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Burnt Coffee and Burnt CDs
senzafine writes "Cnet reports that HP and Starbucks are jointly working on Storefront Coffeeshops which will allow people to browse and listen to music from a digital library...and have selected songs burned to cd. Sounds really cool...wonder how long before Starbucks and HP get John Doe lawsuits in the mail. --- But does this seem like an idea that would work?"
Will the computers run on linux?
Get paid to read spam
Yes. Would the prices be reasonable? Doubtful.
I'd like to calm the rhetoric. Sure, common sense would indicate the RIAA's copyrights have been violated. But copyright has been heavily legislated over the past century to the point that common sense or common law is nearly absent. It has such things as compulsory licences and device royalties. Morality should be confined to governing personal actions and advocating revisions to intellectual property law. It is disingenuous for the RIAA to invoke morality when if anything they have had excessive influence in crafting legislation.
IANAL but lets look at the law. Once you know the tokens, legalese is not usually harder to parse than APL :) Apologies for a
US-centric viewpoint but I believe a statutory situation exists in
all other common-law countries with different details. There's an
excellent copy of the United States Code, Title 17 - Copyrights at Cornell.
Chapter 10 covers DIGITAL AUDIO RECORDING DEVICES AND MEDIA .
Particularly interesting is:
Sec. 1008. - Prohibition on certain infringement actions... No action may be brought under this title alleging infringement of copyright based on the manufacture, importation, or distribution of a digital audio recording device, a digital audio recording medium, an analog recording device, or an analog recording medium, or based on the noncommercial use by a consumer of such a device or medium for making digital musical recordings or analog musical recordings
Simply breathtaking! The words "this title" mean Title 17, which contains all of US copyright law. The first "based on" means these things are not actionable as contributory negligence ("burglars tools"). The second "based on" means non-commercial use of these things does not violate copyright. Wow!
The definitions in Sec.1001 would seem to include computers. They sure are designed, advertised and used that way amongst others. But all is not [Guns'N'] roses. The manufacturers of these recording devices would seem to owe a device tax that gets paid through the Librarian-of-Congress (of all people!) to the RIAA as specified. There are also requirements related to the Serial Copy Management System. I trust that RIAA have settled this with their long-standing antagonists, appliance manufacturers, now including Dell, HP, et al. But even if not, how does it affect me?
The term "noncommercial use" would almost certainly cover receiving music files to make recordings on a hard-disk. Offering to transmit music files might not be covered and fall under the exceptionally byzantine Sec.114 as an "interactive service". But a lawyer specialising in Copyright law should be able to give a better interpretation including case precedents. The Diamond Rio MP3 player case is probably relevant. Is there a lawyer in the house?
Given HP's recent relationship with Apple on a rebranded iPod, does that mean that 1) the tunes sold in starbucks will be AAC and/or 2) that iTunes will be involved?
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The price? For anyone that hasn't been to Starbucks recently the prices of RIDICULOUS, although it is a very relaxed environment, nice chairs and very good coffee.
I have over 70 freaks, do you?
sounds like a neat thing to try.. not really sure if it's incredibly practical.. or if anyone would care after the initial 'wow' and 'hey thats kinda cool; thing wears off
...as saying "All your coffee are belong to us." during a raid of a local Starbucks while seizing 20 computers, 400lbs of coffee beans, and a 12 year old Indian girl with one leg.
Coffee - and coasters to put the mugs on, too! It just doesn't get better than that... :)
will they also label the CD-R as hot as they do with coffe cups in America?
This distribution method seems ideal for Linux also. Perhaps if HP weren't afraid of MS, we could also get nice bootable Linux distro while waiting for a venti mocha.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
I don't know, this sounds like a dumb idea to me. I mean, I just don't see the synnergy between the two brands. If I want to go out for coffee, I go out for coffee. If I want to listen to music, I either go to a club or (back before I decided to boycott music) check out a music store. I guess some people go to coffee places to pick up girls and flirt, and amongst the young musical tastes can be a critical selection trait, and the young are an attractive demographic to target, but even so I don't see this catching on, really.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
Why must everyone be involved with music these days? Pepsi, Coke, Starbucks....
What's next? I'm going to get a free song with a Happy Meal? I guess there are a lot of execs out there that think if you don't offer music in one way or another, then you must be doomed. I esitmate that in a few years, we will be back to several high quality music choices.
--
Real-time deal updates
This actually would work out quite nicely for Starbucks, because all music [i]currently[/i] in store is put out by their own label.
Kids these days. They don't know the difference between classic, and just plain old.
I'm curious as to what possible reasoning Starbucks used to enter this completely alien market. There's little money to be made from it and it seems impractical due to the time required to both burn the CD and create the playlist. Unless their goal is to keep the customer in their store for longer periods of time -- which I could see as a viable business model -- there really doesn't seem to be any strategy involved.
As an employee of a publically-traded rival corporation [Peet's Coffee & Tea] I'm not exactly unbiased here, but I'm wondering what others have to say about the strategy behind such a radical departure from the typical role of a coffee shop.
I'm not popular enough to be different.
Homer Simpson, The Simpsons
Seems a little techie for the cool, grungy Boehemians, reading their Kerouac. Where will they go?
If HP and StarBucks can get this going legally and without hassles from RIAA et al against them or customers, wouldn't the next logical step be offering downloads directly to your iPAQ?
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
Who loses in the end? The music stores, anyway.
