$250,000 is enough to buy a very respectable personal studio, assuming you already have a room you can use for it.
$500,000 if the room needs acoustical work.
As to that half-million figure, it's still ridiculous, unless you're spending MONTHS in the studio. Even the biggest studios don't charge more than 100-200 per hour. 16 hour days are bad enough. So, at worst, $3200 per day, plus a salary for your engineer and producer - add 100%. So, $6400 per day, at the outside?
Multiply that by a couple weeks in the studio, which is the most anyone except manufactured pop stars should need. $6400 * 21 days = $134,400
So, in the most expensive case, an album by a real musician should take no more than 135,000 dollars to record. Considering that many truly great studios cost a lot less than 200 dollars per hour, and that 16 hour days are relatively excessive....
Well, those RIAA figures look a bit suspicious now, don't they? And you can still build a quite respectable studio for a quarter or half million.
Analog computers were used for orbital calculations for a simple reason:
It's *very* easy to do differential and integral equations in analog circuits. It's much harder to do them digitally.
Orbital and aerospace/ballistic calculations involve lots of integro-differential equations.
FWIW, there's a (relatively) cheap source of analog computers available still - analog synthesizers. They can be interlinked and interchanged with analog computers, and the demands of music make sure they're fairly accurate. Wouldn't trust the space shuttle to an MOTM synth, but then again, I'd just use a binary computer.
Lastly, only the Government could force me to wear a chip. If we are to be enslaved, it won't be the mega-corps that dictate it. It might be a collaboration between the mega-corps and Government that dictates it, but I don't see any reason whatsoever to believe that Bush is any more likely to usher this in than a Democrat (see above).
Only the government can force you to wear a chip. True. Now, let's go a little further. Imagine if Sony, Yamaha, Harmon-Kardon, and Pioneer put a little bug in their home theatre gear. It recorded what you said, used the "ambience" DSP to process it for interesting expressions, and sent it up the "internet radio" broadband connection it possesses.
I don't really think this is happening right now. I just wanted to make the point that any successful company could use a similar tactic. Force, no. But a corporation could pretty easily trick you into wearing a chip.
TVT is an independent in only the loosest sense of the term. They also have been prone to some nasty, nasty behavior with their artists.
They're the biggest indie label, with revenues of about $50 million. They're also notable for doing a lot of very major label things to their acts - they don't fit the "artist-friendly" indie image. Notably, they severely damaged the WaxTrax! imprint, changing its focus.
Also, they completely screwed over Trent Reznor. They prevented him from releasing material, and in order to allow him to leave his label contract, they retained financial interest in all future albums.
Don't be fooled. TVT is not a "small" record label. They just happen not to be affiliated with any of the seven... no, six... no, five... no, four majors.
They operate the same. Observe this link to Steve Albini's explanation Some Of Your Friends.
Freedom of speech impared. I don't know what the freedom of speech laws in Canada are, but here in the US you are (normally) allowed to say what you want. where you want, to whoever you want. I don't know if this would be considered limiting this or not.
No, it wouldn't. See the decisions regarding freedom to broadcast (i.e. the regulations that prevent pirate radio.) You can still say whatever you want, to whoever you want, whenever you want. However, you have no given right to the method to do so. Cell service is neither a god nor government given right.
For the record, I love my phone. For the record, I'm currently researching the difficlty of building a jammer myself. For experimental purposes, of course.:)
Hate to break it to you, but.... the UK is *not* going to start a war over this. Period. Murder is not (yet at least) an acceptable solution to legal problems, and there is no possible way the UK could cover up what is effectively murdering a country.
And likely, the "squatters" (they have every right to be there, as they aren't in anyone else's soil, and seem to have done everything to declare themselves a sovereign country) have a lot more than a couple firearms. Remember that heavy weaponry is pretty easily available on the black market, for those with cash. If you can afford to set up a sovereign off-shore platform, you can afford to buy yourself a few guided missiles and/or torpedoes to protect it.
Do you really think England would risk losing several multi-million dollar airplanes, or a billion dollar warship, over this?
Radio stations would use the same or a similar service.
No, they wouldn't. Here's why.
Option A: You are a commercial radio station. You play something on the order of (12 songs per hour * 24 hours * 7 days) 2016 songs per week. Just for fun, we'll assume there are actually that many different songs on your playlist. For most commercial stations, this isn't true. Guess what? You already have every single one of these songs, on CD, for free. Because the record labels send them to you, so you can play them. So, commercial stations will have no interest in this, because their songs are programmed in advance.
