JWZ On Music Over The Internet

kchayer writes "JWZ ^[?] 's current obsession includes an audio webcast. Recently he added to the site a description of what it takes to broadcast music over the Internet. Makes for an interesting read, and a good summary of the DPRA, DMCA, their relationship with the RIAA, and other issues involving music copyright and the recording industry in general. His summary at the end says it best: "What's going on here is that the music industry establishment are absolutely terrified of the internet...and are trying to ^[?] force things to continue to be done as if turn-of-the-century technology was all we had to work with.""

Eligible Non-subscription Transmission question

Hey, does anyone know how similar those rules on Eligible Non-subscription Transmissions are to what "real" (ie, non-internet) radio stations have to abide by?

I'm talking about the "In a three hour period, you can't play more than three tracks from a given album, and no more than two consecutively" and "In a three hour period, you can't play more than four tracks by a given artist, and no more than three consecutively" restrictions.

Because, on Australian radio I've heard some great specials on particular artists, where many many more than 4 tracks get played in 3 hours. I've heard new albums played in full. So obviously APRA (the Australian version of ASCAP) doesn't enforce such conditions. I'd hate to think that radio stations in the USA missed out on the chance of such quality programming because of these rules..

Try Making DJ Mixes at Myplay.com

They let you 'legally' share music across accounts by making 'DJ Mixes' - Virtual compilation tapes of you favourite stuff which anyone can listen to. (One of the reasons why myplay.com was always better than my.mp3.com ;-)

The thing is they've clearly gone for the basic compulsory license because they have a rules checker which enforce DMCA compliance and tell you when your sequencing is illegal, it'll even fix it for you.

People should try it out because it's a nice working example of the DMCA sequencing rules in action.

(and you can also go listen to my latest 'mix' at
http://www.myplay.com/mp/playlist/now_playing.js p?plid=312651&start=1)

Re:What you need

Streaming over the internet is even easier...
- my first server went something like this...

soundcard -> mp3encoder -> file.mp3

then in my cgi-bin directory I had

#!/bin/sh
echo "Content-Type: audio/mpeg"
echo
tail -f file.mp3

JWZ is an interesting fellow..

From his leaving Netscape, and his neat little utilities he codes on the side, from a nightclub to this little tutorial about music law, JWZ is one keen cat.

It's nice, and refreshing to see people with high visibility in the computer sphere showing backbone, and talking HONESTLY about music law. Sure, there are plenty screaming "napster, napster", but few break it down this well.

What we really need to consider is just how fast technology is moving, and how easy it is becoming to circumvent laws, not on purpose, but on accident.

I look forward to the day when artists get paid fairly, and I can click a link for any song in the world.

Re:Property is not a God-given idea

Unfortunately, unless congress passes leglislation that prohibits the restrictions quickly being imposed on the internet by entertainment industries (limit( 1/x: x -> infinity)), our civil society will let the Music industry do whatever they want with their copyrights and licenses.

The law is on their side. The record company's had all the artists first borns signed over, and the atrotious "what if's" can scare enough business people (across most industries) to support legislation that enhances copyright restriction in the new digital age.

On the one hand we have the Wild Wild Web, which is still lawless, and vandels can run around anonymously producing whatever mischivousness (or lawlessness) that they desire. For example: Kiddi pr0n, nuclear bomb blue prints, pirated software (including music), DOS attacks, generally accessible objectionable material by minors...

The average person, when faced with these might get a little scared and say, "oh yeah, we should try and stop those". In the next decade or two, we're going to see the Internet infultrate our lives, which will require it's regulation. Sadly, we, the techni's, will be a minority influence on what we will and will not be allowed to do on the global network. Most likely, there will be licenses, jailable laws, monitors at every node, etc.

The regulations involving copyrighted music distribution on the net are really too soon to see the outcome. On the one hand, hands off government (aside from contractual enforcement), will allow the music industry to keep their cash cow. I don't think the general public is all too concerned if one industry looses revenue, but as with the above, I think the general public is concerned with autonomy and security on the internet - They'll vote on what-ever they have to.. Or whatever they're made to believe that they have to.

History would suggest that the net is going to become beurocratic to the point of unproductivity. The "Free lunch" we've been given will be abused and spoiled for the whole lot of us. Industry will win, resistance will be futile, you know, the whole bit. Might as well enjoy it while it lasts. :) Key point, keep a low profile. I can't believe that slashdot hasn't been flagged yet (with varoius posters submitting 'illegal' links, or saying 'naughty' things).

Can we form an anti-corporate party yet? Or is it too soon?

-Michael

Property is not a God-given idea

At the risk of sounding like a Marxist, let me point this out: Property is not a concept that we find in nature, and it's not an idea handed to us by God. It is an arbitrary social construct, a scheme of points and benefits that we set up so that all of society can benefit.

