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Audio Lunchbox: Music with no DRM
An anonymous reader writes "MacCentral just posted an article on Audio Lunchbox, an online music store dedicated to music by independent artists and labels. ALB offers all of its music in DRM free MP3 (192 kbps) and Ogg Vorbis (Q6) formats with iTunes style pricing and a completely web based and platform independent delivery system."
I wonder how RIAA will take notice (rest assured they will take notice)? Will they view it was a threat and try to buy out these independent artists to close this down, ignore it, or see that it actually works?
I'd like to think they'd know a good thing when they see it but I'm not that optimistic (or naive depending on your viewpoint). I'd lean towards them trying to buy out any independent artists who make it big using this method -- and with the way the current world works (money == good) they'll probably succeed.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Of course these are the little guys. They will have a very hard time with the big boys of the music industry trying to squash them. (They view them as a threat... like they view just about everything.)
The only thing that will decide if they can stay in the fight is if their business model pays off. If it does, small, independant producers to nudge out the bastards that run the show right now. Which brings me to my next point...
Buy music from these guys! Find something you like and buy it. If you're not sure what to buy, buy from several bands and try them all. If you don't like any of it... buy a lot anyway! Help them give the boot to the established (bully) companies out there.
Slashdot Syndrome: the sudden, extreme urge to correct someone in order to validate one's self.
In case you've forgotten, the record Labels are evil, because:
Indefinitely Detained US Citizen
Am I the only one who doesn't bitch about 99 cent pricing? Bitch about the DMA all you want (I'll be right there with you) but don't bitch about the pricing.
How much work do you think goes into writing the average book? A new hard cover typically goes about $20-$40.
I'm not suggesting that it's as hard to make an album as it is to write a book but there's at least as much creative talent at work here. That sort of talent deserves to be fairly compensated. Could you or I do it?
If you want to bitch about something bitch about RIAA taking 90% of that $0.99 when all they did is market the artist in question. The $0.99 itself isn't the problem.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
The quality of Ogg and MP3 is pretty good (certainly better than radio) but I want to be able to build an online music collection that is comparable in quality to my offline one; i.e., one that does not suffer from the high-end noise that the lossy formats have.
Otherwise, I might as well go back to vinyl.
Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
-- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.
Let me help those of you who may not know... it costs a lot of money to write and get a good recording of a song. If I were to only charge 25 cents for a recording that cost me $500 of my time, it would take me 2000 copies, versus perhaps 500 copies, to get at least to a gross return on my investment. What makes this website cool is that the artist doesn't have to sell as many tracks as they otherwise would, because the artist is getting a bigger payout than pretty much anyone offers. Considering that this is the case, is it worth your 99 cents to get the track? Yes, because that 99 cents goes a lot farther towards helping that artist than it would for say, Britney Spears, who probably gets a tiny fraction of that sale and could really care less. Oh yeah -- she doesn't write her music anyways, so it's kinda moot to discuss her, but you get the point.
stuff |
If you want non-brand-name music for $0.25 a song, try http://www.emusic.com, which offers 40 songs for $10 a month. It used to be unlimited, but they cut back awhile ago.
You have to hunt for the good stuff, but overall, Emusic isn't bad. No DRM, either.
Simple Unexpected Concrete Credible Emotional Stories
Yup, they will capture that huge Ogg Vorbis community. And it's mountains of disposable cash.
You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
Let me be the first to say that this company is dead!
If you don't know what AltaVista is (was), get off my lawn.
Here is another service along the same lines and even less evil: Magnatune, "we are not evil." Pay as much as you want (within reason, natch'). There is not a huge selection yet, but maybe if more peeps start buying from them....
Well, we only have 12 indie artists so far. Canadian indie stuff... anyway www.hearsaymusic.ca! mp3s 1 dollar Canadian (192kps)... 30 second samples (128kps). And in contrast to what indiepool (Canadian puretracks' indie thing) does, we do not charge anything to get onto the site, and encoding. We take a share of the sales.
Cheers,
Daniel
=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=
Daniel
http://people.cinn.ca/daniel/
The only ones who really win are the VISA and MASTERCARDs who get a cut of EVERY sale anytime one of them is used. Why else does Apple bunch up all of your purchases made throughout the day to a single transaction at night???
If they could implement a credit style system, pre-pay if you will, they will be able to avoid the 30 cent (or more) per transaction overhead and lower prices. Maybe if when you set up an account, you buy a $20 credit or so, similar to how iTunes does it with their gift certificates (which only makes Apple MORE money since they don't have to pay the transaction fees on gift certificate purchases -- and they don't pass the "savings" on to you....)
More options are always a good thing, especially with DRM-free formats.
What exactly do you mean by "Don't touch this button?"
Open music is what Magnatune.com sells. From the site: "All songs are available in MP3, CD-quality WAV, OGG, FLAC and MP3-VBR: download whichever formats you like." The best part is you can download and audition the music, then decide what you want to pay, if anything. "Magnatune lets you choose how much you want to pay for your downloaded album. The more you choose to pay, the more the artist makes, because at Magnatune, half goes directly to the artist, while the other half supports Magnatune." They are also members of the Creative Commons.
