Free Chicagoland Music

WFMU’s Free Music Archive–as discussed Friday on the blog and radioshow–is featuring a whole mess of music from artists around my new hometown of Chicago.

Happy downloading and listening!

Free Music Archive

On today’s radioshow I interview WFMU station manager Ken Freedman about the station’s very cool Free Music Archive project. The idea of the Archive is to take the fundamental idea of sharing Creative Commons-licensed music online, as seen with sites like Archive.org, and add a curatorial element. According to Ken, the goal is to replicate the editorial judgment inherent in radio, a record label, music venue or gallery where the artists, songs and pieces have been carefully chosen. Thus the Archive staff and affiliates are engaged in proactively inviting artists and labels to contribute music rather than just opening uploads to anyone.

As someone who has tried to pick through numerous music sharing sites I have certainly been frustrated by trying to find artists and tracks that suit me. In our interview Ken points out that these open access sites tend to be dominated by people making electronic music or jam bands, which seem to be two groups inclined to be more inclined to use the internet or to share music than, say, modern classical composers and performers.

Over the last ten years WFMU has really solidified its reputation as a cutting-edge freeform music station driven by taste and artistic value. And it’s achieved that by carefully selecting the DJs it puts on air and giving those DJs full control over their programs. On top of that the station has been on the forefront of using the internet and webcasting to both better serve it’s local audience and to reach a broader, global audience.

As one might guess, much of WFMU’s aesthetic appeals to me, and so I am very much looking forward to the debut of the full Free Music Archive. Like a favorite record label, publishing house or rock club, I have come to trust that ‘FMU is likely to steer me towards interesting, challenging and appealing music that I might not otherwise encounter. Simply, I expect them to sort through the chaff and present to me the wheat, even if it’s not everyone’s cup of tea (to mix my metaphors).

I don’t think that the Free Music Archive is intended to be or will be a challenge, substitute or replacement for open submission archives. The internet continues to be a big place and there’s plenty of room for both approaches.

One delicious irony of the Free Music Archive is that it was seeded by a grant from the state of New York that comes from the money received in the big payola settlement of a few years ago. I love that an archive of Creative Commons music is being funded by the entertainment cartel RIAA-members.

The Archive is not yet online, though Ken says they’re currently planning for a launch date of November. However, they’ve been posting selected tracks on a project blog.

You can listen to my interview with Ken Freedman about the Free Music Archive at the radioshow page. To learn more about WFMU and the station’s unique approach to internet broadcasting listen to my first interview with Ken on the Nov. 11, 2005 edition of the radioshow.

Congress Says, Let’s Screw Up Broadcast Radio, too

Never doubt the power of the lobby. Despite all the public uproar over the rising royalties levied on online radio broadcasters, paid to the recording industry, Congress is now considering putting similar royalties onto traditional broadcast radio.

The fact that no royalties are paid by radio stations to the owners of the “performance” on a recording (typically a record company) is the result of a law passed a half-century ago that specifically exempts radio. The rationale behind the law is that radio provides promotion for the music roughly equal to the profit derived by playing it. Now suffering from over a decade of bad business decisions, the recording industry is again turning to Congress to help save it from itself by biting one of the last hands feeding it.

On one hand it’s hard to get worked up about this effort. I find it hard to empathize with either Clear Channel or Warner Brothers in this battle. But as a community broadcaster I am more concerned about the effect of royalty payments on noncommercial stations that do not profit from the music they play.

Another big concern is the possible extension of internet radio restrictions to broadcast. In particular, the DMCA places limits on the number of songs from a particular artist or album that can be played in a row, and within a specific amount of time. These are silly restrictions to begin with. While they are intended to thwart listeners who want to rip an album side from a net radio station, the reality is that ripping internet radio streams is pretty lousy way to obtain free music compared to file sharing and other methods. Mostly, they just add a layer of senseless bureaucracy and limitation to internet stations.

