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Music Download Service Targets Linux Desktops
An anonymous reader writes "According to DesktopLinux.com, a new music download service was launched recently by theKompany.com that, unlike iTunes and Napster, targets Linux desktops. Mindawn is claimed to provide CD-quality song files and 'virtually no' digital rights management (DRM) restrictions, offer full previews of the entire songs, and provide downloads in a variety of formats." There's also an interview with the founder.
The good stuff is all in the story - a music download service that provides Ogg format music without DRM and a Linux client.
The bad stuff is that there doesn't seem to be much support for big name music. It'll come, and it will only come through sites like this leading the way. But for now, it looks like I still have to get most of my music from iTunes.
On the plus side, things like this do help little known independent bands sell to a much larger audience. And a lot of these bands are really good. The major labels take ages to notice something good. Especially if it's original. We'll start seeing bands become successful through sites like this soon, and when they do and they keep 75% of the profits, that'll be it for the music industry as they know it.
Mighty oaks, and all that...
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
eMusic offers MP3 downloads and also offers a Linux version of their download manager (if you choose to use it).
You could literally have the best and most rights friendly (whose?) service on the planet, but if all you have is one thousand songs, and no deals with recognizable record companys, or artists (it'll never happen with their TOS), why should I care?
Really, this isn't a troll, but this just strikes me as being along the same lines as the truckloads of audio players that play a bjillion formats, but don't actually offer anything that I want.
Q: What do you think about American Culture?
A: I think it's a good idea.
(adapted from Gandhi)
I'd love to support them.
Trouble is, I want to buy Franz Ferdinand, not Fred and the Freaks....
Much as I admire the attempt, I can't see major labels sacrificing their precious DRM.
Remember when iTunes came out - none of us could beleive how strict it was - quite how inconvenient it would be to use. Nowadays iTunes is the friendly face of DRM...
I'd just buy a damn CD if they weren't protecting them as well... I just want to listen on my Linux PC and iPod why do they make it so difficult?
I have no idea what this company's business plan looks like, but anybody with even a modicum of common sense knows that there's virtually no way possible to grow this thing into a usable service if your customer base is that tiny. We're talking HOME LINUX users. Realistically, that's a customer base that's in the 5 figures, low 6 figures, tops. Out of those, even if they get 50% of the market, it's going to be very tough. But that current customer base is mainly made up of geeks screaming "free! free! free!" who are very able to find free music. So not only is their potential customer base tiny, but the customer base that does exist is not one that is likely to purchase music.
This one is a no brainer. It's just a matter of time before they run out of cash.
I don't respond to AC's.
My god people, there are other letters in the alphabet besides 'K'! Use them!
WTF? how did this get modded up? right there on the page:
"...offer full previews of the entire songs..."
not to mention even iTunes Music Store has 30 second clips of every song. And it's not lame like first 30 seconds or random clip of middle of nowhere - the 30 seconds are chosen manually to be the representative sound of the song.
So parent is very mistaken. nevermind RTFA, RTF summary.
Did Mindawn/theKompany not pay any attention to what happened to to mp3.com?
About the time mp3.com started to make money they were purchased by an RIAA member mega-corp. They were embraced, and extended - assimilated and unltimately destroyed both as an outlet for artists and as a corporate entity.
The music industry will not tolerate un-affiliated (independant) success any more than the political industry will. If an independant shows signs of gaining traction with the public - of getting a following - that independant will purchased by one of the RIAA mega-corps and shut down. If they don't gain a following, they'll simply go bankrupt and shut down.
Either way, no non-RIAA company can compete in the industry, and no dissenting (unsigned) artist stands a (statisticly significant) chance of success. That's why what the insdustry is doing is called "racketeering" and that's why the music industry as we know it must be destroyed before Capitalism (competition) can have an effect...
You can't win if you're playing with their ball and by their rules.
"The Internet is made of cats."
Really only the big guys are using DRM. There are lots of other smaller independent digital retailers selling music with no DRM at all. We send them the albums in FLAC, MP3, or OGG format.