It sounds like a pretty good idea to me, but there seems to be one mistake in the post, I am pretty sure that they would go ahead and clear the music to be downloaded legally via iTunes or something like that, rather than illegally via P2P, and thus avoid any "John Doe" lawsuits.
Post apocalyptic gaming goodness
Maybe I'll low-ball them on the price for a music CD.
At long last the secret of Starbucks' "very good coffee" is revealed: burn the holy living shit out of your beans!
Now you, too, can have that wonderful taste of charred coffee in your very own home!
...overburned? - the CDs or the coffee?
Sure, they'll make big bucks with just Britney, Justin and Limp Bizkit available. Cause everyone knows people who drink coffee at Starbucks don't have taste.
The article states that Starbucks is working in conjunction with Hear Music. I know that in Chicago, there is (or was, havent been there in awhile) a Starbucks that had a Hear Music CD store next door. The two stores were connected, and you could bring your coffee in with you while you browsed for CDs and listened to music at the listening stations. Sounds like this is just a natural extension of that. And I think its a great idea. I'm not too optomistic about getting one in Pittsburgh, however, where the only common record store chain (NRM) is long since gone and bankrupt and a Virgin Megastore or even a Tower Records has never touched the shores of the Mon River. But I digress.
And you want to know why? Because you have no clue as to how to read the law.
Sec. 1002. - Incorporation of copying controls
No person shall import, manufacture, or distribute any digital audio recording device or digital audio interface device that does not conform to -
(1)
the Serial Copy Management System;
Computers do not conform to SCMS. So either computers are illegal or computers cannot be considered a digital audio recording device. It's your choice. I'd rather pick choice #2.
I think the reason for the music tie-in is that there's more and more competition for the coffee-drinker's dollar and they need to come up with new ways to stand out. Within two blocks of my apartment, there's a Starbucks, a Seattle's best, and two local coffee houses. 10 minute's walk up the street, there a cluster of about 6 more coffee places, including 2 Starbucks at the same intersection.
But between the insane cost and the burnt flavour of their coffee, I never go to Starbucks and the ability to put together a CD isn't going to entice me.
i think they do quite a bit in the hope of luring customers and getting them to linger to maybe buy a second round or other stuff. they play music, provide tables outside, sell newspapers, easy bwireless access.... i'm not that wild about their coffee buy will pay extra not to be told to leave right away. :)
also i suspect starbucks feels pressure to continually reinvent itself rather be perceived as yesterday's coffee news. notice how mcdonalds introduces new items of dubious value to get some buzz and quietly drops them later. (or such is my impression, i don't eat there anymore.)
now if only starbucks could make coffee that didn't taste burnt. i like underdogs, good luck peet's. we have an indy coffee place nearby that has *couches* and wireless..... i doubt the chains will go this far, that's just a bit too inviting.
Coffee makes me go poo and burning CDs at Starbucks sounds like a crappy idea.
HP can pay back the Canadian DND in songs and coffee. $160 million...now that is a lot of beans.
Either that or the military will fly a Sea King helicopter over their headquarters (Canadians will find that last bit funny).
Here's the issue: music used to be expensive (full albums $18, singles $6). Now, music is getting cheap, or at least affordable (albums $10, singles $1). That makes it a perfect thing for companies to give away. People are still used to thinking of music as expensive, but in actual fact, that is an incorrect assesment. So a music giveaway seems like a better deal than it really is, so everyone's rushing to offer free music before perceived value falls to current market levels.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
Have they even been into one of their shops recently? On any given morning the place is packed beyond all reason. Adding a laptop listening station and headphones will only add to that problem.
There are three types of people in starbucks: Those freaky, overhyped, quad-shot espresso people, who are terminally late to work and just forgot to pick up their kids from soccer practice; the blue collar men in dirty clothes who are so relaxed you would think someone slipped prozac into their spam; and the college kids / young pros with their laptops who come to get some work done in the peace and quiet of a store full of caffeine withdrawal victims screaming for soy milk in their peppermint no-whip half-caf grande white mochas. None of the above seem like the type who would hang out to pay for music... too busy, occupied, or just poor. Admittedly, this might fly in the retail store locations (the Starbucks in Barnes and Noble, for example), as they draw a more relaxed, less goal-oriented crowd, but I can hardly see their host stores being happy about the competition.
Starbucks does this every now and then. They had that crazy arrangement with Kozmo before they went Kaput, whereby drop-off stations were strategically placed in every Starbucks in exchange for some significant quantity of realbucks. Kozmo might actually have made it if it wasn't for that tremendous monetary commitment.
Personally, I don't see this arrangement being significantly more successful than that one.
Oh well. They've got the money to try, I guess. Someday they'll find another use for their successful cafe chain. Besides, of course, being the seat of power for Mister Evil. Sorry, Doctor Evil.
*full disclosure- used to be a Barrista. I was young, I needed the money.
The ______ Agenda
to charge my lowfat half-caf triple venti latte and a settecento CD (pronounced "chi dee") for $30.
It's a grande scheme to make CD pricing look reasonable.
Though Linux is very flexible, without all those licensing issues (go ahead and troll, SCO trolls) like Windows, it is highly unlikely that SBUX and HP are going to use it on this system for two reasons that I know of: 1. They are going to use TabletPC's for this, something Linux has somewhat limited support for, particularly in the handwriting recognition aspect. 2. HP's provider of digital music is most likely going to be Apple, and this means a modified version of iTunes. Apple has not included Linux support for anything.