Option B: You are a non-commercial station, like (shameless plugging alert) WFMU, WCBN, or WFHB. You probably would want something of this sort. However, these stations tend to have an extensive library of older titles, as well as the new CDs labels send them. The only things they would tend to look for are obscure old releases they don't have, and new releases they haven't received. Speaking as a DJ at WCBN (hence the shameless portion of above plug,) I find 95% of what I want to play in my collection or the station's library. Although I wouldn't mind a similar service's availability, it's not necessary, and likely would not be worth it as a pay service.
I don't know about that. I think there is abundant evidence from AM radio and Fox News itself that over the past few years many people are only listening to the news that has the ideological slant and filtration that they want.
What about the side-effect this would have on sampling, if it were to go through?
This would effectively establish a simple procedure for guaranteed rights to sample a song, with no regard to fair use one way or another. As long as you paid the fee, you're allowed to use the entire song or pieces thereof. Thus, you could legitimately sample it.
Of course, due to the wording of what Hatch said, this likely wouldn't apply to CDs, but imagine if it were extended... suddenly, sampling an artists song is good. The original artist is compensated, there're no worries about permissions or fair use, and new artists can receive inspiration from whence they will.
Preach on, Brother Hatch! Extend this, so that compulsory licensing could be applied to ALL forms of music. Imagine that... copyright limited to originator of work, and compulsory licensing for all. A truely free America.
Because, as someone else will/has no doubt pointed out - American Law != Worldwide Law.
Let's go over this. It's called compulsory licensing because the *copyright holder* (your friend, I assume) receives *compulsory* (also known as mandatory) payments.
So, let's go over this. Your friend's CD that she made, she releases. She makes all the money, but pays all the costs. Then somebody else decides to include her song on a pay website. Every time somebody downloads this song, she gets paid. No infrastructural costs. Just, in effect, a royalty.
Yep. Put a Faraday cage in. Of course, whenever a (door/window/pet flap/anything) opens, your cage breaks. You did know that, right?
A Faraday cage isn't effective in a general environment for this very reason - it requires that it be *completely* closed to work. Also, have you ever seen the doors that work properly as a Faraday cage? Impressively thick and heavy. Also, expensive. Except for extremely security conscious environments (i.e. people who are worried about others reading the RF coming out of their monitor), no one seriously uses Faraday cages.
On the other hand, there would be a side benefit - no annoying cellphone ringing!
Who thinks that Aqua really isn't that pretty of an interface anyway?
I'm talking style-wise. I've not yet used it, so obviously in terms of HMI I can't talk, but I think that the screenshots I've seen just aren't attractive.
Then again, I think iMacs look like those cheap plastic toys you bought when you were five that broke before you got them home from the store....
Wait a second. Aren't they?
At any rate, Apple has devolved to a company that innovates in exteriors, not interiors. They'd be just as well off designing a way to put PCs in tacky plastic cases. In fact, they'd probably make a lot more money doing that.
Actually, DAT tapes do still exist. Pretty much solely in recording. At any rate, the DAT format existed before CDs did - CDs didn't kill DAT. The RIAA did, by insisting on surcharges on blank media to prevent copying (sound familiar, anyone?)and surcharges on recorders. To make up for piracy.
End result? If I want to record my own music that I compose on a DAT, I pay money to make up for the (non-existent) "piracy this format will promote."
RIAA, MPAA? I'm forming the KEIAA - Kill Entertainment Industry Associations Association.
Actually, automated IC bears a surprisingly high resemblance to speech-recognition problems, another high-point of Lincoln Labs.
Lincoln Labs, in conjunction with DARPA, is also doing real-world evaluations of actual ICE. This is the sort of thing ISPs need to be paying attention to, as the research being done here is what's going to be protecting their networks, soon.
Usually, when a/.er says "They're helping expose security flaws" etc. they're doing just that - taking advantage of a *flaw* in that ISP or server's configuration. In general, this comment is restricted to the following situation.
1 - The flaw is relatively unpublicized. And: 2 - The flaw isn't a brute force flaw.
This situation doesn't meet these standards - this is, essentially, a brute force flaw. DoS is the equivalent of trying every single password out for a login ID - given sufficient time, it will eventually break the protection without *any* fault from the server.
Yes, this is a simplified argument (there are ways to prevent brute-forcing passwords at the login prompt) but it does discern the essential difference between destruction for the sake of destruction (DoS) and defacement. It's the difference between vandalism and arson - I mean, yes, Janet Reno had a Hitler mustache, but so what? She does normally, too, it just isn't as obvious. =)
I hate to say it, but... American Customs more friendly than Canadian?? Are you crazy?