So forcing these restrictions onto broadcast stations is similar stupid and would disproportionately affect community and college stations, which tend to play more freeform mixes of music. And, in a other instance of biting the hand that feeds, these stations also tend to play to a more loyal music-obsessed audience.

According to the Broadcast Law Blog’s analysis of the bills in Congress the House’s version of the broadcast royalty bill would put these restrictions on traditional radio, and the Senate’s wouldn’t.

Who knows how far these bills will go, especially since they pit lobby against lobby. While the internet lobby was just getting its legs when the DMCA was passed, the NAB is an experienced old hand at pressing its interests in Congress. Nevertheless, I think if Congress is really willing to go forward with this nonsense some kind of exemption for noncommercial stations ought to be included at the very least–something that should have been included for internet stations to begin with.

Anarchy, Integrity and the Digital Marketplace, via a Double-Ended Podcast Interview

Michael W. Dean is the former lead singer of the 90s band Bomb, an author of instructional books, podcaster and is probably most well known for his documentary DIY or Die about independent artists. I watched DIY or Die a year or two ago and had made a note to get Michael on the radioshow, and then promptly forgot. Then this weekend I read this excellent commentary that he wrote for O’Reilly Digital Media, Anarchy, Integrity and the Digital Marketplace:

What I’m saying is this: I believe in a free-flowing global exchange of information. I believe free flow is important to continue advancements in art, science, and commerce. And I believe in Fair Use. But I also am not a communist, and I enjoy getting paid for something I work very hard on. I think the artist (or content creator, if you like) will do well to learn what all the various options are, all the different levels of copyright, copyleft, free, and pay, and adjust accordingly on a project-by-project basis.

Don’t believe the pundits, intellectuals, or dumpster-diving squatters who tell you that any one way is the right way or the wrong way. Don’t let anyone guilt you into doing anything you don’t want to do with your art. Your art is your baby. Respect it, love it, cherish it, but don’t devalue it just because “everyone’s doing it.”

Art belongs to the ages, but it primarily belongs to the artist. To you. You are free to do with your art as you please. And that’s true anarchy.

So i shot off an email to him and almost immediately received a positive response and we recorded an interview Monday night.

Be sure to tune in to this week’s radioshow to hear this very interesting interview with someone who is making a go of it as a multi-media independent artist. You can listen live Friday at 5:30 PM Central Time on WEFT’s live stream, or wait for the archive which will be posted by midnight Sunday.

And a quick note on the tech behind this particular interview. Michael suggested we do it “double-ended” where he recorded his voice in his podcast studio and I recorded my voice in my studio. We did the interview over Skype, which I also recorded so I would have a good sync reference. Michael uploaded a high-quality mp3 of his vocal track and I’m mixing it together with mine. Then it will sound like we were in the same room together.

That’s actually how a lot of public radio interviews are conducted, like on Fresh Air. All those celebrity guests don’t travel to Philadelphia to be in-studio with Terry Gross. Instead they go to some studio or station nearby where they record the celebrity’s voice as s/he speaks with Terry on the phone. Then the Fresh Air producers mix it all together.

Radio magic.

Make Noncommercial Online a Little More Like Noncommerical Broadcast

According to Broadcasting and Cable the Association of Public TV Stations has created a Digital Rights Coalition in order to ensure that some of the same Fair Use rights they enjoy for noncommercial TV broadcasts. Some of these rights are:

1) use copyrights audio in their shows without asking permission or paying, so long as no commercial use is made of them; 2) use published music, pictures or art works so long as they pay a license fee; and 3) teachers may record public TV shows for classroom use so long as the use is within seven days of initial airing and the copy they destroyed.

Sounds reasonable to me, though I would expect a collective whine from the content cartel, since they’ve taken every step of digitization to try and steal back control they weren’t supposed to have in the first place.

A hearty and vibrant noncommercial media is crucial to our culture and any hope of democracy. Provided the use really isn’t for profit, I don’t see why any noncommercial media producer shouldn’t enjoy these fair uses.