This has been brought up a couple times before and the answer is always the same.
Essentially, you can make a copy of a song from deck to deck and hand it off to anyone. It's a perfectly legal copy.
That is why you pay your tax on cd's and other audio recording medium.
I don't know the particulars on the limits and whats classified as a recording device. Certainly, distributing mp3's via your favorite network transmission does not fall under this act.
"You should always go to other people's funerals; otherwise, they won't come to yours." -- Yogi Berra
.02
cLive;-)
-- Trinity in high heels carrying a whip: The donimatrix - there is no spoonerism
loose
lose
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
Moreover, 12" Vinyl has made a huge comeback over the past few years because its "mixable" and "scratchable," on turntables, great for live performance purposes.
I think he means you'd get a custom bootable linux CD that would work in the kiosks at the coffee shop. This would be a great idea if the distro was tuned to be as simple as user-friendly as possible. They could also give you a CD-RW on which you could store email, settings, cookies, music, etc.
On top of that, HP could offer an extremely cheap and low maintenence (read: Windows-less) internet appliance on which the CD's could be used when you are at home.
Mix in some built-in branding and (unobtrusive, I hope) advertising in the custom distro, and you'd have a pretty profitable racket goin on.
pi = 3.141592653589793helpimtrappedinauniversefactory7
Linux is something that maybe one in ten thousand people has heard of,
What? have you seen a newspaper, cnn, whatever in the last year and a half? now granted, most people probably aren't actually interested in it, why should they be when their unpatched winME is working just fine? of course, if you could get them to try linux and see what it's like not to blue screen every 3 hours, and have bandwith not being sucked up by the spam/viruses you're sending out unknowingly, they might become interested. No, I don't think this is the "ideal" solution, but a little AOLesque display of bootible knoppixes would be a nice start.
I'm not sure where you went to law-school (probably not Cornell) but section 1008 mentions nothing of the importation or distrobution of the actual copyrighted material. Section 1008 simply protects CDRs Inc. from being brought to court because their customers were selling copyrighted music on their CDs.
In short: It states that the manufactures are not responsible for what the customers choose to do with their products. I don't know where you drew from this that the customers therefore have the right to "the "sharing" of digital music files".
One thing that could be effective here is the following:
1. A song is playing in Starbucks.
2. You like what you hear.
3. You go to the "jukebox to go" (or whatever they will call it), click the "buy what's on now" button, and pay $1 for the song and $1 for the CD ($2.00 total).
I keep thinking about the scene in High Fidelity, where John Cusack says "I'm going to sell a copy of x album right now" and then puts on a record. Sure enough, someone comes up and asks what is playing and buys it. The impulse buy in an environment is powerful. I often hear things in record stores, etc. and would love to have an easy way to buy it.
Answer: Never.
Here's a clue about how to avoid lawsuits: don't break the law.
<bart
It says right on their site that they're using an HP branded version of iTunes. I'm not sure if this will extend to the Starbucks deal but it seems extremely likely. Why would they choose Apple, iTunes and the iPod and then offer a service that competes with that?
In short: It states that the manufactures are not responsible for what the customers choose to do with their products. I don't know where you drew from this that the customers therefore have the right to "the "sharing" of digital music files".
So your interpretation of the law differs from his..? Why is yours correct and his incorrect?
I could see this idea working in one of those indie coffee houses that play music that no one has heard of.
You can hear some interesting music at a shop and be kinda forced to go around asking the people what the name of the song is etc... If they're playing all of their music on a database that people can buy burned cds from, it would take a lot of the hassle of having to search for it. It would be even better if they could put the CD-TEXT, ID3, whatever...so you know exactly what the songs are...MY SECRET DIARIES
You, as a slashdot reader, are more likely to notice, pay attention to, and remember every Linux story on CNN or in the newspapers. If you were to ask the average joe on the street what Linux is, I highly doubt a significant percentage could tell you. Any non-technical person (read: most people) is totally clueless regarding Linux.
Most people can't tell you what version of Windows they're running.
--
the strongest word is still the word "free"
Because his seems to be based on the text, whereas, as was pointed out, the original author draws conclusions that cannot logically be drawn from the text by an rational person.
So your interpretation of the law differs from his..? Why is yours correct and his incorrect?
Because the original poster's is wrong, maybe?
Look at the piece that the original poster even pasted:
No action may be brought under this title alleging infringement of copyright based on the manufacture, importation, or distribution of a digital audio recording device, a digital audio recording medium...
It's clear as day that they are talking about manufacturing/importing/distribution devices or mediums... Ie, Computers/tape recorders/Ipods or CDRs...
This section says nothing whatsoever about the actual infringement of copyrighted materials.
This is maybe why people need to get the advice of lawyers. I have always felt that reading contracts/laws was relatively straightforward... But so did the original poster, and he is completely wrong.
LOOSER is what something is when it is made not quite so tight.
Your sentence doesn't make any sense jackass. I think you can do with a few less 'is's.
I know perfect people like you never do this, but sometimes on a rare occasion, my finger will slip or shake and I will type 'oo' instead of 'o'. It's called a typo dumbfuck.
I always thought they were selling milk, sugar and "lifestyle" with some kind of dark caffeinated substance occasionally thrown in.