I've dealt with several different sets of Customs in my life. One of these was Israeli Customs. They were thorough, quick, polite, and overall a pleasure to deal with. Why? Because they're trying to find the psychotics with heavy weaponry.
Contrast this to American Customs, who I deal with every time I want to go to Windsor to (drink/dance/eat/pick up *legal* OTC codeine) take your pick. Canadian Customs on the way in? "How are you, sir? Destination? Length of stay? Thank you, have a good day."
American Customs, next day, on my way back. "Step out of the car while we slash your seat cushions, forcibly body-search you, and send you on your way with a wrecked car and severe pain, no recompense."
In retrospect, I'll take Israeli or Canadian Customs over US any day.
As to the 40% content regulation - even with that, most Canadian radio I hear is better than what I can pick up Stateside, at least for commercial stations. I'm not a Tragically Hip fan, but they're sure as hell better than 90% of what passes for "radio" on most stations.
I live in the States, for now. And as soon as I graduate, I'm likely to be moving to somewhere which makes sense.
One - you're using real time effects processing. In this case, the latencies across a network would kill you. It is generally accepted that the human sense of hearing can distinguish sounds within 3 milliseconds of one another (Bracewell's Sound For Theatre.) 3 milliseconds latency is hard enough for software on the host PC to meet as a goal - keeping the response of all the computers within a cluster to under 3 milliseconds distance from one another would be difficult. A trained musician (I live with one and have tested this, FWIW) will get very confused if monitoring latency causes them to hear what they're playing more than about 10 ms from when they play it.
In the second case, non real-time post-processing, a cluster would be more useful. Essentially, it would be a parallelization process - each computer in the cluster gets a chunk (perhaps even allocated by some measure of speed) and they all grind away seperately and return their results to the host, which reintegrates the data into a continous whole. However, problems arise when the effect you're using is a time-domain effect. Frequency effects (filters, EQ) and amplitude effects (compressors, envelopes) won't have problems with being split, but time-domain effects like reverb and echo will have an issue. Imagine if the echo from one segment spills over into the next? I suppose you could extend the echo beyond the given data, and the host machine could mix them with the next machines data for a result. But what about multitapping echoes, where the echoes can themselves be echoed? Problems arise even with non-realtime processing.
The ideal solution is dedicated hardware, either internally (programmable DSPs with VST plugins for them) or externally (banks of I/O with external reverb and such). Both probably cost more money than software, but you pay a price for realtime. mLAN is just an implementation of the latter idea, using Ethernet for the I/O and the dedicated DSPs for the effects.
Finally, for all you Linux weenies who are crying "Why Windows for audio?" - I hate to break it to you, but Linux isn't very good for real-time. In fact, in some ways it's worse than Windows. I'm not a programmer - these are the words of a friend who is, and manufactures timing-critical show-control hardware and software. For a long time (as long as it was practical) they used Amigas, because the RT support was better. Eventually, they moved over to NT, because it was the best available.
So, for the foreseeable future, it looks like the best investment is still decent analog gear - after all, the EQ on my old RAMSA analog mixer doesn't add 5 ms of delay to my signal.
If you'd actually READ THE STORY , you would have known that RIAA was not behind this at all. RIAA actually benefits when the number of music-playing stations increases, since their royalties come from the number of times a song is played on-air, not number of listeners.
If you'd actually DONE YOUR HOMEWORK you would know that the RIAA makes nothing from broadcast. ASCAP, SESAC, and BMI collect broadcast fees - the RIAA is funded exclusively by two things - dues from member labels, and the money it makes in lawsuits. Royalties for the physical media (CDs, cassettes, tapes, etc.) go to the copyright holder - in most cases, unfortunately, this is the record label. Occasionally, it is the artist. Broadcast royalties are collected by the rights organizations, and eventually paid to the artists (after a significant chunk of change is deducted.) In fact, the RIAA has no financial interest in broadcast at all, other than the financial interest of its members.
However, as the RIAA is most influenced by the big 3 (it's only three these days - sad, isn't it?) they did have a interest in this. These LPFM stations likely wouldn't have played much major label music at all. The RIAA views LPFM spectrum space as unprofitable, compared to the money they could make with more bad commercial stations occupying this space.
Do your homework - just because a story doesn't mention someone doesn't mean they aren't involved.