Check out this list of companies that we distribute to. There's a link to each, and all of them have (or will have) the entire CD Baby Digital Distribution catalog of 30,000 albums (350,000 songs).
I see a lot of comments along the lines of "there's not enough selection", "it'll never work as a business model", "Can't do it without the major labels", et cetera ad nauseam.
I guess I am just starting to get rather irritated with the sense of spoiled entitlement that many in the "open source" linux world seem to have these days. They expect everything to be handed to them on a silver platter, free, or else it must be crap and doomed to failure.
Whenever we hear about the latest shenanigans by the RIAA or MPAA, we hear a chorus of shrieks and wails bemoaning the fact that there are no "fair" music services out there that are unencumbered by the DRM mess.
Well, here we are: A guy actually stepped up and started something that seems to provide a very reasonable service: Songs you can download without any restrictions on subsequent use, for a very reasonable fee. And (this is what kills me) he even caters directly to Linux users. But still we hear a chorus of complaints. There isn't enough selection? He just started for crying out loud! Give him a chance to build the thing. I've often wondered myself why someone couldn't do just this sort of thing for the independent artists, just a really straightforward service that charges reasonable fees, doesn't try to screw the customer and rewards the artists. Here it is! He's trying to do it.
Here's an idea: Be grateful, try it, give him feedback, help him make it work. This is what you've been waiting for.
I don't know, sometimes I read Slashdot these days and all I see is people who want everything handed to them on a silver platter. They want everything for free, and if it isn't Open Source then it must be spawn of the devil. Unless, that is, it's Google.
I say, good luck to this guy, he's trying to do something that seems to be very worthwhile.
Just my opinion.
The other point is that yes, the number of tracks available is small. But Mindawn is actively looking for new and independent artists -- think of the site as a kind of CaféPress for music geeks, though of course some big-name artists (such as James LaBrie from DreamTheater) are coming soon.
Cheers,
Ethelred
Everyone wants to be Ethelred. Even I want to be Ethelred.
Anonymous Coward, Your check is in the mail - thank you for supporting the Evil Empire (tm). Incidentally, in the future you should make up some more supporting details. For example, you should talk about how you've gone through 3 high-quality hard-drives to find the source of the lag, and have positively determined the problem to be in the Linux kernel. Also, you should up the specs a bit. No one is surprised any more when an 800 mhz machine is slow. However, make sure that you don't do so much specifying that someone could actually reproduce your claim. With warm regards, Santa (p.s. Nice touch in the question-begging department. Why any would chose to use linux over other "faster, cheaper, more stable systems"! We laughed out loud at that one!)
"He who would learn astronomy, and other recondite arts, let him go elsewhere. " -- John Calvin, commenting on Genesis 1
So get the FLAC versions and convert it to whatever you want.
I live ze unknown. I love ze unknown. I am ze unknown.
Vorbis is lossy. OGG is a container format that can have Vorbis or FLAC as codecs. So a .ogg file can contain a FLAC-formatted song and thus be non-lossy.
Crap. So *nearly* the Right Thing, and then fumbled at the last hurdle.
DRM-free downloads? Check. Platform-agnosticism? Check. Good choice of file formats? Check. Looking good. Might spend some money here if the tracks are any good.
So, are the tracks any good? Er. Where's the 'listen' button? Erm... [reads FAQ] so I have to sign up to the service and download and install a special application, just to see if there's anything I want to listen to. Aha.
Nope. Can't be bothered. Gone. Bye.
When you're launching a new web service it's vital to make it easy for uncommitted potential new users to slip into using your services easily, bit by bit.
This feature, however, is a great big roadblock to discourage potential customers. A simple link to an excessively-compressed or partial MP3 preview file would have been easier for everyone.
It has never really been about music being freely traded. These attacks on p2p is purely a way to stop minor labels from growing and up and coming musicians from doing it on their own. If the cost of production approachs zero, then musicians will not need labels. As it is, the major labels are making as much money as ever before.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.