Interview With Lucas Gonze of Webjay

Richard MacManus writes "I've published an interview with Lucas Gonze, creator of the P2P music-sharing web app Webjay. Lucas was an early developer of peer-to-peer applications and back in 2000 he created a P2P start-up called World OS (the product was called Goa). In this interview we discuss World OS / Goa, how it compared to other P2P apps such as Gnutella, the 'Internet as Platform' concept, how Webjay works, some P2P History and Decentralization Theory, and ways around the legal hassles of P2P."

How in the world...

Do you see p2p becoming anything other than an academic plaything? It's inherent "sometimes" nature (Sometimes you'll find the file you are looking for, sometimes it's busy/not found due to you not having the right connections) would seem to run counter to most business' requirements for reliability. How do you plan on redressing this?

Joe

Re:How in the world...

Yeah, man, the basic principles of decentralization are still quite sound. I mean, how'd you get here? typing "66.35.250.150"?

The thing is, Webjay [webjay.org] (Gonze's current project, for those who skipped the article) isn't a decentralized service. It's a centralized index of audio from all over the net. It provides tools to aggregate disparate and far-flung audio into a single playlist, and lets users judge. It's pretty cool, actually, because it solves (or tries to solve) a big problem with online free music, which is that nobody wants to weed through the crap to find the good stuff.

p2p is dying.

P2P is becoming viewed more and more like warez. Whether or not there are thorny legal issues, it will still die. Joe User doesn't know his rights, he just listens to the propaganda.

Lucas gone Gonzo

when I first read this, I thought it was going to be another negative Star Wars thread:
"Interview with Lucas gone Gonzo"

music industry revolution

i'm sure it's been said before, but i haven't seen it put this way:

why don't artists just give away their music, and charge for concerts?

the cost of distributing used to be the promotion of a cd, the making of the cds, yadda. but with p2p those costs go to nothing.

artists don't make much on cd sales anyways
they make most of their money on concerts as it is.
(from what i've heard)

Re:music industry revolution

just playing devil's advocate here, but:

why don't artists just give away their music, and charge for concerts?

the cost of distributing used to be the promotion of a cd, the making of the cds, yadda. but with p2p those costs go to nothing.

the cost of a CD is more than just distributing: it is also the manufacture of the cd (ok, this again goes to $0 when you just go via P2P), cost of recording, administrative overhead, ....

Recording music is not cheap. While yes, it is possible to setup a home recording studio fairly inexpensivly that sounds decent, to get really good quality sound you're paying lots of money (for example, a good studio mic can run thousands of dollars). Building a studio is expensive, and thus renting one is expensive. Not to mention, you have to pay your sound engineer, support staff, etc.

Also, someone's gotta figure out how you're doing with fans (which is much harder to do with P2P than CD sales). Are you popular enough in Toronto that it's worth looking into playing a concert there?

You've also got to pre-pay for a lot of the production - renting a stage if required, sound gear, lights, trucks (if touring), paying security, roadies, hotels, food..

Now, here's the big problem. Where do you get that money? Do you go to the bank and say "hey look, I need $80,000 to put on this concert.."? Perhaps mortgage your house or sell your car.. what happens if you only sell 20% of the tickets you expected, because 5 other bands that are bigger than you are playing the same city the same night (since that's the only way they can make money now)?

While I disagree a lot with the way record companies work, there's not many places that will spend $1-million on you, and if you don't "make it", just let it go..

Is webjay really p2p?

i thought it's just playlists collection of music/video on the web. Does that qualify as mpoint to point?

P2P as the larger Internet

Most of the criticisms folks sling against P2P these days are surprisingly similar to the ones they addressed against the Internet about ten years ago.

Then, it was "You can't trust anyone on the internet. You can't depend on a web server being there when you need it. And you can't really get people to buy anything from you!"

I think those criticisms answered themselves with time. The Net changed business and dating forever, and now seems to be leading the U.S.A. into a great standoff between the intelligent and the stupid. (You know what I'm talking about.)

And P2P is just for copyright pirates? Get real. It's a mass movement that's going to destroy copyright as we know it. Then what will you say it's for?

Don't Steal Music

Gonze has a good perspective on piracy:

I don't believe there is a moral duty to stick to authorized music. I do believe that politeness is the only path to a political solution. If somebody wants me to stand on my head while listening to their music, I will either stand on my head or find other music. If somebody wants me to listen to their music, they will have to make it available under terms that I can accept.

Politeness is a winner tactic. It forces the crappy businessmen in the recording industry to stop hiding behind piracy. It makes the good guys smell serious. It's a dignified way of living. It helps musicians who respect listeners get popular at the expense of musicians who don't. The sole problem with politeness is that the technology and culture to filter up the best music libre is still immature.

In other words, don't steal music. Take music from people who give you permission to do so. It's common decency and politeness. Gonze's technology is supposed to help you find music like this which is just as good as the crap you've been stealing.

Sounds to me like it's worth a try.

Lucas Gonze

I've been personnally in touch with Lucas Gonze on some Creative Commons mailinglists, and he's a very nice guy.

But when I read this from his interview :

" Webjay will be history the instant somebody sues, no matter how stupid and wrong the suit is. Obviously. "

Well, that's not serious in any way... I mean how can he go on with this project, under this kind of threat ?

Isn't there a foundation like the FSF, but for P2P, which could help with at least obviously "wrong" suits ?

off: blink

Wow, I thought the blink tag on webpages was dead.

I was wrong : http://webjay.org/about [webjay.org]

Re:Bit Torrent!

BitTorrent is a form of P2P.

Re:A side thought

BitTorrent doesn't just use a "line". You download from multiple people simultaneously, and those peope change over time, so you're not just downloading from a single person. Also, the more you upload to others, the more you'll be favored when clients are choosing who to upload to.

Re:A side thought

No, bittorrent does not work like that, you download from multiple sources. Peercast works like that, but not bittorrent.

Re:A side thought

are you on crack, mate?