Ripping Video Streams with Real Player 11 beta

The beta of Real Player 11 came out the other day, for Windows only, and I have installed it and fooled around a bit. I do have to report that it does what it advertises: it very easily rips online video and saves it to your hard drive. From YouTube to streams coming off our Real Server at work, no glitches. If you ask it to, Real Player 11 installs a browser plug it making a “Download” button appear with embedded videos, making recording video a one-click operation.

The free version of Real Player downloads the video in whatever format it originated in. And if your machine has the proper player or codec installed to play the video in the first place, Real Player should play whatever you download, too (including Flash Video .flv files). The as yet unavailable Real Player Plus 11 promises to transcode videos into the format of your choice. I wonder if it’ll transcode Real Video, since Real has kept its audio and video codecs pretty locked up all these years. Even though you can find plenty of apps on the ‘net that will save them to other formats, no major commercial video app like Premiere or Cleaner will do it.

I also have to report that the installation process of Real Player 11 is significantly less evil than prior versions. Gone is having to register a username and password. And then, rather than just taking over playback of every media type on your system by default, Real Player instead asks if you would like it to take over the playback of any format not already claimed by another player. Indeed, the “media-type wars” may be closer to over.

I must admit that the simple video stream ripping will make my life easier in a lot of ways for simple fair use purposes, like research and teaching. Certainly there have been all sorts of stream ripping apps floating around the ‘net for years that will accomplish pretty much the same thing. But none are as easy or as well executed as Real Player. I only wonder if this feature will survive a possible legal attack.

Finally, Real Networks CEO Rob Glaser chose to answer some tough questions leveled by blogger Rafat Ali about Real’s new player. Regarding the legality of the record function, Glaser says:

The new RealPlayer is just like a VCR, a DVR, or a photocopier: It knows nothing about whether or not a piece of content is copyrighted. Like these earlier video players, the new RealPlayer facilitates many legal and appropriate uses, for instance downloading public domain content and content for which the owner has given permission.

I’m still not sure what the profit model is with the new Player, because it plays multiple media formats it doesn’t necessarily push people to use the Real Server. But maybe Real can figure out a a way to capitalize on the good karma of offering up something genuinely useful. Stranger things have happened.

Real’s New Survival Technique is Stream Ripping and Fair Use

I have no idea how I missed the big announcement at the end of May that Real’s next media player will feature the ability to record media streams in a whole host of formats — most notably, YouTube’s Flash video content.

(As a tangent, the way I found out is kind of interesting — it’s because a Real Networks product manager actually called me at work in response to an article I wrote for Streaming Media magazine that ended up on the front page of Streamingmedia.com. The university where I work has a site license for the Real Helix Server, so the call was actually more to talk about Real’s roadmap for the Server’s future in a browser plug-in media world. The call from Real wasn’t the only one I got from inside the streaming media “industry” in response to my article… didn’t realize how a little freelance writing would garner quite so much attention…. mostly from sales reps.)

As I noted last month while attending Streaming Media East, Real definitely needs something to stay in the game, since the rise of Flash Video has moved the media player game into the browser, making the separate media player app seem like a quaint relic compared to Google Video. However, with Microsoft offering its own in-browser player to compete with Flash, adding a third plug-in player from Real would be absurd, and probably a losing strategy.

Adding the ability to record media streams is a ballsy move that adds functionality that a lot of people want. In my university work setting, I often hear from faculty who would like to save online media for various research and teaching uses. Of course, there are various programs out there that will accomplish this with varying degrees of quality and ease, but few are simple to use or universal. The new Real Player is promised to download video in four of the major formats: Flash, Windows Media, QuickTime and Real. And, the Real Player should be free, rather than costing $50 – $100.