As to NPR - they've been bad for a while. Pacifica is no better, these days - check out Savepacifica's Web Site for some reasons. The only good public radio anymore is locally produced, non-syndicated radio, and that's rarer than an unbought PS2.
In comparison to webcasting gear.... oh, let's see. The prices for FM gear are from Broadcast Warehouse
Webcasting requires: a) a computer of enough power to webcast. Let's call it $500, which may be on the low end. b) a broadband connection ($50 a month), unless you're casting to 1 (one) person at a time, which would seem to defeat the purpose. So, $500 to start, plus $50 a month.
LPFM equipment costs. One piece FM limiter/exciter/transmitter, 150W, $1500. Now. Let's compare.
I'm not including common costs - music, CD players, and mixer, because those will be needed for either (unless you plan on broadcasting MP3 only - which is possible.) A mic is also not included for the same reason, although computer mics are completely unacceptable in terms of fidelity.
They'll both sound about the same, depending on how close to the antenna you are.
Costs? At $50 a month broadband fees, it'll only take 20 months to recoup equipment differences. And as these licenses are issued for 8 year periods, this isn't that long.
Which will have more listeners? The radio wins again. Why? Well, because anyone can listen to the radio. At a quick count, in my apartment I have 6 FM receivers, plus one in my car and one at work. At my parent's house, I would guess there at least 20 in various locations. How many webcasting receivers? Two in my apartment, none at my parents house (they have modems.) People can't listen to a webcast while they drive, which is where many people listen, especially during rush hour.
So, is this for people who want to play around with radio? Nah. The startup cost is way too high for your average student who just wants to mess around for a couple months and then forget about it. But a persistent community entity? Most of them can probably find the $1500, especially if they believe in it. Dedicated radio pirates? IF they haven't yet been caught (thereby losing any chance at a license) then they'll jump at the chance to broadcast legally. I know a few, and all of them did.
The FCC finally did something right. They want LPFM. They had good reasons why it wouldn't damage spectrum integrity. They were going to legitimize a valuable resource that had been forced to go underground (pirate radio) and thereby eliminate some of the people who had been doing real damage to the spectrum. And they were overruled by the corporate controlled Congress. Why? Because the NAB was worried. Who controls the NAB? All those major radio stations - the few innovative radio stations left (WFMU, WCBN, WXOU, WORT to name a couple off the top of my head) don't have that much of a voice in there, compared to the 300+ stations owned by Clear-Channel.
So, let's applaud the FCC, and William Kennard, for trying to do something right. The culprits in this are Congress and the NAB, for usurping the FCC's right to determine who has access to the airwaves.
I'll get off my soapbox now - it's probably too late. Do what you can, though - write, e-mail, whatever. Support good local radio if you have it. Listen to it - most of us (shameless plug alert!) broadcast online.
Fees are based, essentially, on the size of the possible audience. Bigger market, higher fees. Non-commercials have a much lower flatrate fee. So, yes, Station A pays more - it's generally done as a yearly flat rate payment.
And, unfortunately, mixing in country music is likely to increase audience share. Creepy, but true.
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OK. Working for a small college radio station (200 watts, but we're good) - taxes for on air broadcasts? There are two things you might mean.
If you mean the ASCAP/BMI/SESAC fees, those go to songwriters organizations that (theoretically) pay the musicians. The FCC sees not a dime of that money.
Then we pay another, 3rd party, company to measure our signal to ensure we aren't overmodding, overtransmitting, and such things. The FCC can slap us with a fine, if we overbroadcast, but they don't see our money in a regular form.
What you might be thinking of is the spectrum fee commercial stations play. They pay for a broadcast frequency to use, essentially. It's always the stations responsibility to control their transmissions.
And the FCC is not "for" making sure signals don't bleed into one another. Their job is to ensure the use and integrity of the communications spectrum - mostly, they're in charge of divvying up a limited resource. Unfortunately, they tend to go corporate.
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I think you missed his point.
No, wait, you did!
$250,000 is enough to buy a very respectable personal studio, assuming you already have a room you can use for it.
$500,000 if the room needs acoustical work.
As to that half-million figure, it's still ridiculous, unless you're spending MONTHS in the studio. Even the biggest studios don't charge more than 100-200 per hour. 16 hour days are bad enough. So, at worst, $3200 per day, plus a salary for your engineer and producer - add 100%. So, $6400 per day, at the outside?