Snippet from the article:
Those living near one of the closed Starbucks outlets have reported strange glowing mists, howling and/or cowering on the part of dogs that pass by, and electromagnetic effects that cause haunting, unearthly images to appear on TV and computer screens within a one-mile radius. Experts have few theories as to what may be causing the low-frequency rumblings, half-glimpsed flashes of light, and periodic electronic beeps emanating from the once-busy shops.
Starbuck's should go with something more tried and true: sell helium baloons or something.
Have you ever been in some sort of establishment and said to yourself. You know? This tune is quite catchy (pinky to mouth). It would be quite excellent if I could burn this piece of innovative harmony to CD. Wouldn't it Chompsky.. hUhUhU.
Certainly sir. Would you have me ask the young lady what specific tune?
Sure, be on with it.. CHOP CHOP Chompsky. Put them on my ipod.. (pinky to mouth).
When I first saw this, I thought of it as a natural outgrowth of a cyber cafe. They already have the basic computer equipment (for internet browsing, etc.). Why not leverage it more and pick up some extra cash?
Starbucks was already adding cyber cafe equipment, which is as close to the original purpose as leaving out newspapers (people read the newspaper and order an extra cup or two of coffee while they finish). This gives that equipment a use in the evenings when people aren't normally sitting in a cafe to read the news.
I wouldn't consider a buck a song unreasonable if I could pick the songs, as opposed to paying $15 for a CD with one or two good songs and filler.
And who would buy a CD with one song on it? That would waste storage space. Just buy lots of songs (assuming they have a decently-sized library). They're not filler because you pick them. They need a minimum price per CD to cover the overheads associated with each CD.
Somebody tried something like this around 1990, IIRC. You would pick songs from a catalog and order them from a store (Newbury Comics in Boston was one dealer), and the company would send an audio cassette to the store so you could pick it up in a few days. I browsed the catalog, but they never had songs I was interested in (stuff from 10 years before that I didn't already have on CD), and they died before they could expand the catalog. (Ironically, I ended up buying a few regular CDs after hearing some songs I recognized but hadn't known who played them.)
Businessweek ran an item on it in their latest issue. The also said that competitors of Starbucks are looking to implement similar technology.
Krispy Kreme and Outkast?
Yankees suck. yep you know it.
I admit I am a coffee addict; and although I like to frequent a variety of coffee shops, I frequrntly find myself in Starbucks. I don't know how many years they have been selling CD's at the register, but I do know that in the almost 10 years I've been going to Starbucks, I have only bought one CD. This is significant considering I am sure I'm in their target audience (I am 21 -- and yes, that means I started going to Starbucks when I was 11). I listen to a lot of music and have literally hundreds of CD's, but I do not associate Starbucks with music. I do not see this as getting Starbucks any more customers and if they charge even $10/CD it is beyond the price of an impulse buy (esp. for most college students). Another issue I have with it is that I don't know how they wiill store the music, but I personally wouldn't pay for CD burned with music once stored in a lossy format (like AC3 or MP3). I would hope (but highly doubt) that they keep the music in SHN format (lossless) and just unshorten and burn the files then reshorten them. I must admit, this probably won't keep the people who buy CD's off of iTunes from buying them, but it does eliminate some of their audience.
Sadly, PS/2 was yet another victim of USB, which doesn't care what you plug into it, the electrical slut.
All though this seems lke a good idea on paper, I know that starbucks uses wifi networks. I was wondering if anyone a lot smarter than me could comment on the security of this. A hacker could pay for a song, and sniff it being transmitted on the network simaltaneusly. He would then have a clear copy of the data when it was given to him, and an encrypted, letting him use some cryptoanalysis tools to figure out how the songs are encrypted. Any idea on the plausibility of this?
Now that might be amusing. I feel bad for the pilots, though.
..don't panic
No. The point is you can make a copy deck to deck for yourself and it's perfectly fine. Once you hand it out to others it's illigal. If I borrow a friends cd and burn a copy of it it's just as illigal as if I downloaded that same cd off the internet and burnt it.
The darkness... controls the music. The music... controls the soul.
All aboard the crazy train.
Now, if they had pay-per-hour porn centers, success could be a-brewing. Who wouldn't like to kick back with a cup of java and see burgeoning bosoms before they return to their hectic life in the business world or college?
Burn to cd ? Not so useful. But burn to your iPod there and then.. now *that* would be good.
Never, ever lose a file again. Ever.
Here's what I posted on Wi-Fi Networking News about why Starbucks efforts are misguided:
Starbucks reportedly to offer music burning service in up to 2,500 stores: The system will allow customers to have CDs burned while they wait; eventually, it will also allow downloads of music over Wi-Fi, the article in BusinessWeek says.
Starbucks demanded a T-1 (1.544 Mbps in each direction) digital service infrastructure from its first hotspot partner, MobileStar, as well as its second, T-Mobile. I've speculated for a while on how this high-speed network could be used to cache material in each Starbucks, like movie and music downloads.
This latest project sounds somewhat misguided for the reason cited by the Forrester analyst in the article: Your typical barista may be great at making espresso but is not in a position to fix the broken CD burner.
My cousin Steven was involved almost 20 years ago with a company called Personics. The company had worked out a catalog licensing deal with more than 70 labels from the largest down to some independents to allow them to offer custom mix tapes for about a buck a song. This was a reasonable price in those days. The system had a few thousand songs mastered onto CD-ROMs stored in a special employee-operated CD-ROM changer behind the counter. An employee would punch in your choices, and the system created a high-speed cassette tape dub.