Disclaimer: I am not affiliated in any way with Magnatune.com. This is just a really cool idea whose time has come.
Am I the only one not busting a nut at the chance of paying $0.99 to download one song? Or $9.99 to download an album? To me this is hardly an improvement over current pricing. Maybe it's just that the stuff I listen to isn't typically available (live trance sets)
Get yerself in enough of a trance and you won't notice....;-)
has a great selection of FREE music (live and studio). Look under Archive.org -> Audio -> Net Labels.
there's no place like ~
All MP3s are encoded at 192 kbps variable bit rate (VBR). Ogg Vorbis files are encoded at a variable bit rate (VBR) "quality 6"
:'(
4. Can my cousin in Italy buy songs from you?
Yes. Anyone in the world can download tracks from us.
Damn I'm running out of excuses for not paying for music
I'm a chainsmokin' alcoholic sociopath, so-ci-o-path
Keep in mind that
/. readers this is a nice place to find new things to listen.
a) they are being slashdotted now, slowing down their site
b) They are INDIE artists, you won't be able to search for things that are "mainstream" and expect to find results. The idea is finding new artists here, rather than massively promoted RIAA ones.
c) Music isn't cheap to produce. I think their pricing structure is really quite fair, and they probably can't afford to lower prices. I'm more than willing to pay $1 a song for music I like. Music is music, is doesn't matter to me if it comes from a major label or not, if it's actually good.
Maybe this service isn't for you, but for a lot of
If you have the same problem, save the m3u file, copy-n-paste the contents into your browser. It would then launch winamp and I could preview the songs. I don't know if it was Winamp's problem or not, but what a PITA. Instead of streaming it, why not just link to the partial mp3 itself? Sheesh.
Now on the service, I wish it were a little cheaper, but I might check them out. I have been mass downloading songs from MP3.com, burning them to a CD, and listening to them in my car. (MP3 capable car CD player - best thing EVER) It is kind of cool to hear indie artists, but you do get a lot of garbage in there too, just guys in their basement. But it is still interesting.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
It wouldn't be so bad if you owed royalties when you bought the music. I mean when you buy a song then its your to put on any media. Let's say right now CDs are popular. Tomorrow it's going to be, say, Memory Sticks.
Now if the vendors could figure out how to make money and when you buy the music you can listen to it however you like and not a simple one time download but its your to move to various media, always own, sell, etc.
I went though many tapes because the tapes failed over time. It seems I should own the rights to listen to the music upon purchase.
Am I the only one not busting a nut at the chance of paying $0.99 to download one song?
Precisely!
The problem is the same one that kept me -- a fan of classical music -- from ever making many impulse buys of classical music in record stores.
It's difficult to tell a good CD from a bad CD without first listening to it.
With Indie music, the problem is compounded: a bad recording of Bach's The Goldberg Variations is still a recording of Bach's The Goldberg Variations. A bad recording of a bad Indie composition called "Crumpetty Crumpetty Bug-a Lug-a Bomf" is an irredeemable waste of 99 cents.
Back when eMusic.com allowed unlimited downloads, this wasn't a problem: I could try out an artist I'd never heard of, and if on listening I didn't like his work, I was out nothing more than the time to download that album. Now that eMusic.com limits me to 40 tracks per month, I'm stuck with the same problem as in the record store: how do I apportion my limited resources without getting burnt?
The safe answer to this quandary is to only purchase music that you know well, or is popular, to some definition of popular. "Popular among listeners of folk music" doesn't result in my getting pablum as bad as "popular among 15 year-old girls", but using either definition of popular means that newer, less knowm and Indie artists won't even be considered for purchase.
The other answer is to spend a lot of time reading reviews, asking advice of other listeners, and otherwise doing research; the problem is that that's costly, in terms of time, too. How much, exactly, is getting good Indie music supposed to be worth to me?
So when I see stuff like Audio Lunchbox or MagnaTunes, well, I like the idea but I'm inclined not to part with my money, for fear of buying bad music. Since I already know that anything by Bob Dylan or Pete Seeger or Wilhelm Furtwangler will be good, my inclination is to spend my money on CDs by these well-known artists.
As a consequence, I'll avoid the bad Indie music but I'll also miss the good Indie music.
But I'd be far more willing, as the parent poster suggests, to take a risk on Indie music if the risk were smaller: at $2.00 per album I'd be able to get five albums for $10.00, as opposed to one for $9.99. If the odds are that one of those five would be good, then I'd have the same number of good albums for the same price: one good album for ten bucks.
And having found a good album, I'd be willing to pay somewhat more for another album by that same artist -- though I still probably wouldn't be willing to pay what I'd pay for Bob Dylan.
Opinions on the Twiddler2 hand-held keyboard?
Seriously, get over it.