Multiply that by a couple weeks in the studio, which is the most anyone except manufactured pop stars should need. $6400 * 21 days = $134,400
So, in the most expensive case, an album by a real musician should take no more than 135,000 dollars to record. Considering that many truly great studios cost a lot less than 200 dollars per hour, and that 16 hour days are relatively excessive....
Well, those RIAA figures look a bit suspicious now, don't they? And you can still build a quite respectable studio for a quarter or half million.
Analog computers were used for orbital calculations for a simple reason:
It's *very* easy to do differential and integral equations in analog circuits. It's much harder to do them digitally.
Orbital and aerospace/ballistic calculations involve lots of integro-differential equations.
FWIW, there's a (relatively) cheap source of analog computers available still - analog synthesizers. They can be interlinked and interchanged with analog computers, and the demands of music make sure they're fairly accurate. Wouldn't trust the space shuttle to an MOTM synth, but then again, I'd just use a binary computer.
From interviews I've conducted with more than a few artists, both major label and indy (includes Foetus, Firewater, Techno Animal, and a few others)
They dislike the RIAA. They dislike Napster. Both are seen as detrimental to the artist and the artists ability to survive.
Lastly, only the Government could force me to wear a chip. If we are to be enslaved, it won't be the mega-corps that dictate it. It might be a collaboration between the mega-corps and Government that dictates it, but I don't see any reason whatsoever to believe that Bush is any more likely to usher this in than a Democrat (see above).
Only the government can force you to wear a chip. True. Now, let's go a little further. Imagine if Sony, Yamaha, Harmon-Kardon, and Pioneer put a little bug in their home theatre gear. It recorded what you said, used the "ambience" DSP to process it for interesting expressions, and sent it up the "internet radio" broadband connection it possesses.
I don't really think this is happening right now. I just wanted to make the point that any successful company could use a similar tactic. Force, no. But a corporation could pretty easily trick you into wearing a chip.
Just one more note - Slashdot story on the next Nielsen system.
TVT is an independent in only the loosest sense of the term. They also have been prone to some nasty, nasty behavior with their artists.
They're the biggest indie label, with revenues of about $50 million. They're also notable for doing a lot of very major label things to their acts - they don't fit the "artist-friendly" indie image. Notably, they severely damaged the WaxTrax! imprint, changing its focus.
Also, they completely screwed over Trent Reznor. They prevented him from releasing material, and in order to allow him to leave his label contract, they retained financial interest in all future albums.
Don't be fooled. TVT is not a "small" record label. They just happen not to be affiliated with any of the seven... no, six... no, five... no, four majors.
They operate the same. Observe this link to Steve Albini's explanation Some Of Your Friends.
The fact that the article is dated in 1993.
Hear, hear....
Then again, I don't think Xerox has a whole lot to worry about with respect to Canon copiers blowing up...
I mean, who wouldn't want to say "The Canon blew up."???
It's a sound thing. Say it out loud.
Freedom of speech impared. I don't know what the freedom of speech laws in Canada are, but here in the US you are (normally) allowed to say what you want. where you want, to whoever you want. I don't know if this would be considered limiting this or not.
:)
No, it wouldn't. See the decisions regarding freedom to broadcast (i.e. the regulations that prevent pirate radio.) You can still say whatever you want, to whoever you want, whenever you want. However, you have no given right to the method to do so. Cell service is neither a god nor government given right.
For the record, I love my phone. For the record, I'm currently researching the difficlty of building a jammer myself. For experimental purposes, of course.
Hate to break it to you, but.... the UK is *not* going to start a war over this. Period. Murder is not (yet at least) an acceptable solution to legal problems, and there is no possible way the UK could cover up what is effectively murdering a country.
And likely, the "squatters" (they have every right to be there, as they aren't in anyone else's soil, and seem to have done everything to declare themselves a sovereign country) have a lot more than a couple firearms. Remember that heavy weaponry is pretty easily available on the black market, for those with cash. If you can afford to set up a sovereign off-shore platform, you can afford to buy yourself a few guided missiles and/or torpedoes to protect it.
Do you really think England would risk losing several multi-million dollar airplanes, or a billion dollar warship, over this?
Who do you think the movie industry will go to when compression gets good enough to push it over broadband?
It already is. Or hadn't you noticed?
Radio stations would use the same or a similar service.
No, they wouldn't. Here's why.
Option A: You are a commercial radio station. You play something on the order of (12 songs per hour * 24 hours * 7 days) 2016 songs per week. Just for fun, we'll assume there are actually that many different songs on your playlist. For most commercial stations, this isn't true. Guess what? You already have every single one of these songs, on CD, for free. Because the record labels send them to you, so you can play them. So, commercial stations will have no interest in this, because their songs are programmed in advance.