Of course, I’m in favor of media content being downloadable and shareable for Fair Use purposes, and I think there should be tools available that make this easy. For myself, just being able to more easily save copies of FCC hearing and meeting webcasts will be helpful in producing my radioshow.

It’s also good to hear that Real has cleaned up a lot of the annoying parts of its Player with the new version. Importantly, they’re removing the requirement to register and also no longer having the Player take over playback of every media type. As the Real Player blog says,

Remember the media-type wars where QuickTime, Windows Media and RealPlayer would battle for playback? We’re not playing anymore.

Now, of course it still is up for question about how Real makes any money with this free player. Most of their money comes from their server business and Rhapsody. I’m not sure if a much improved player will sell more servers, except for the fact that with a Real Server you will be able turn off the ability for the player to record a stream. But I hope extortion is not the way Real intends to make its business (acknowledging that the player is supposed to respect DRM and not permit protected content to be saved).

Perhaps this is a good karma move intended to improve the image of Real amongst the technorati — a sector where I think the bad habits of its previous version players has caused its reputation to be tarnished. Real CEO Rob Glaser makes some Jobsian remarks in a blog post last week, wherein he says,

Why the big change? I think it has to do with the fundamental nature of media business models. Media businesses are generally based on accumulating the biggest audience possible, which means going where the audience is. Approaches based on locking down the content out of a fear of piracy are self-defeating.

Whether this will work is anyone’s guess. Before any judgement can be made, we have to see the player first — the beta is scheduled to drop sometime this month.

SM East: Microsoft’s Bid To Beat Flash at the Plug-In Game

This morning’s keynote was Microsoft’s Sean Alexander giving a peek under the hood of its new Silverlight platform which offers a bi-platform (MacOS & Windows) browser plug-in rich media player that looks an awful lot like Flash. He also showed off MS’s new production suite offering design and authoring tools that look a lot like Adobe’s.

It’s an interesting challenge to Adobe’s Flash Video, especially since the media server is built-in to MS’s new server OS, and the plug-in is backwards compatible with older Windows Media versions. It also represents another sign that online video is busting out of the player and into the browser.

The problem for those of us in education and the grassroots is really choosing the platform you want to use so that your sites and content don’t look like 1999 web. Certainly, if your content is compelling and challenging compared to the mainstream that should bring people in. But in my everyday existence doing educational video I’m finding more students and faculty balking at having to use a player rather than watching right in the browser.

I don’t relish having to learn two entirely different development platforms, nor supporting both. For me, Flash is still ahead because it supports Linux, where Silverlight does not. Yet, as standards, neither are nearly as open as MPEG-4, or a codec unencumbered by patents and copyrights like Ogg Theora. Can the open source community meet this challenge?

Another question is: Where is Real Networks in all of this? Will their server start delivering Flash? Silverlight content? If Real won’t do these formats, or can’t offer something that competes in the browser, then their future isn’t looking so bright.

Technorati tag: Streaming Media East 2007

Headlines from the Feb. 2 radioshow: Journalists Beaten in Oaxaca, a Pro-Fair-Use Bill, The House’s Telecomm Agenda

Community Radio Journalists Beaten in Oaxaca
Two community radio journalists were beaten by state-supported militants in the Mexican state of Oaxaca on the night of January 24.

One was arrested. According to a report from the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters, known as AMARC, the incident occurred during a confrontation between militants of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, PRI, and the grassroots community council of San Antonio de Velasco in Oxaca. Both journalists report for community radio station Radio Calenda.

These acts of violence are part of an ongoing struggle between the former national ruling party PRI which is still in power in Oaxaca, and the popular movement that believes the state’s governor is illegally holding power.

AMARC says that this incident is one in a series of violence perpetuated by the Mexican state, which has used excessive force to attack freedom of expression, association and assembly, all of which have been widely documented by human rights organizations.

The state-sponsored beating of these two community journalists comes after a bad year in general for journalists in Mexico, where nine were killed in 2006, according to Reporters Without Borders. A significant portion of the violence against reporters happened in Oaxaca.