The company failed for two primary reasons: the hardware was proprietary, meaning that engineers had to fly around the country to fix it when it inevitably had glitches; and the catalog they offered too small because labels balked at including their most popular stuff for fear of cannibalizing pre-recorded CD and tape sales. (Price, my cousin reports, was not a problem: many customers were willing to pay even more, he noted to me after this item was originally posted.)
If Starbucks creates the expectation of an easy process that's always available and then isn't available even part of the time at any given store, they lose their audience. Starbucks makes its money from processing a high volume of custom drinks--you don't want to distract from that. CD burners aren't that difficult to keep operating, but a failure rate that's a fraction of that experienced by typical home and business users could be a dramatic problem in a high-expectation retail environment.
The article says the price is comparable to Apple and other download services. Two problems with that comparison. First, it's not. It's $7 for five songs, or 40 percent, or $13 for an album, or 30 percent higher. That's a significantly different price when you're dealing with price sensitivity. It's comparable to a mass-produced discounted audio CD.
Second, you're receiving an audio CD, not digital music per se, which could be a turnoff for the audience that might be interested in a fast, in-store music service. (However, since HP is the partner, and is reselling their own version of the iPod, it's possible that the ultimate digital delivery system will be a version of the iTunes Music Store.)
This is the latest incarnation of Compaq-cum-Hewlett Packard's attempts to capitalize on their relationship as a supplier to Starbucks. In January 2001, when the MobileStar deal was announced for installing hotspots, Starbucks made a big deal about Microsoft and Compaq's participation. Compaq wasn't a partner, though; Starbucks had signed a $100 million, five-year deal to buy equipment and services. Microsoft was a partner, and it never seemed to amount to anything that saw the light of day.
In the years since this deal, Compaq and then HP have reaped advertising benefits, appearing in full-page newspaper advertisements as part of the Starbucks hotspot system, even though they had nothing to do with MobileStar and T-Mobile's deployment. At one point, Starbucks had Compaq iPaq's available for customers to play with, and those disappeared, too.
It's this fumbling that's I orig
Freelance tech journalist for the Economist, MIT Technology Review, Macworld, and others
I say its a fair bet that this service wont recover the money they need to put into it to start off, not to mention the training cost of training all those 18 year olds who barely know enough to do a decent cup of coffee.
What exactly are they selling?
- a Raw Audio track in all ways identical to what you get when you purchase a mass-market factory-pressed CD?
- the WAV file equivalent?
- the {insert preferred lossless encoded format here} equivalent?
- a 320Kbps encoded MP3? (ie plays everywhere and not-quite-but-nearly-as-good-as-lossless)
- a 16kbps encoded MP3? (ie totally-crap-but-still-plays-anywhere)
- the {insert hellspawn DRM managed format here} equivalent?
Methinks people need to wake up and smell the HYPE.(ie buy ~16 of these and you have "an audio CD")
If this was a shameless attempt to score off the recent Digital Music wave, it didn't work. Yahoo Finance shows SBUX Stock didn't do all that well Friday (Reuters had this news Thu March 11 ~8pm)
Visit CryptoGnome in his home.
That seemed like an odd comment, certainly they are doing this with permission from the record companies, much as iTunes did.
OK.. I like a coffee shop in Fort Collins CO that offers internet access.
This coffee shop has entered into no strategic alliances, nor has it spent a ton of money to get internet access.
Basically, what I am curious about is why HP and Starbucks are spending a lot of money hyping a new product line that any coffee shop with internet access offers.
Isn't this basically just a Starbucks using HP computers to hook to iTunes?
That's hardly a revolutionary concept.
I have already seen shops doing this. And, these days, HP on the label of a new innovative direction is a huge redflag. Is this really worth the investment for either company? Starbucks is adding a partner to sell it's own product and split the sales. HP is adding a retail component in an area outside it's expertise. And, the barrier to entry for competition is something like $100 a month..
Anyone with internet access and a couple cd burners at a coffee shop is competition as iTunes is *legal* for use.
Want to bet that they will be trying to roll that horrible IT contract Starbucks signed for internet access into this operation, then slam people with the charges to offset their losses in their regular stores? They were having a lot of customers balk at paying an internet access fee for coffee, but would that apply to a store that is an internet music store first?
I want it beamed straight to my iPod, or I'm not interseted.
There exists no way of exchanging information without making judgments. --Bene Gesserit Axiom
It's not a difference in interpretation, it's a difference in reading comprehension, the original poster (and obviously you) are not comprehending what you are reading correctly.
It's not necessarily music, but other draws to the business. They already provide a place to meet & socialize and/or sell, and access the internet. Starbucks is not really even in the *coffee* business; it's just one of the incidental profit centers. Good thing too; they would never make it just on the merits of their coffee; they depend on customers for whom coffee is just an indifferent-tasting warm brown liquid used primarily as a delivery mechanism for caffeine and sugar.
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That sounds a tad alarmist, and appears to assume that online music distribution is automaticaly out to screw the "Industry".
In general, you can distribute copyrighted music in any common format such as the internet. All that's required is that you pay royalties to ASCAP/BMI/et. al.
I submitted this story for slashdot and got rejected
What do you mean 'until p2p users switch over?'. I've seen a lot of lossless compression cd's on that - eh - other download service that I use.
