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Gnomoradio: Creative Commons Music Sharing

Posted by michael on Fri Sep 10, 2004 10:48 AM
from the share-the-love dept.
An anonymous reader writes "I just stumbled upon Gnomoradio, a file sharing jukebox based on Creative Commons licenses. This program looks like a garage band's dream come true! It recommends songs based on each user's ratings, and has the capability to share them. Announced less than a year ago, the program has already made a great deal of progress, as can be seen from these screenshots. I downloaded the Debian package, and aside from a few interface quirks, the program works flawlessly. Is this the future of digital music, or should we be looking for something less centralized?"
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  • similar to irate (Score:5, Informative)

    by iamplupp (728943) on Friday September 10 2004, @10:51AM (#10213290) Homepage
    This seem to be based on the same concept as irate [sourceforge.net]
    • by dpilot (134227) on Friday September 10 2004, @12:31PM (#10214253) Homepage Journal
      Now we have gnomoradio, irate, and somewhere else they mention magnatune.

      Forget the programs, we need the standards. Isn't that what we've been saying about the Web and file exchange.

      These buggers all need to interoperate. I haven't looked in detail at all of them, but let's say that gnomoradio has hit the key points:
      1: publish the music
      2: publish the license - keep it legal
      3: ratings feedback
      I'd say we also need
      4: option to send money/payment/exchange to the artist

      We need standards, and let gnomoradio, irate, and magnatune all run on those standards. Then pick the one you like, that runs on your platform.

      3 disparate systems splits the catalog, and it's going to be tough enough to reach critical mass, as it is.

      Some sort of license check is necessary as a fundamental part of the infrastructure, to keep the ??AA of their backs.

      Provisions to pay the artist are a good idea. I wonder if percentage-wise voluntary payment works better or worse than spam.
  • by nizo (81281) on Friday September 10 2004, @10:52AM (#10213302) Homepage Journal
    This looks awesome, but how long before the RIAA starts feeding copyrighted music into the system and then gets it shut down? Things like this have to be their worst nightmare.
    • by bizpile (758055) * on Friday September 10 2004, @11:00AM (#10213378) Homepage
      This looks awesome, but how long before the RIAA starts feeding copyrighted music into the system and then gets it shut down? Things like this have to be their worst nightmare.

      Even for /. that statement seems a bit paranoid. I doubt that the RIAA would try to entrap people that are legally trading music the RIAA doesn't own when they have plenty of people actually illegally trading music they can go after.
      • by tolan-b (230077) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:07AM (#10213436)
        It threatens their ditribution monopo^H model.
        • Yeah, because I'm sure that use of Gnomoradio is going to cut a huge dent in the number of people listening to RIAA music. After all, if history has shown us anything, it's that when given the choice, the teeming masses have always chosen to listen to free independent music rather than illegally downloading the latest Britney song.
      • by tsg (262138) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:08AM (#10213439)
        Even for /. that statement seems a bit paranoid. I doubt that the RIAA would try to entrap people that are legally trading music the RIAA doesn't own when they have plenty of people actually illegally trading music they can go after.

        Unless their primary goal is to protect their obsolete business model, but they wouldn't do that....
        • Unless their primary goal is to protect their obsolete business model, but they wouldn't do that....

          I think the RIAA is not really concerned about online communities like this one. Things like GarageBand.com [garageband.com] have been around for a long time and the RIAA is not sweating it. Things like this make it easier for an RIAA label to sign a band. The band will be more professional, will already have some knowledge of marketing itself, and will have some sort of proven success to show that they can create a "bu

          • I think the RIAA is not really concerned about online communities like this one.

            They will be if this becomes popular.

            Things like this make it easier for an RIAA label to sign a band.

            Things like this make it unnecessary for a band to sign with a label. And that's really the crux of the matter. The recording industries business model has been the creation/promotion of superstars and the selling of plastic disks. The plastic disks are no longer needed and sites like this make promotion available to b
      • by gcaseye6677 (694805) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:19AM (#10213552)
        The RIAA has a history of trying their hardest to stop ALL online music distribution. Remember the early suits against the makers of Diamond RIO MP3 player? The thing couldn't even copy music, but they sued simply because they wanted to stall digital music. Then there were all of the lawsuits against MP3.com which didn't even carry RIAA music, but it was theoretically possible that it could be used for copyright infringement, so their lawsuit said. Like I've said all along, the record labels aren't so much bothered by kids downloading Britney Spears songs; what scares them is a digital distribution model so efficient that a band decides to use it rather than sign over their souls to a record company.
      • Even for /. that statement seems a bit paranoid. I doubt that the RIAA would try to entrap people that are legally trading music the RIAA doesn't own when they have plenty of people actually illegally trading music they can go after.