Option B: You are a non-commercial station, like (shameless plugging alert) WFMU, WCBN, or WFHB. You probably would want something of this sort. However, these stations tend to have an extensive library of older titles, as well as the new CDs labels send them. The only things they would tend to look for are obscure old releases they don't have, and new releases they haven't received. Speaking as a DJ at WCBN (hence the shameless portion of above plug,) I find 95% of what I want to play in my collection or the station's library. Although I wouldn't mind a similar service's availability, it's not necessary, and likely would not be worth it as a pay service.
I don't know about that. I think there is abundant evidence from AM radio and Fox News itself that over the past few years many people are only listening to the news that has the ideological slant and filtration that they want.
You mean, just like Slashdotters??
What about the side-effect this would have on sampling, if it were to go through?
This would effectively establish a simple procedure for guaranteed rights to sample a song, with no regard to fair use one way or another. As long as you paid the fee, you're allowed to use the entire song or pieces thereof. Thus, you could legitimately sample it.
Of course, due to the wording of what Hatch said, this likely wouldn't apply to CDs, but imagine if it were extended... suddenly, sampling an artists song is good. The original artist is compensated, there're no worries about permissions or fair use, and new artists can receive inspiration from whence they will.
Preach on, Brother Hatch! Extend this, so that compulsory licensing could be applied to ALL forms of music. Imagine that... copyright limited to originator of work, and compulsory licensing for all. A truely free America.
Because, as someone else will/has no doubt pointed out - American Law != Worldwide Law.
Of course, you're still wrong.
Let's go over this. It's called compulsory licensing because the *copyright holder* (your friend, I assume) receives *compulsory* (also known as mandatory) payments.
So, let's go over this. Your friend's CD that she made, she releases. She makes all the money, but pays all the costs. Then somebody else decides to include her song on a pay website. Every time somebody downloads this song, she gets paid. No infrastructural costs. Just, in effect, a royalty.
What's she complaining about?
Yep. Put a Faraday cage in. Of course, whenever a (door/window/pet flap/anything) opens, your cage breaks. You did know that, right?
A Faraday cage isn't effective in a general environment for this very reason - it requires that it be *completely* closed to work. Also, have you ever seen the doors that work properly as a Faraday cage? Impressively thick and heavy. Also, expensive. Except for extremely security conscious environments (i.e. people who are worried about others reading the RF coming out of their monitor), no one seriously uses Faraday cages.
On the other hand, there would be a side benefit - no annoying cellphone ringing!
Who thinks that Aqua really isn't that pretty of an interface anyway?
I'm talking style-wise. I've not yet used it, so obviously in terms of HMI I can't talk, but I think that the screenshots I've seen just aren't attractive.
Then again, I think iMacs look like those cheap plastic toys you bought when you were five that broke before you got them home from the store....
Wait a second. Aren't they?
At any rate, Apple has devolved to a company that innovates in exteriors, not interiors. They'd be just as well off designing a way to put PCs in tacky plastic cases. In fact, they'd probably make a lot more money doing that.
Actually, DAT tapes do still exist. Pretty much solely in recording. At any rate, the DAT format existed before CDs did - CDs didn't kill DAT. The RIAA did, by insisting on surcharges on blank media to prevent copying (sound familiar, anyone?)and surcharges on recorders. To make up for piracy.
End result? If I want to record my own music that I compose on a DAT, I pay money to make up for the (non-existent) "piracy this format will promote."
RIAA, MPAA? I'm forming the KEIAA - Kill Entertainment Industry Associations Association.
Check out some of the research being done at MIT's Lincoln Labs on automated electronic attack countermeasures.
Bottleneck Verification to find novel attacks, a method that can seriously reduce new root-attacks, including un-identified ones.
Dynamic reconfiguration for survivability, a technique for surviving DDoS attacks.
Development of intrusion detection methods, another abstract on techniques for automatic detection/reaction.
Actually, automated IC bears a surprisingly high resemblance to speech-recognition problems, another high-point of Lincoln Labs.
Lincoln Labs, in conjunction with DARPA, is also doing real-world evaluations of actual ICE. This is the sort of thing ISPs need to be paying attention to, as the research being done here is what's going to be protecting their networks, soon.
It's different.
/.er says "They're helping expose security flaws" etc. they're doing just that - taking advantage of a *flaw* in that ISP or server's configuration. In general, this comment is restricted to the following situation.
