. I want a free OS - I want free music - I want a free database. Well, FU all - someone has to write the OS - someone has to write and perform the music - someone has to setup and maintain the databases (as well as machines, Internet connectivity, etc.)
/. think that all services related to computers should be free? You don't expect to get a haircut for free do you? (Maybe you do...but then what kind of quality do you expect?)
All of these things take resources - time, and money particularly. If there are people out there willing to do these things out of the goodness of their heart - so be it. But you should be GRATEFUL that you can run an OS (Linux) that is free. You should *not* however EXPECT it. If you want it free - then YOU setup a DB - YOU write an OS - and YOU start writing and performing songs for free.
If people (corporations) have the resources and they feel they can break even, or even make money by charging people, they would. These are called *services*. They are a primary part of our society and our economy. There are goods and services. Why does everyone on
The notion seems to be that software and data, in any form, should be free. In reality, software and data crosses that fine line between goods and services. You are really paying for the service of someone to write the software / create the data (songs, etc). But since it only has to be written once, the cost is spread over all the people who buy it. Either way, in the days before computers, neither goods nor services were free. So why should the gray area in between all of a sudden be FREE?
Bottom line: CDDB runs a service. It is not a free service. Deal with it. Companies who create commercial ripping software are willing to pay for the license, so they don't have to rely on a free service such as FreeDB. If they pay for a service, they can expect a certain level of reliability (uptime, and accuracy should be expected). This is worth something to them - and they pay for it. They, in turn, pass the cost down to you when you buy their software. If DB reliability and accuracy aren't a concern to you, use FreeDB. Communities are great, but they can't rule like good old fashion supply and demand can. Russia proved that very well.
Buy a license or don't. I don't care. But don't bitch about companies that are just following simple supply and demand.
Werd to free music. Werd to free information. Werd to the people.
Werd to the fact that running an internet resource costs money.
"And like that
You gotta read the fucking licenses. The license is everything, that's how you know what you're donating your effort to. You think just because they give you shit without paying for it it's a "free effort"? I think you know that's not what "free" is all about...
Go read at http://www.gracenote.com/terms.html:
"Proprietary Rights Information
"The contents of this Site are protected by the copyright laws of the United States and around the world, including international treaties. No use of the CDDB Content, database or other content on this Site is allowed except as expressly stated herein. All rights not expressly granted are reserved. Copyright © 1996-1999 CDDB Inc"
That's not exactly the goddamn GPL.
I'm looking around for a place on their site where they tell me what rights I have to the information that I donated to them. I don't find anything. I find obscure licensing terms which they force their applications to adhere to, like (just one example):
"End users must register with CDDB2 the first time they access the service with your application."
Here's a rule of thumb: if something is free like in speech, you will learn this within 60 seconds of visiting their website for the first time. Free projects are proud of being free. If you find yourself clicking around page after page, hoping to find some magic words about distribution rights and can't find any, that's how you know it's proprietary.
Jamie McCarthy
Jamie McCarthy
jamie.mccarthy.vg
just a thought. is cddb still allowing users to submit data? if so wouldnt it be nice if everyone submitted false data. a database full of bad data doesnt really sell that well.
use LaTeX? want an online reference manager that
-- john
The real value to CDDB in particular is that they have accumulated a watershed of TOC's to CD's in the world.
When you insert that disc, it's not just dumb luck that CDDB knows it's one disc from another. As you all probably know the same "release title" can have different TOC's due to the disc mastering and pressing process.
The quaility of the CDDB service is that you all have helped make it a deep watershed of TOC inventory for every title.
In the game of matching a CD to it's meta data it's important to realize that the signature of the track offsets (it's Table Of Contents) varies from pressing to pressing. If CDDB is able to aquire the unique TOC's of the same CD release then they are better in position to give accurate data once the next query comes for it.
And so on.. so pretty soon for any given CD title, like Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon (which has over 100 different TOC's from all the pressings that it has had over the years) you're bound to be farily high on rate of successful query..
Which is what the QOS issue is about too.
CDDB has this watershed of data, and they are going to leverage it to it's maximum, which means makign deals with software/service vendors to get revenue for every player/service deal is available.
In the mean time it would be really great to just re-aim your player/system to freedb and use them.
Let freedb accumulate their database to actually be competitive with CDDB in the spirit of collecting the most CD meta data that is out there. The end result should hopefully be a viable alternative to CDDB which is free, open and really out of reach of any MPAA or similar forces.
The information is free, and needs to remain free.
This is possible and quite easy to do. Why more Napster users aren't installing a freedb plugin that will automatically "snarf" up the cd meta data from their own disc and send it to freedb is interesting.. Why people using Napster aren't already on the bandwagon is interestin. Millions of Napster users all with a plugin to feed the freedb database? Nice.
do they still allow additions and fixes to the DB? start fixin' it wrong... Enough mad people get even and no one will use such an ureliable service anymore.
Set your CDDB apps to access www.freedb.org instead. No licensing or patenting nazis there.
In kscd (my CD player of choice) simply click on the preferences button, set your CDDB server to "www.freedb.org http 80 /~cddb/cddb.cgi". Other CD players should have similar configuration procedures.
Problem solved.
Meldroc, Waster of Electrons
I know that there was a bill in congress to change the law on this a couple of years back, but at least as of a few years ago, it was completely legal to copy a database wholesale, as it did not constitute a creative work. CDDB is clearly not a creative work, so perhaps someone can just setup a sneaky bot to download their entire database and move it to FreeDB.
Grip has been using freecddb for as long as I've been using it, and that's where I've been sending all my CD info when I run across the rare one that they don't already have in the database.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
If we keep mirroring the database, then we'll never be fully under their thumb. Download a copy from one of the existing mirrors, and keep the movement alive.
As of yesterday, Gracenote has posted a *free* (FREE, NO COST) license to freeware developers.
There's a difference between freeware and free software. The terms of the non-commercial license conflict with those of a certain popular free software license.
Check this out:
Note that this definition excludes computers with common peripherals such as (/me scans the back of my computer) trackballs, touchpads, drawing tablets, joysticks, floppy disk drives, Zip drives, tape drives, network cards, modems, video capture hardware, etc. (This license is useless, as floppy drives are included with most PCs, and use of a network card or modem is required to access the Gracenote CDDB® database.)The real GPL compatibility killer: "You agree not to modify or disable any Gracenote CDDB Client functions or to otherwise interfere with the operation of the Gracenote CDDB Client." Also, "The Client ID must be embedded in binary form in your Licensed Application, and must not be easily extractable by End-Users or other developers."
Or this:
Translation: "You will not modify, or allow to be modified, the hostname or IP number accessed by the software." Not compatible.Of course, there are a couple patents on using a TOC hash as a database key that keep you from just using FreeDB instead.
All your hallucinogen are belong to us.
Will I retire or break 10K?