        It's not a matter of legal; it's a matter of might.

        RIAA can pour money and resources into shutting it down and going after users, as long as they insinuate that there *must* be some copyright material being traded.
      • I would think this is worse for the RIAA, if it catches on. Like Microsoft, who turns a blind eye to widespread piracy but has secret Hallowe'eny-type meetings on how to covertly kill One-Percent-Of-The-Market Linux (through SCO, etc.), the RIAA knows that piracy of their music is not as bad as people ditching them completely to pirate OTHER people's music. Irrelevancy is their greatest worry right now, not piracy. And rightly so; they're easily replaced. At least piracy means they're still relevant.
      • The article describes something very different than what is being claimed. The RIAA "poisoning" specifically combats people who are downloading their copyrighted material (by posting files masquerading as the copyrighted music.) That's a completely different thing, both in goals and in implementation, from what the poster was claiming. Rather, his scenario was just a knee-jerk "Big Bad RIAA wants to shut us down!"
  • Only time... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by StevenHenderson (806391) <stevehenderson@gmai[ ]om ['l.c' in gap]> on Friday September 10 2004, @10:52AM (#10213304)
    Sure this is fine for the garage bands, but it will never catch on with the "mainstream" bands. This is for one reason. No money.

    Just as mp3.com used to be a great resource for me to find bands, the bigger artists tried to get in on it, but would never allow songs for download. Especially with the widespread adoption of "legit" music stores, I doubt this will catch on outside of indie groups (which is where I will continue to get my music).

      • I was already pissed that it was going to be so tightly tied to GNOME, and I tried to build it anyway. No go, even after installing *every* package it requires. Something's wrong somewhere, obviously.

        What I'd like to see is their backend factored out into a cross-platform library (note when I say cross-platform that does not mean it can require GNOME on Linux and still be cross-platform, because GNOME is a platform and depending on GNOME libraries means you're tied to a platform). It would be trivial at

  • by jonesboy_damnit (773676) on Friday September 10 2004, @10:53AM (#10213312)
    As per topic: it seems to me that centralization is a good thing when no copyright violations are taking place. It allows easy sorting/searching/etc. based on data that is easy to find (the central server) - I think this is a great thing for indy/garage/etc artists looking for another place to promote themselves.
    -Matt
    • As per topic: it seems to me that centralization is a good thing when no copyright violations are taking place. It allows easy sorting/searching/etc. based on data that is easy to find (the central server) - I think this is a great thing for indy/garage/etc artists looking for another place to promote themselves.

      Funny how now we now assume something is illegal unless proven otherwise, instead of the opposite.

  • Asked and answered (Score:5, Interesting)

    by stratjakt (596332) on Friday September 10 2004, @10:55AM (#10213336) Journal
    Is this the future of digital music..?

    No, because few people want to listen to indy music.

    The future of digital music is giving the RIAA another buck, via Apple or Napster or whoever, to listen to your favorite songs in yet another proprietary format. One for your portable player, one for your PC, one for your car.

    That's just the way it is, like it or not.
    • by Thunderstruck (210399) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:02AM (#10213402)
      History is nothing if not cyclical. I've often lamented that local music is so hard to find now-a-days, and I honestly can't believe I'm the only one. For all but the last 200 years of human history, music was played live by local talent. Now, we have better technology and more people... there should be more local music rather than 10,000 radio staions all owned by clear channel with the same 35 song playlist. I for one welcome our new music source.
      • Actually history goes through periods of being cyclical, then periods of not being cyclical, then periods of being ...
        • I should say it's not just Americans, it's everyone.

          People want to listen to the same songs and music because it helps them identify with each other. If you're the only fan of unknown band X, then you can't use that to link yourself to a particular crowd or lifestyle.

          Which is what the RIAA really sells, prepackaged "lifestyles".

          Want to be a non-conformist? Buy these CDs, and wear these cloths, pierce this, so you fit in just like every other non-conformist. (Yeah, the ass-backwardsness of that remark
        • So your position is that the problem lies not with the RIAA so much as with the population. On that I agree, but I think the population currently demands the MTV Crap (Do they even show music videos anymore?) because of habit rather than preference.

          For the past 2 decades, there were only national channels to get music information. There were only national radio corporations to play the songs, and there were only national commercial distributors to buy your own copy (whatever rights you still get if you d
        • They absorbed punk, metal, hip-hop, country, ska/reggae.

          But "They" haven't absorbed 100% of the scene. For each of these genres, there are numerous non-mainstream bands which haven't been completely assimilated by the beast and which will never been shown on MTV.