Usually, when a
1 - The flaw is relatively unpublicized. And:
2 - The flaw isn't a brute force flaw.
This situation doesn't meet these standards - this is, essentially, a brute force flaw. DoS is the equivalent of trying every single password out for a login ID - given sufficient time, it will eventually break the protection without *any* fault from the server.
Yes, this is a simplified argument (there are ways to prevent brute-forcing passwords at the login prompt) but it does discern the essential difference between destruction for the sake of destruction (DoS) and defacement. It's the difference between vandalism and arson - I mean, yes, Janet Reno had a Hitler mustache, but so what? She does normally, too, it just isn't as obvious. =)
I hate to say it, but... American Customs more friendly than Canadian?? Are you crazy?
I've dealt with several different sets of Customs in my life. One of these was Israeli Customs. They were thorough, quick, polite, and overall a pleasure to deal with. Why? Because they're trying to find the psychotics with heavy weaponry.
Contrast this to American Customs, who I deal with every time I want to go to Windsor to (drink/dance/eat/pick up *legal* OTC codeine) take your pick. Canadian Customs on the way in? "How are you, sir? Destination? Length of stay? Thank you, have a good day."
American Customs, next day, on my way back. "Step out of the car while we slash your seat cushions, forcibly body-search you, and send you on your way with a wrecked car and severe pain, no recompense."
In retrospect, I'll take Israeli or Canadian Customs over US any day.
As to the 40% content regulation - even with that, most Canadian radio I hear is better than what I can pick up Stateside, at least for commercial stations. I'm not a Tragically Hip fan, but they're sure as hell better than 90% of what passes for "radio" on most stations.
I live in the States, for now. And as soon as I graduate, I'm likely to be moving to somewhere which makes sense.
OK. There are a couple of possibilities here.
One - you're using real time effects processing. In this case, the latencies across a network would kill you. It is generally accepted that the human sense of hearing can distinguish sounds within 3 milliseconds of one another (Bracewell's Sound For Theatre.) 3 milliseconds latency is hard enough for software on the host PC to meet as a goal - keeping the response of all the computers within a cluster to under 3 milliseconds distance from one another would be difficult. A trained musician (I live with one and have tested this, FWIW) will get very confused if monitoring latency causes them to hear what they're playing more than about 10 ms from when they play it.
In the second case, non real-time post-processing, a cluster would be more useful. Essentially, it would be a parallelization process - each computer in the cluster gets a chunk (perhaps even allocated by some measure of speed) and they all grind away seperately and return their results to the host, which reintegrates the data into a continous whole. However, problems arise when the effect you're using is a time-domain effect. Frequency effects (filters, EQ) and amplitude effects (compressors, envelopes) won't have problems with being split, but time-domain effects like reverb and echo will have an issue. Imagine if the echo from one segment spills over into the next? I suppose you could extend the echo beyond the given data, and the host machine could mix them with the next machines data for a result. But what about multitapping echoes, where the echoes can themselves be echoed? Problems arise even with non-realtime processing.
The ideal solution is dedicated hardware, either internally (programmable DSPs with VST plugins for them) or externally (banks of I/O with external reverb and such). Both probably cost more money than software, but you pay a price for realtime. mLAN is just an implementation of the latter idea, using Ethernet for the I/O and the dedicated DSPs for the effects.
Finally, for all you Linux weenies who are crying "Why Windows for audio?" - I hate to break it to you, but Linux isn't very good for real-time. In fact, in some ways it's worse than Windows. I'm not a programmer - these are the words of a friend who is, and manufactures timing-critical show-control hardware and software. For a long time (as long as it was practical) they used Amigas, because the RT support was better. Eventually, they moved over to NT, because it was the best available.
So, for the foreseeable future, it looks like the best investment is still decent analog gear - after all, the EQ on my old RAMSA analog mixer doesn't add 5 ms of delay to my signal.
If you'd actually READ THE STORY , you would have known that RIAA was not behind this at all. RIAA actually benefits when the number of music-playing stations increases, since their royalties come from the number of times a song is played on-air, not number of listeners.
If you'd actually DONE YOUR HOMEWORK you would know that the RIAA makes nothing from broadcast. ASCAP, SESAC, and BMI collect broadcast fees - the RIAA is funded exclusively by two things - dues from member labels, and the money it makes in lawsuits. Royalties for the physical media (CDs, cassettes, tapes, etc.) go to the copyright holder - in most cases, unfortunately, this is the record label. Occasionally, it is the artist. Broadcast royalties are collected by the rights organizations, and eventually paid to the artists (after a significant chunk of change is deducted.) In fact, the RIAA has no financial interest in broadcast at all, other than the financial interest of its members.