Doh, in a test with a room full of music lovers listening in with their own (mostly sennheiser) headphones, NONE was able to distinguish a normal CD with 192 kbit compression. The test was done using several formats (minidisk format, mp3 format & ogg format). Only a few could distinguish between 128 kbit mp3 and 44khz CD, and only for a couple of music genres (mostly classical, if I remember correctly, which seems logical).
Nowadays you can buy scratching tables using CD's. My former boss had two. They seemed to do the job, but then I'm not an audio professional. Vinyl probably sounds more vinylly according to audio freaks (that still use those tubes to get perfect - mashed up - sound).
So, what exactly is the point to this story???
This is a great idea.
Many people want custom mixed CDs, are willing to pay for them, but they are not willing to pay for a high speed connection or for a huge collection of second hand CDs in order to get the individual songs they want.
Steve
Do you really think that HP and Starbucks would just skip over the licensing and royalty stage of doing this?
...or something like that. I remember going into a music store and choosing a number of songs and having them compiled on a cassette for me. For some reason, it just didn't catch on. Maybe it was the cost or maybe it was the wait (in which case burning CDs would cure that)
Just to let you know people that last month HP invented a MP3 player with cool features such has MP3 mixing and scratching wich can then be uploaded has a ringer for the cell phone.
I imagine this will be sucessful for the next two years or so, but once it becomes normal for people to carry 8 million (obviously exagerrated number) wirelessly networked gadgets then they'll be able to download and rip their own mini-DVDs (or whatever) at the cafe without having to use some Starbucks/HP proprietary mechanism...
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. --Will
Yeah, they do seem to over-roast a bit. I think they do this to cover the uneven quality of their beans. As "luxury" coffee goes, Starbucks ain't nothin' to write home about. They aren't using premium beans and their blends are distinguished only for their uniformity.
It bothers me that people assume coffee is good just because it's served with an Italian name and costs three bucks a serving.
I really like coffee and have spent some time teaching myself how to make a decent cup and be able to tell the difference between packaging and actual quality. Starbucks is going for nearly $8.00 a bag for beans these days (and is STILL not Fair Trade coffee, even at those outrageous prices). On the other hand, a comparable bag of Community Coffee French Roast is about three bucks. Properly prepared, there is no practical difference in the qualities of CCFR and Starbuck's House Blend. They use similar grades of coffee beans and arrive at the store with approximately the same degree of freshness.
There are plenty of expensive coffees out there really worth the money for their rarity, freshness, and blend. But they usually don't come in Starbucks wrappers.
For whatever it's worth.
This is my post. There are many others like it. If you don't like what you read here, go try one of the others.
I dunno about where you live, but where I'm from - a moderate-sized city - we have a 24hr Starbucks. Now, quite often people will hang there in the late hours of the night, and they'll maybe drink a few coffees, whatever, and stay a few hours.
I've never been told to leave. Usually as long as somebody at the table gets a drink every so often they're rather happy to have us there. To me... it's not about the coffee, I'm paying for both my beverage and the fact that there is a place where I can sit and socialize at 3am without disturbing the neighbours. It's cheaper than most restaurants... when you count the price of food and that some have a "minimum per patron" requirement.
Reas Internet Audio Allotment
After being pampered by the likes of Kazaa I decided I wanted to buy a music CD.
I've purchased indie bands online, but I really haven't been in a music "store" for a decade. I quickly found myself in a foreign place.
There were a number of albums for the artist I wanted, while the one I'd specifically decided to buy wasn't in stock.
I decided that maybe I'd buy something else, too, but just as quickly found that *gulp!* there's no way to sample the tunes before you buy!
So, you spend $12-$20 without being able to "kick the tires" and no way to sample the tunes first?
Just rediculous. I'm surrounded by thousands of albums from hundreds of artists, and have no idea what I might be interested in.
I eventually bought a mediocre "Alanis Morrissette unplugged" CD that I really don't appreciate all that much - she sounds bored, without her usual passion and fire.
Preview, then buy? I might very happily do it! Ever see Magna Tunes?
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
You're posting your troll to the wrong thread, loser.
Cool factor aside, what exactly would HP get out of that business model?
1. $9.95 -- I notice that many Linux magazines distribute distros on CD and retail on newstands for substantially more than regular paper-only mags. The kiosk would offer an up-to-date distro of your choice burned on a CD (better and cheaper than the magazine).
2. Service revenues: HP could offer Linux support services as an add-on for more dollars (or bundled with a $49.95 "Platinum Service" version of the distro. The Kiosk creates the initial connection with the customer. If they have problems, HP sells them service.
Muzak announces the "Muzak burner", coming to an elevator near you:
"Can't get enough of that cool version of 'One Note Samba' while riding your way to the 20th floor? Press the [Muzak-burn] button, swipe your credit card, and VOILA... your CD is ready by the time the doors open."
there's no place like ~
It may work, but I'll never buy them if the are lousy lossy approximation burnt on to cds
I'm sure there is a way to fake invoices or something...
If my answers frighten you, stop asking scary questions.
Not wonderful, bitter. And, every few months, pay a higher price. And, the coffee was never as good as the cheapest coffee in Brazil.
In either case, it takes a long time to absorb music. Music demands linear time, and lots of it.
If you sit in a coffee shop for a whole forty minutes, (which is stretching the allowable loitering time a retail outfit can afford to let one customer take up space), you can pick out and listen to maybe ten tracks. (You're buying coffee, getting yourself set up, figuring out their system, going through selection lists. Yep. I'd say ten songs in forty minutes is optimistic. And whether or not you'll even like and want to buy those songs. .