          There is still plenty of good music in these genres, and much of it is in your local scene. If you live in culturally deprived suburbia or some other place that doesn't have a vibrant scene [culture snob] and maybe you should think of moving.[/cu
        • I think popular music is "popular" for basically the same reason McDonalds is popular. It's not that everyone (or even anyone) thinks it's the best but it's familiar and fairly consistant. If you walk into a music store you can't possibly make an informed choice in an hour or two so people just tend to choose something by an artist they've heard of. Wheather having thousands of additional choices freely/quickly available in hundreds of nooks and crannies on the internet will make things better I don't kn
          • Music is music...it doesn't matter where it comes from. If you like it, if it brings up an emotion in you...so be it. Who cares if Wayne Newton does it for you or Black Flag?

            Your peers care. That's what I'm getting at. If your friends are into Black Flag, listening to Wayne Newton makes you an outsider.

            They sell lifestyles. You can choose from goth, ska-punk, country redneck, hip-hopper, headbanger..

            Many many people don't go to Best Buy and pick up CDs so much as they have songs they want to hear, bu
            • I'll agree with you there about younger people seeking acceptance...but this is nothing new of course as I saw it all through the '70's. Hey, it's tough being a kid...in the past and now. Conform or be cast-out.

              But you get older. Hip friends matter less and less and being part of a crowd matters less and less as that old devil time wears on.

              Then the music that you most cherish happens to be the music you liked as a youth when you look back. Yes, I like new stuff coming out...but it usually has to brew for
    • by Ignignot (782335) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:10AM (#10213455) Journal
      I think a better way to look at this is to say "is this the future of radio." Instead of the broad sweeping "...future of digital music." Ultimately the RIAA doesn't like things like this, but clearchannel must be sweating hard. They can see the chopping block, and maybe someday their head will go on it. Same thing goes for virgin records stores, sam goody, etc. The whole distribution network is getting beat up.
      • ClearChannel is already shaking because of a new radio format with disc jockeys who don't scream, who actually know about music, don't talk over songs, don't play songs on top of one another, play 5 minutes of commercials an hour, and have 2000+ song playlists.
        • You listen to KLBJ too? ;)

          Seriously, the two interesting complaints I've seen are "Not enough local bands" and "ClearChannel". Try living in Austin sometime. KLBJ has a good, solid mix of local bands, and they aren't clearchannel and never will be. (If they become clearchannel, expect rednecks to develop suicide bombing tactics)

          The soul of a Texan is independence.

          • You listen to KLBJ too? ;)

            Actually, I'm in PA. I heard a story about them on NPR. The sample playlists they gave sounded like they had hacked into my computer and stole my iTunes library, so I was intrigued. A true 'driveway moment.'

            • :) KLBJ is awesome. They had an internet stream at one point, you might be able to find it if you hit their website. My only real caveat with it is that it required internet explorer to work.

              Ok, I checked, and they don't stream over the internet any more. :( Sucks, but you can at least visit their website [klbjfm.com]. Naturally I recommend visiting their lame website so you don't promote excessive usage of flash.

              And a slight political word: KLBJ better represents Texans than the president. In fact, you can con

    • by joabj (91819) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:18AM (#10213539) Homepage
      >No, because few people want to listen to indy music.

      Hate to say it but there is something to be said for this. And for good reason.

      Part of popular music's appeal is that it is, duh, enjoyed by a lot of people. That is the *primarily* purpose of the major labels, with their huge marketing budgets. They buy consensus along the lines of "Yes this is a song that we, the people, like."

      This allows a sort of cultural bonding to take place over certain songs--the producers of "Garden State" can put Cold Play's "Don't Panic" in the begginning of that movie and we'll all understand its shared meaning. It becomes a generational thing.

      Music companies buy consensus, and we all need that consensus to build a music community. (Whether we need this done in the way that music companies now do this is another matter entirely--I'd rather have 100 world music bands sell 100,000 copies each of their songs than Fleetwood Mac sell 10 million copies of their latest tired joint. But I digress).

      I noticed this back in the early 90s when I was a reviewer for a heavy metal mag. We got *lots* of fantastic CDs in (Along with loads of dross) that, over time, became some of my favorite music. But I feela loss because no one today would know what a great band, say, Antic Hay, was. The music is just as good as what was popular, but something is lost nonetheless.

      So Yay! for the major labels!

      joab

      • I don't think you're taking into account the effects of new technologies, some of which are already exploited by Gnomoradio (the internet, for example).

        Why do music companies market inane girl and boy bands instead of good indy music? Because their business model is based on the idea of high marginal costs for distribution. If there are 10,000 people in the world who will like a song enough to pay $1 for it, and it takes me two days in the studio and other two on my Mac to make the song, at a total cost o

    • I give Apple one buck, and I can play a song on any device that supports the format an unlimited number of times, burn it to unlimited CDs (10X for the same playlist), and store it on five different computers, or stream it to unlimited computers on my network, or stream it to an Airport Express and play it on my home stereo, or listen to it on my iPod.