However, as the RIAA is most influenced by the big 3 (it's only three these days - sad, isn't it?) they did have a interest in this. These LPFM stations likely wouldn't have played much major label music at all. The RIAA views LPFM spectrum space as unprofitable, compared to the money they could make with more bad commercial stations occupying this space.
Do your homework - just because a story doesn't mention someone doesn't mean they aren't involved.
As to NPR - they've been bad for a while. Pacifica is no better, these days - check out Savepacifica's Web Site for some reasons. The only good public radio anymore is locally produced, non-syndicated radio, and that's rarer than an unbought PS2.
In comparison to webcasting gear.... oh, let's see. The prices for FM gear are from Broadcast Warehouse
Webcasting requires: a) a computer of enough power to webcast. Let's call it $500, which may be on the low end. b) a broadband connection ($50 a month), unless you're casting to 1 (one) person at a time, which would seem to defeat the purpose. So, $500 to start, plus $50 a month.
LPFM equipment costs. One piece FM limiter/exciter/transmitter, 150W, $1500. Now. Let's compare.
I'm not including common costs - music, CD players, and mixer, because those will be needed for either (unless you plan on broadcasting MP3 only - which is possible.) A mic is also not included for the same reason, although computer mics are completely unacceptable in terms of fidelity.
They'll both sound about the same, depending on how close to the antenna you are.
Costs? At $50 a month broadband fees, it'll only take 20 months to recoup equipment differences. And as these licenses are issued for 8 year periods, this isn't that long.
Which will have more listeners? The radio wins again. Why? Well, because anyone can listen to the radio. At a quick count, in my apartment I have 6 FM receivers, plus one in my car and one at work. At my parent's house, I would guess there at least 20 in various locations. How many webcasting receivers? Two in my apartment, none at my parents house (they have modems.) People can't listen to a webcast while they drive, which is where many people listen, especially during rush hour.
So, is this for people who want to play around with radio? Nah. The startup cost is way too high for your average student who just wants to mess around for a couple months and then forget about it. But a persistent community entity? Most of them can probably find the $1500, especially if they believe in it. Dedicated radio pirates? IF they haven't yet been caught (thereby losing any chance at a license) then they'll jump at the chance to broadcast legally. I know a few, and all of them did.
The FCC finally did something right. They want LPFM. They had good reasons why it wouldn't damage spectrum integrity. They were going to legitimize a valuable resource that had been forced to go underground (pirate radio) and thereby eliminate some of the people who had been doing real damage to the spectrum. And they were overruled by the corporate controlled Congress. Why? Because the NAB was worried. Who controls the NAB? All those major radio stations - the few innovative radio stations left (WFMU, WCBN, WXOU, WORT to name a couple off the top of my head) don't have that much of a voice in there, compared to the 300+ stations owned by Clear-Channel.
So, let's applaud the FCC, and William Kennard, for trying to do something right. The culprits in this are Congress and the NAB, for usurping the FCC's right to determine who has access to the airwaves.
I'll get off my soapbox now - it's probably too late. Do what you can, though - write, e-mail, whatever. Support good local radio if you have it. Listen to it - most of us (shameless plug alert!) broadcast online.
Assistant manager of a college station.
Fees are based, essentially, on the size of the possible audience. Bigger market, higher fees. Non-commercials have a much lower flatrate fee. So, yes, Station A pays more - it's generally done as a yearly flat rate payment.
And, unfortunately, mixing in country music is likely to increase audience share. Creepy, but true.
OK. Working for a small college radio station (200 watts, but we're good) - taxes for on air broadcasts? There are two things you might mean.
If you mean the ASCAP/BMI/SESAC fees, those go to songwriters organizations that (theoretically) pay the musicians. The FCC sees not a dime of that money.
Then we pay another, 3rd party, company to measure our signal to ensure we aren't overmodding, overtransmitting, and such things. The FCC can slap us with a fine, if we overbroadcast, but they don't see our money in a regular form.
What you might be thinking of is the spectrum fee commercial stations play. They pay for a broadcast frequency to use, essentially. It's always the stations responsibility to control their transmissions.
And the FCC is not "for" making sure signals don't bleed into one another. Their job is to ensure the use and integrity of the communications spectrum - mostly, they're in charge of divvying up a limited resource. Unfortunately, they tend to go corporate.