New Book Covers Oaxaca’s Popular Assembly

The ongoing popular resistance in that Mexican state is the subject of a new book by Nancy Davies, who appeared twice last year on this program. The book is titled “The People Decide: Oaxaca’s Popular Assembly,” and is being released by the publishing arm of NarcoNews.com.

The book brings together none months of Davies’ regular reports from Oaxaca, where she lives, and is compiled by George Salzman, who appeared with Davies on mediageek, and radical social philosopher James Herod, a member of the Lucy Parsons Center collective. The book includes an extensive introduction by Salzman, based on his own eyewitness experience in Oaxaca, along wit a special update from Davies appearing for the first time in print.

NarcoNews is a very grassroots organization that has been able to find the funds for an initial press run of 1000 copies. In order to fund a larger printing, NarcoNews is asking interested readers to reserve their copies in advance. You can find out more at NarcoNews.com

A Pro-Fair Use Bill

A bill that would undo some of the more odious portions of the Digital Milennium Copyright Act is due to be introduced before the end of the month by Virginia Rep. Rick Boucher. This bill, which failed in previous sessions of Congress, is supported by the Consumer Electronics Association, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Public Knowledge.

If passed Boucher’s bill would end the ban against using circumventing anti-piracy technologies for purposes that don’t otherwise break copyright law.

At the present time it is illegal to break anti-piracy tech, like the encoding on commercial DVD movies, in order to make a backup copy of the movie, or to extract a clip for use in a way that is legal under Fair Use provisions.

Boucher’s bill, which is not quite finished, aims to restore to people the ability and right to circumvent such encryption to make such legal uses of copyrighted material.

Predictably, both the movie and recording industry lobbies oppose the bill, and given that Hollywood is represented by many Democrats in Congress, there may be some bipartisan opposition in Congress too.

Laying out the House’s Telecomm Agenda
A little bit more of what the new Democratic Congress is going to do about the internet has become clearer. On Feb. 2, Massachussetts Rep. Edward Markey, the new chairman of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, delivered the keynote address at Consumer Federation of America’s Consumer Assembly in Washington, D.C. In it Markey outlined his committee’s telecommunications agenda for this session of Congress. He emphasized making broadband internet service ubiquitous and affordable, and ensuring Network Neutrality with what he called “an open architechture that supports internet freedom.”

Fellow Democrat Rep. Rick Boucher delivered a similar, but perhaps more industry-friendly message earlier the same week, speaking at the Third Annual State of the Internet Conference. He told the conference, “The Internet must remain open and accessible to all, but we don’t want to hobble innovation within the network.”

Bipartisan Hostility Towards Your Rights To Record and Enjoy Satellite & Net Radio

Sure, it looked like a new day in Congress with the Democrats taking over. This past weekend’s National Conference on Media Reform definitely reinforced that notion as it pertains to media ownership and internet freedom. But the entertainment industry and copyright cartel are a whole different she-bang.

Too many entertainment industry liberals are way to close to the Democratic party to let pass your right and ability to time shift music programming from satellite radio and the internet. There’s language taking aim at portable satellite radios that let you record and playback programs in a bill called the Platform Equality and Remedies for Rights Holders in Music Act, reintroduced by copyright crusaders from both sides of the aisle, Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Joseph Biden (D-Del.) and Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.).

According to CNet,

Radio listeners would be permitted to set their devices to automatically record full radio programs on certain channels at certain times. But allowing users to program their devices to automatically find and record specific sound recordings, artists or albums–say, only all Michael Jackson tracks played on the service–would be prohibited. So-called “manual” recording would be allowed, as long as it’s done “in a manner that is not an infringement of copyright.”

Nevermind that without this law, allowing listeners to find specific recordings would not be “an infringement of copyright,” in the first place.

What’s next? I’ll be allowed to TiVo a whole evening of prime-time TV, but not be able to find a specific program?