Next, you're in a busy environment. LIFE is happening all around you. Are you there with friends? There's another distraction. Are you going to be able to comfortably pay attention to any of those songs?
Is the experience going to be rewarding or a hassle? Is it easier to just switch on a home computer and download the song off the web?
My thinking is that the way to make this business work is to sell a lot of coffee and cookies. At a cost of pennies per cup, there's a great profit margin in coffee sales. Make the place cool to hang out in, offer internet and other distractions. .
And sell lots of coffee. That'll pay the rent.
-FL
Perhaps this would require further clarification of this "business model" idea.
1. Linux maganizes target specifically a demographic that is interested in Linux and willing to buy paper that "talks" about it, in full awareness it's all in the Net anyway, most often published by the magazines themselves.
Would you suggest that the Linux-geek demographic is suffciently large and affluent for HP and Starbucks to open retail coffe/distro stores for their pleasure?
Perhaps they could open bird-watcher coffee-and-print shops as well. Birdwatchers could drop by for coffee, watch birds on supplied telescopes and binoculars, take pictures with HP digital cameras and print them with HP inkjet printers.
Or perhaps HP is aiming at more mainstream markets than hobbyists.
2. Right. Because spending 50 bucks on software and support is exactly what people do when dropping by for coffee, as opposed to... say, computer stores.
They're aiming at the impulsive consumer market. There is an economic barrier which said market cannot surpass if it is to be "impulsive", and although it varies from time to time, it tends to float around a "lunch at a cheap restaurant price". Currently 15-20 bucks. In other words, money a middle-class consumer wouldn't miss too much and can spend on a whim without thinking twice.
That is the market for media: pulp-books, magazines, music, comics, etc. Stuff where you hope exposure==buy, because it is unlikely to be seen as an investment by the consumer.
3. You do realize the whole point behind their business model is the "browse->hang-out->buy" process?
If people want a specific Linux distro, they'll go looking for it at specialized stores/places. If they don't know enough to face a clerk and say "give me a debian with that mocha", they would have to "browse"...
There are two BIG problems with that business model:
-Browsing is expensive for the store: you have to provide computers, preferably with broadband, to let users play with the distros.
First, this sounds like CompUSA, not Starbucks. Second, this is a lot of equipment for very little revenue (distros). CompUSA can do it because they're selling PCs, MS Office, and other stuff that rakes larger profit margins than 9.95, 59.95 with support.
- IF you make a sale, and IF you get them to sign up for support... there is essentially no repeat customer.
What are they going to do, drop by next week to buy a new distro? If you made a good sale, they won't need to see you until they get another PC.
Just like a software store lives selling applications, not just OSes, you would need some other substantial form of CD-pressing revenue to justify the distro-scheme.
Yet that is difficult to justify since the whole point of the distros is to include all the common applications.
Freedom is the freedom to say 2+2=4, everything else follows...
for those who don't purchase small, intangible or any items online. The idea of having a CD made for you, and physically having it in your hands with all the songs you want, sounds reasonable.
This will help to get the segment of the market who do not yet understand downloadable files, and electronic commerce for an intangible product.
I have a tape, made for me by a record store, containing 10 tracks that I hand-selected and arranged.
The tape is the product of Sony's mid-80s Personics system. It consisted of a display machine which provided a 2-line display and a pair of headphones, and a big book of tracks with associated code numbers (a la The Box). You selected the tracks you wanted, in order, and then your request was put into a queue, controlled by a PC at the checkout desk. This special PC contained an auto-reverse tape recorder which wrote desampled audio tracks onto a cassette at high speed. Meanwhile, a cheap laser printer printed out a heavy-weight case liner and cassette labels with your title and track info. The price was about $1.50 per track.
Fast forward roughly 10 years, to the latter edge of the dotcom boom. Hansol Telecom (now bust) creates the MyCD vending machine, which will, of course, revolutionize the music industry. But some five years later, I am hard pressed to find if any such machines were ever installed anywhere, and the music industry is as yet un-revolutionized.
So good luck, Starbucks. (BTW, $40/mo wifi will rake it in for just a little bit longer. And how well do those jazz compilation CDs really sell? Good game, by the way, but I would never have actually played Hoopla IN the store if it had been remotely busy that day.)
Terrorists can attack freedom, but only Congress can destroy it.
Does Starbucks have a license for this groundbreaking innovation from the patent owners at FPDC inc?
"System for reproducing information in material objects at a point of sale location"
And before any europeans in the audience start chuckling, it's patented in Europe too.
No Way!
;)
I had this idea a while ago, only it is online and the website provides you instructions how to make a decent cup of coffee to drink while you download ripped music.
Nevrar
1. Bad Coffee
2. Bad Music
3. ???
4. Profit!
...you could even order your coffee from the computers while you listen. Further more, the protocol already exists - rfc2324
(let ((t (sig. my))) ( cons (cdr t) (car t)))
Now, when I use my credit card at Starbucks, I will also be signing a RIAA inspired contract to use the media for my own personal use only. And i will be authorizing them to use any means necessary to ensure that the ....
:)
bad idea
Remember, a truly wise man never plays leapfrom with a unicorn
Well, their coffee is bad (the frou-frou lattes etc. sell well b/c the sugar and foam hide the taste). The fact that they open a zillion stores in a threee block radius helps contribute to the homogenization of urban culture and hurts small local businesses trying to compete with them. And their tie-in CD's etc are obnoxious cross-marketing of the worst sort.