      I don't know where people come up with the idea that Apple's DRM is in any way more restrictive than, say, a CD. Sure, it's not supported by *every* MP3 play

  • The name (Score:4, Insightful)

    by MikeMacK (788889) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:01AM (#10213390)
    Perhaps the biggest stumbling block to wide-spread adoption - the name, "Gnomoradio". Come on guys, we can be a little more creative than that - not everything that is created for Gnome needs to use "Gnome" or a derivative there of in it's title.
    • Re:The name (Score:5, Insightful)

      by MaestroSartori (146297) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:10AM (#10213454) Homepage
      I quite like the name - "No More Radio"...
      • Re:The name (Score:3, Interesting)

        So why not just call it "No More Radio"? "Gnomoradio" is far from clear, especially for people who might never have heard of "Gnome" the destop environment.

        It may be clever in context, but unless the goal was to create a new program so they could give it a clever name, they're really just undermining their own efforts.
    • Re:The name (Score:4, Funny)

      by fritter (27792) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:39AM (#10213769)
      You should try my KDE-based music sharing service for hip hop, K-Rapper.
  • The Classics (Score:3, Insightful)

    by KrackHouse (628313) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:08AM (#10213437) Homepage
    Correct me if I'm wrong but nobody owns the works of Mozart. Now if all songs were incoded in Ogg format wouldn't it be feasible to create a legitamate radio station or stations based on Classical music that would be totally legal?
    • Performance is owned (Score:5, Informative)

      by Otto (17870) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:11AM (#10213464) Homepage Journal
      Correct me if I'm wrong but nobody owns the works of Mozart.

      You're right, however the works of Mozart need to be performed. And those performances are owned by the people who performed them.
      • "those performances are owned by the people who performed them."

        Yes, but why? Most, at least, of the major classical orchestras in the USA are heavily subsidized by federal grants and other forms of funding for the arts. (And I'm only saying "most" because its possible a few privately formed ones like the NBC symphony may be exceptions for at least some of their performing years - EVERY orchestra that has a place name in its title is on the grant system.
        Why didn't our tax dollars buy us any rights? WE
    • Re:The Classics (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Bill_Mische (253534) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:12AM (#10213481)
      er...only if the orchestra were also long dead. Otherwise they would hold the copyright to their performance. Nice try though.
      • Re:The Classics (Score:4, Informative)

        by gl4ss (559668) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:22AM (#10213574) Homepage Journal
        oh but that's the beauty! there's OLD recordings that can be transferred to digital in damn fine quality, too.

        one of the national stations over here used to play classical music from some 20-30's recordings all night long some years ago, as they didn't have to pay for playing them at all.

        now they just play pop.. trying to compete with commercial channels I suppose but whats the point for them(they're not a commercial channel, yet they try to act like one for some weird reason - taking all the bad bits from commercial stations like braindead hosts)..

        and in addition to that there's quite many classical orchestras that don't really make the recordings for profit(you can find good classical music cd's in the discount bin always).
      • Well that's a given but couldn't a group of musicians perform it Pro-Bono? I mean it's not like there are only 3 people in the world that know how to play the piano.
    • Only if you were listening to the version Mozart recorded himself.
    • That's what MIDI is for. Click here for Mozart MIDI files. [midifilearchive.com] Hear exactly what Mozart wrote.

      For classical piano works, MIDI is almost tolerable.

  • Good Start (Score:5, Informative)

    by jim_nanney (757896) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:10AM (#10213460)
    But really, I prefer http://www.magnatune.com/ [magnatune.com] . Its uses allow for free download of music and yet still promotes licensing music (paying the actual artist for thier creations) It is a perfect blend of free for public consumption, and paying musicians royalties.
  • by Agrippa (111029) on Friday September 10 2004, @11:39AM (#10213762)
    From my experience from being a programmer at MP3.com from 1999 until its sale to CNET in 2003, the independant artist community is one of the biggest bunch of cheating assholes I have ever witnessed. Not all, but enough independant artists will utilize any number of underhanded ways to boost their exposure on a network. I see nothing in this system that prevents what artists did at MP3.com - user ratings are a joke, because many artists will do anything possible to whore themselves out among their community to get a higher rating. What you will end up seeing is that if this get popular enough, it will become fully corrupted by crappy music being highly rated , which will then turn off the average user, and become yet another circle jerk for talentless artists and basically a waste of time for legitimate ones.

    .agrippa.
    • If it's anything like iRate, it doesn't use absolute rating to decide whether artists are "good" or "bad." It uses your ratings to find people who have SIMILAR interests to you, and gives you songs that THEY rate highly. Problem solved.