For example, most tribal societies didn't believe in the idea of owning land. Before the Industrial Revolution, the idea of somebody else owning the tools that they didn't use personally was also a bit counterintuitive. Eventually, people in society decided it might be beneficial to let those property rights exist, and they put them into place.

What does that have to do with copyright? Simple: Copyright is a system that we as a society set up to balance conflicting interests -- for the good of society as a whole. And if the circumstances change, we can change them, too. We should: I'm a firm believer that art, like software engineering, is extremely hard work, and that people should be compensated for it. (I studied both in college, and thought art was ten times asdifficult.) But I also believe that hamstringing new technologies just for the sake of preserving an outmoded system of compensation would only serve the best interests of corporate attorneys.

Re:Question: How are jukeboxes handled?

Actually, any place that has public performances of recorded music is supposed to pay songwriting royalties, usually through ASCAP or BMI. (And although this seems like more egregious corporate shakedown, let's note that the vast majority of these royalties go directly to bonafide flesh-and-blood songwriters, and not the record companies.) On the level of bars & restaurants, royalty payments seem to be irregular at best -- many bars have never been asked to pay. But some bars have had visits from reps from ASCAP or BMI, asking them to pay their royalty fee, yes.

The threat...

I've said it before and I'll say it again:
The real threat to the record megacorps lies not in users downloading songs instead of buying CD's.
It lies in artists bypassing the record companies.

A studio can be rented for a resonable amount of money, distribution can be done over the net.
The only remaining service that the record companies provide is promotion.
There are a lot of ways to promote your band without a record company, Even if you are a world-scale artist, it might be better to hire a PR-firm rather than a record company.

Re:Property is not a God-given idea

Property is not a concept that we find in nature

I think you want to say "trade" in place of property, because notions of ownership certainly are bovious in nature, while bartering is not (although a symbiotic relationship might approach this in one sense).

For example, most tribal societies didn't believe in the idea of owning land.

The overwhelming fact often ignored when discussing North American tribal societies is that the incredible abundance of resources made most notions of ownership unnecessay.

Were these same tribes to exist in a place like ancient Britain, where resources and land were more scarce, they would have certainly developed a notion of traded property.

Before the Industrial Revolution, the idea of somebody else owning the tools that they didn't use personally was also a bit counterintuitive.

Ever heard of the feudal system?

International issue...

Audio streaming over IP has the ability to cross borders, and the second that happens jurisdiction and exactly what laws apply, becomes a less-than-trivial issue. Restricting access to within a country can be difficult and is easy to work around (port bouncer anybody?)

The Australian alternative radio station Triple J [abc.net.au] does a netcast 24/7, but IIRC they killed that for the two weeks the olympics were on, because people in other countries would have heard news on the Sydney Olympics before their local IOC licensee got to it, and that would have raised hell.

when is the turn-of-the-century?

as if turn-of-the-century technology was all we had to work with.

but, turn of the century technology is all we have to work with!

It's all about control

Well duh, obviously these organisations are afraid of the internet, they are totally reliant upon traditional distribution and marketing channels to enforce their control over their market. It's hardly a suprise that given the means to implement totally different models they're not going to embrace them with the same fervour we see here.

The way I see it is that there are two issues here which contribute to the RIAA's crusade against online and digital music in all of its many forms. The first, and most obvious, is that they're not geared to operate in this way, and that it would take a lot of the profit out of their hands if they did. These organisations have built up multi-billion dollar business structures, and they've set them up to profit at every step. But online, many of these steps are irrelevent, and indeed all of the steps for which they are currently required (marketing and distribution being the main ones at the moment) may not be required. They're terrified that artists and customers may directly hook up.

Secondly, there's the fact that current efforts to implement online music have been headed by such blatent thievery such as Napster and Gnutella, systems in which the only winners would have been Shawn Fanning and co. Rather than allowing the RIAA to adopt online music gracefully, Napster has forced it to act before it loses all control over everything it has ever produced. At the moment, very few people in the music business seem to want this.

Unfortunately, between the ossification of the RIAA and the damage to online music that is Napster, it's likely that the advancement of digital music will slow to a crawl, and that only independent artists, with little to lose, will take full advantage of the internet.

The problem with legality

It seems that from a legal standpoint, we are *perpetually* behind the times. The law slowly drags its feet, and more often than not, it seems that big business takes advatage of this fact to maintain current holdings. For the moment it seems best to go do what you want! However, it's best to do this without getting to popular. If this plot fails due to legal reasons in the near future, the real future will be in independant bands who aren't seeking pay-to-play royalties.