Freedom: "I won't!"
Would you suggest that the Linux-geek demographic is suffciently large and affluent for HP and Starbucks to open retail coffe/distro stores for their pleasure?
You are absolutely right, HP & Starbucks would never create these kiosks for Linux afficiandos. But because the kiosk is already in the store (as a music download/burn kiosk), the incremental cost of loading some distros on the HD is extremely low.
They're aiming at the impulsive consumer market.
Good point! Perhaps sales of a service-addon would be very low. But what about sales of cheapo, preloaded distros? What is more impulsive than a $9.95, "tryout HP Desktop linux" CD?
there is essentially no repeat customer.
Not true. Although many users will download patches & upgrades themselves, some users will prefer to get a new preloaded CD with all the latest versions. This also deals with the security problem (when security holes are found in an old distro) of having to expose an unpatched machine on the internet in order to access the patches. HP could even advertize (in those specialized Linux magazines) that this Starbucks download kiosk is a great way to get linux distros and OSS application CDs.
At $9.95 a disk, the Linux CDs would be just as profitable (or more so) that the $6.99, 5-song minimum that HP is proposing.
3. You do realize the whole point behind their business model is the "browse->hang-out->buy" process?
Apparently HP & Starbucks think that the the music versions of the kiosks will be profitable. I would assume they have factored in the cost of people browsing, listening to, and selecting music tracks.
And they don't have to provide browsable Linux distros, only information about the pros/cons of the alternatives. HP could even offer a total impulse buy to all music buyers ("Make your computer feel like new again, get HP Linux & OpenOffice for $9.95")
The point is the kiosks are already in the Starbucks, the costs of an extra few gig of HD space is minimal, the costs of perhaps a gig a month of transfer to update the distros is minimal. At $9.95, this scheme might be profitable if only one person a month bought it.
I guess the Digital Revolution In Music we've been hearing about for so long is finally starting to arrive. What would kids who saw the birth of rock'n'roll make of it? In the 50s you had to physically travel to the record shop, listen to the latest releases in a booth, and buy them on little 7" plastic discs if you wanted to take them home. How things have changed! Nowadays you can just go down to Starbuck's, listen to the latest releases on your headphones, and buy them on little 5" plastic discs if you want to take them home. And for 3 quid you can buy a cup of coffee as well! Somebody grab my arm, the pace of social change is making me dizzy.
You got a point there: iff there is a matching demographic, the incremental cost of providing that feature in their kiosk would be worth it. It might even be worth to subsidize it, if the incremental cost is overset by higher customer satisfaction and retention (much like poetry readings in bookstores).
Almost anything? An OS is normally not an impulsive choice for any significant non-hobbyist demographic, Linux users included. It's not just the "el cheapo" price, it's the baggage: the time spent installing, reconfiguring, etc. makes this unavoidable an "investment".
We're back on the hobbyist demographic in that case.
So, let's see: although we're dealing with a small demographic group, an even smaller demographic group actually might be a repeat customer in order to get patches and updates.
Which makes one ponder:
- Will they demand a cheaper (free?) patch/update disc in that case?
- Isn't that what support is supposed to do?
Would we expect people to drop by to buy their patch/update CD every two weeks? Or to run to the coffee shop when a new vulnerability is exposed?
I know if I had to do that I would stop preferring my updates burned on a CD from a brick-and-mortar source. It would simply be impractical, as opposed to the Net connection.
The people who prefer a pre-packaged distro per upgrade, and prefer a solid CD per update, sound like the people who will update rather infrequently.
You're missing the point. Entirely. You might want to go back and read my previous posts.
The whole business model is BASED on "browsing->hang-out->buy". The costs of browsing are not just factored out, they are the WHOLE POINT of this scheme.
The benefits will be reaped out only if customers spend an inordinate amount of time browsing, sampling, and making impulsive buys that end up being as expensive, if not more, as they would have spent on traditional CDs. The coffee is there is to keep them in the store.
The problem with Linux is PRECISELY that it is not easily browseable, not easily sampled.
Even if you go through all of the expenses to make it browseable, only people already extensively familiar with Linux can "sample" it a minute or two and choose a distro. For the rest, the differences would be too insignificant or too drastic.
Without browsing and sampling, the product fits about as much as selling furniture at McDonalds.
Freedom is the freedom to say 2+2=4, everything else follows...
If they would just give me a free hour of Wifi when I pay 6 bucks for my at least once daily tasty beverage and pastry (ChaiTea and Chocolate Croissant) I Would be a happy guy(tm)!
comment directly in my journal
This section says nothing whatsoever about the actual infringement of copyrighted materials.
what about the part that says
the noncommercial use by a consumer of such a device or medium for making [...] musical recordings
-no broken link
You didn't read thea ct did you.
Deck to deck copy is perfectly fine to hand off to a friend assumming you don't profit from the transfer.
Read it again.
This is fairly well known...
"You should always go to other people's funerals; otherwise, they won't come to yours." -- Yogi Berra
I'm assuming that this is what you are refering to correct? This basically states that because something such as a cd burner enables a user to violate copyright law does not mean that the cd burner itself is in violation of copyright law. Essentially guns don't kill people, people kill people. It's stating that the act of copyright infringement is what is illigal, not the tool's used to commit that act. It does not in any way condone copying your cd's and giving them away, that still falls under copyright infringement.
The darkness... controls the music. The music... controls the soul.