Free downloads make so much more sense for a band trying to reach a wider audience.
Most people will only pay for music that's already "made it". They like that song thats always on the radio, "who are those guys? Im gonna get that CD."
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
The reason people download music and not books is that it is cheaper and easier to download and burn to a CD. If you buy a hardcover for $40, you're paying $35 for the medium, not the content.
With peer to peer, the medium has been made enormously cheap. Why are we paying $.99 for a track (equivalent to store prices) when their distribution costs are all but eliminated (bandwidth + servers are much cheaper than stores, staff, shipping, and packaging).
Uhm. Audio Lunchbox gives you that when you buy an album. The MP3s + Oggs, artwork, and lyrics.
But don't believe me, see for yourself
From http://audiolunchbox.com...
192 kbps VBR MP3 Audio Files
I'm confused...which is it? 192Kbps or VBR? And if it's VBR, what quality?
I'm somewhat disapointed that out-of-print stuff isn't available through here though. They distribute albums on Epitaph Records, but none of the albums no longer produced are available. I think this would be a great way to let people get ahold of those old albums they can't buy any more, since it involves 0 cost for the label to provide the mp3s.
Emusic on the other hand offers at least some of the out of print albums in DRM-free mp3 form. Unfortunately, I tried their service once and found the quality of mp3s sorely lacking...one album I downloaded crackled audibly through the whole thing.
Sounds like Audio Lunchbox is a lot more fair to the artists than iTunes and other online music stores are.
This music store comes through where Apple failed for me. I download iTunes, and I wanted to like it, I wanted to possibly save for an iPod, but the store interface was crap. I don't feel I'm alone on this, but here's why: There weren't enough categories. There were no ties between like bands.
Audio lunchbox divides the music up so much better. It has hardcore, four metal subcategories, a bunch of rock categories and even a seperate punk category (these are just my tastes). iTunes, from the searching I did, would label all this "alternative/rock". By doing this, it was hard to find bands that don't have radio exposure and thus hard for me to buy music unless I wanted the radio top 40 garbage.
//Blessed are they that run around in circles, for they shall be known as wheels.
A) Most of the independent artists that will be available through sites like this are NOT RIAA artists.
B) While $.99 may be necessary to cover the cost of Marketing Blitzes, Big Budget Studio time, Advertising, Printing and Distributing an album to your local record store, I think its feasible that independent artist spend considerably less on promotion and 'the machine'. If everyone adopts prices that don't reflect the actual costs involved in bringing the music to market we just end up with a new version of the old system. A lot of artist still are focused on GETTING THEIR MUSIC HEARD so this whole money argument is marketing talk as far as I'm concerned.
Industry music may be a different story, but I love and am VERY familiar with independent music and artists. I've got no trouble with sending 10 bucks off to support an artist I like, but I usually get a fancy printed album and what-not that added a little more value. If a download (of a 192 bit track?) is going to cost some money, fine, just don't charge me as much as you would for a CD, after all, its not the same thing.
Quack, quack.
try http://www.emusic.com, which offers 40 songs for $10 a month.
If you're already an emusic.com customer, and you find emusic.com's "My Collection" page to be a slow, tedious, pain in the ass, and you'd prefer to download to your local harddrive an HTML page showing every album you've downloaded from emusic.com with links back to each album page at emusic.com, get this free program for Windows, Mac, or linux:
Get Collection.
Opinions on the Twiddler2 hand-held keyboard?
(Actually, if I wanted a song from this store, it would not be a factor. 192 VBR MP3 sounds just fine on my iPod... but there's at least one of you OGG cheerleaders saying the exact same thing about your favorite codec on Every Single God-Damned iTunes Music Store and/or iPod Thread, so I figured I should return the favor.)
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
You are a cheap bastard. For fucks sake, it costs at least 50 cents to listen to a song on a jukebox, and you only get to listen to it once! This way, you own the song forever. You can make copies for your different devices, share 'em with your friends if you want, and you can buy whole albums for $9.99, which is a bargain compared to the cost of CDs. Plus, the artists aren't getting screwed.
"If you're thinking what I'm thinking, you're right." -
There's even more than paper and bookstores. A lot of other people go into writing a book. My book, which goes for about $40, had an editor, a copy editor, a typesetter, an indexer, an artist for the cover, and a small army of reviewers who received honoraria. The postage alone when we were doing the final phases of reviewing ran into the hundreds of dollars. In the end, yeah, I get about five bucks a copy.
Mind you, this is a technical book from a major reputable publisher (Addison-Wesley), so it got the luxe treatment. Fiction would get a different treatment.
Magnatune have a whole collection of non-mainstream music, with a particular emphasis on classical stuff (which suprised me a little initially). They offer FLAC encoded audio providing you actually pay up (the mp3/ogg are try before you buy too).
Perhaps audiolunchbox can be persuaded to go the same way. Its certainly nice being able to burn full quality CDs of the music I bought online.
http://www.magnatune.com