Charley Pride probably sells more Album CDs than the shit you hear on radio at the moment.. he's just an old-time black country musician (and a rather successful one at that - allmusic.com has him as having 36 number 1 hits over the past 35 years), I'd heard i've him, and im a country-music hating New Zealander!
Ah Well, Major labels won't let me rip my CDs eh? Thats a pity - I was just dying to buy major label music anyway.. dontchya just love crappy generic radio rock/pop?
Well ok, there are some major label musicians that put out decent music (especially if you consider Capitol a major label), but how long do you think it'll be before Independent record companies are gonna produce these CDs.. years?, not at all?
That actually opens up the opportunity for Independent music to take over the file exchange systems (just what I've always wanted! - I hate trying to find rare tracks and being swamped by radio hits)
I think Independents should take up the cause of providing better service to their customers, by not incoporating this technology - having an internet presence is good publicity anyway!
Chris Fraew Andrews
Here in New Zealand were pretty much entirely cash-free - EFTPOS (i.e. automatic in the shop electronic transfers) are available just about everywhere - including the smallest cornershops and service stations (at the pump!), and of course Direct Credit payments take care of all the regular bills etc.
I was recently overseas travelling through England, France, Greece and Thailand and was actually taken aback by the low level of automatic transfer options such countries have - where ATMs are actually quite scarce (well - compared to New Zealand anyway!).
I like having some cash in my pocket (for playing games of pool, or making small purchases) as it saves on bank fees!
Personally I have a two sided approach to the format. Firstly I have a reasonable collection of MP3 files to complement my rather large CD collection, and the majority of those files are encoded at 192kpbs. I have no idea why people encode MP3's at any less than 160, and i've put it forward to MP3.com to accept files of higher than 128 (why 128! - this is supposed to be a site for musicians!).
Secondly, as I am a musician myself, and one who has accumulated a large number of samples and beats, I've recently employed compression onto my primarily WAV sample collection. What I chose was the OGG format as it allows me to encode at 350kps, reducing most of my files to a quarter of their original size, and still retain a high level of quality (for perfect quality mixes, the original files can always be resourced). The primary reason why I switched to OGG though is that its always free!, every music application I use exports and imports OGG files, and I don't have to register a damn third party encoder / decoder to use it.
I think either format is acceptable for listening (if they've been encoded correctly), and I think acceptability will come down to how well their implemented - for example the P2P search engines such as Audiogalaxy. This is the best example of post-napster music-engine, and its a pity its MP3-centric.
Am I the only one that see's the positive light in MP3.Com as it SHOULD be taken. I'm an MP3.com artist myself, and I've ammassed a massive $1.60 in earnings over the past few months. THIS DOES NOT BOTHER ME IN THE SLIGHTEST. I am a musician, and what I see as being great about MP3.com, is the fact that around 700 people who may have never even heard my music in their life have now done so - and I've gotten positive comments from all over the world and I've even made contacts. Although I'm glad every time my $ raise a little (hey I might have enough cash one day to send myself a CD of myself!), its not the reason I joined and its certainly not the reason I stay on MP3.com. I think the readers on Slashdot (which I know a fair proportion of actual perform music) should stop worrying about whether they can download the Madonna song thats on the radio ALL THE TIME anyway, and appreciate the service for what it actually provides.
One thing I noticed bout the site.. they've got top scores for PC and Mac games - but what-tha' no AMIGA high scores?
Damned if my Record of 812-8 vs. Super Nashwan in Speedball 2 is going to be ignored because the don't have Amiga records!
Slashdot Mirror
Charley Pride probably sells more Album CDs than the shit you hear on radio at the moment.. he's just an old-time black country musician (and a rather successful one at that - allmusic.com has him as having 36 number 1 hits over the past 35 years), I'd heard i've him, and im a country-music hating New Zealander!
Ah Well, Major labels won't let me rip my CDs eh? Thats a pity - I was just dying to buy major label music anyway.. dontchya just love crappy generic radio rock/pop? Well ok, there are some major label musicians that put out decent music (especially if you consider Capitol a major label), but how long do you think it'll be before Independent record companies are gonna produce these CDs.. years?, not at all? That actually opens up the opportunity for Independent music to take over the file exchange systems (just what I've always wanted! - I hate trying to find rare tracks and being swamped by radio hits) I think Independents should take up the cause of providing better service to their customers, by not incoporating this technology - having an internet presence is good publicity anyway! Chris Fraew Andrews
Here in New Zealand were pretty much entirely cash-free - EFTPOS (i.e. automatic in the shop electronic transfers) are available just about everywhere - including the smallest cornershops and service stations (at the pump!), and of course Direct Credit payments take care of all the regular bills etc.
I was recently overseas travelling through England, France, Greece and Thailand and was actually taken aback by the low level of automatic transfer options such countries have - where ATMs are actually quite scarce (well - compared to New Zealand anyway!).
I like having some cash in my pocket (for playing games of pool, or making small purchases) as it saves on bank fees!
Personally I have a two sided approach to the format. Firstly I have a reasonable collection of MP3 files to complement my rather large CD collection, and the majority of those files are encoded at 192kpbs. I have no idea why people encode MP3's at any less than 160, and i've put it forward to MP3.com to accept files of higher than 128 (why 128! - this is supposed to be a site for musicians!).
Secondly, as I am a musician myself, and one who has accumulated a large number of samples and beats, I've recently employed compression onto my primarily WAV sample collection. What I chose was the OGG format as it allows me to encode at 350kps, reducing most of my files to a quarter of their original size, and still retain a high level of quality (for perfect quality mixes, the original files can always be resourced). The primary reason why I switched to OGG though is that its always free!, every music application I use exports and imports OGG files, and I don't have to register a damn third party encoder / decoder to use it.
I think either format is acceptable for listening (if they've been encoded correctly), and I think acceptability will come down to how well their implemented - for example the P2P search engines such as Audiogalaxy. This is the best example of post-napster music-engine, and its a pity its MP3-centric.
Chris Fraew Andrews
Am I the only one that see's the positive light in MP3.Com as it SHOULD be taken. I'm an MP3.com artist myself, and I've ammassed a massive $1.60 in earnings over the past few months. THIS DOES NOT BOTHER ME IN THE SLIGHTEST. I am a musician, and what I see as being great about MP3.com, is the fact that around 700 people who may have never even heard my music in their life have now done so - and I've gotten positive comments from all over the world and I've even made contacts. Although I'm glad every time my $ raise a little (hey I might have enough cash one day to send myself a CD of myself!), its not the reason I joined and its certainly not the reason I stay on MP3.com. I think the readers on Slashdot (which I know a fair proportion of actual perform music) should stop worrying about whether they can download the Madonna song thats on the radio ALL THE TIME anyway, and appreciate the service for what it actually provides.
Chris Fraew Andrews
Email me!
One thing I noticed bout the site.. they've got top scores for PC and Mac games - but what-tha' no AMIGA high scores? Damned if my Record of 812-8 vs. Super Nashwan in Speedball 2 is going to be ignored because the don't have Amiga records!