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BBC To Launch Music Download Store
Posted by
timothy
on Wed Sep 03, 2008 03:07 PM
from the cat-detector-van dept.
from the cat-detector-van dept.
Jackson writes "According to a post on Cnet today, the BBC is working on a paid-for download, and ad-supported streaming music store, making available its entire archive of music recorded at BBC studios for TV and radio. The venture has major label backing and is rumoured to be launching next year. More interesting still is that the service will be run by BBC Worldwide — the commercial arm of the BBC — meaning downloads are likely to be available to the entire world, not just the UK. Beatles radio sessions, anyone?"
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Submission: BBC to launch music download store by Anonymous Coward
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Publicly funded? (Score:5, Insightful)
If the BBC is publicly funded by the British people, why the hell are they charging for their content? Isn't that a bit absurd?
Same thing goes for PBS here in the States, though I've got slightly (very slightly) more ambivalence towards them because they receive such a minuscule amount from the government and they are always stretched on budget. But still, PBS shouldn't be charging for content...
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You wouldn't pay for Mr. Rogers on Demand?
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"But still, neither PBS nor BBC should be charging for content..."
Re:Publicly funded? (Score:5, Insightful)
Hmm, but would you want your taxes/gifts/donations etc going towards royalties to some music company? I would presume that the BBC doesnt have complete control over some, or most of the music they would be distributing.
And on the other side, if they can make more money from this, it means they can A: put their normal funding to better use, or B: not use as much.
However, having it ad-funded, will inevitably make the advertisers have more control over its existance.
And as for PBS, I think they should be allowed to charge for content in certain cases, like VHS/DVD/CD copies of shows as they have already put their income into making the show, not duplication and distribution of discs.
Parent
Re:Publicly funded? (Score:5, Informative)
Seems you're right about ownership of the archive:
"BBC Worldwide has already struck a deal with EMI to use the Corporationâ(TM)s archive of recordings by the majorâ(TM)s artists and it is understood to be in talks with the other three majors about reaching similar agreements."
Parent
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I guess it was easier for them to issue a blanket charge instead of trying to suss out between stuff they own the whole copyright to (which is funded by the British "telly tax"), and stuff that they only have partial copyright to (e.g. stuff they hired an outside artist or corp to compose and produce).
Still dumb, but that's what happens when a multi-billion-pound corporation gets lazy.
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Well don't rule it out entirely, the deals arent all set yet... I dont see why they couldnt have the normal ad-funded stuff Mon-Sat, and then maybe the (entirely hassle/ads) free stuff on Sunday, or an entire station(s) devoted to the free stuff, I'm sure that whatever archives they have are already fairly well split into one pile or another, the "safe for anything" and the "check the rights" before playing piles, not very hard to go from there.
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You say that you're in the US, so you're not funding them; they certainly have the right to charge you.
As for charging the British... well, this certainly doesn't sound like something that comes under the remit of the TV license fee, so charging users is the only other way to get funding for it.
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Actually, the Beeb does get money from the US viewer: BBC America (among others) is considered a semi-premium channel in most cable and satellite packages, which means the rights are paid for by either Cable/Sat corp or by the viewer directly. Also, there are some rather distinctly American-oriented commercials (for instance: how many UK car commercials tout miles-per-gallon fuel efficiencies, and displays the sales prices in dollars?)
Re:Publicly funded? (Score:5, Interesting)
Also, there are some rather distinctly American-oriented commercials (for instance: how many UK car commercials tout miles-per-gallon fuel efficiencies, and displays the sales prices in dollars?)
The big difference here is that there are *no* adverts on the BBC TV or radio channels *at all*...
Yup, no adverts. You know that TV Licence we pay? Well, you know how it's quite a lot less than you pay for cable or satellite in the US? We don't get adverts on our BBC channels. Doesn't it suck to *pay* to watch TV and still get bombarded with ads?
Parent
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Actually, we still have local broadcast channels that cost nothing - perfectly free. The Portland Metro (Oregon) area has about six or seven of them.
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Actually, we still have local broadcast channels that cost nothing - perfectly free. The Portland Metro (Oregon) area has about six or seven of them.
Do they have adverts?
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Most do, some do not. And overall, to be honest, I'll take the adverts over having to pay for the privilege of owning a television, and paying up by governmental force. It's drop-easy to excise them from my computer (or skip right past them with the DVR), where at least I still have a choice in the matter.
Re:Publicly funded? (Score:4, Insightful)
However I don't buy that the worldwide unit doesn't get any benefit from the tv licence. Hell, the fact it was British licence money that funded those records means that we've paid for them to have those recordings and now we're going to get charged again if we want something from there.
Parent
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Another reason for those is that they don't have to support Linux or Mac since it won't use tax payer money. I suspect this will be a windows thing.
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They don't really support Mac and Linux now, and haven't (that I can remember). Even before the advent of iPlayer, radio was available via WMP or *shudder* Realplayer.
But the tech which "supports" Mac and Linux now is what they'd have done anyway if they only supported Windows.
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... radio was available via WMP or *shudder* Realplayer.
But the tech which "supports" Mac and Linux now is what they'd have done anyway if they only supported Windows.
Realplayer has always supported mac and as both wmp and realplayer have fairly widely used codecs getting either to play under linux has never been a problem (realmedia may even be avalible on linux (not that id touch the thing)
as for the current iplayer, as a linux user and a British citizen i realize that they have other priorities but i am happy to use the flash or script versions until work on the mac & linux versions is complete.
Re:Publicly funded? (Score:4, Informative)
Funny that you mention you wouldn't touch such a thing (Realplayer Linux) while it is the cleanest, best performing Real player on the internet which you can actually build right away from source (Helix Community).
OS X version which has been always praised is the closest thing to Realplayer Linux, it is built on Helix Code/Cocoa Frameworks such as Webkit.
The baseless "hate" against Real Player as they are clean for years gives those MS bribed officials ideas of WMP only streaming etc. They think "Oh they hate Real anyway" as someone will of course question the choice of WMP while Real is available to anything you can imagine.
Also let me be the one to say as a OS X user. Flip4Mac can't and will NEVER do WMedia DRM. If BBC chooses WMA/DRM, say bye to your Mac streaming and install Bootcamp or Parallels ;)
They gave up perfectly working real/embedded for Flash/download and act like streaming. Do you know the result? My Mac Mini G4 connected to HDTV can't show BBC embedded video anymore.
Parent
Re:Publicly funded? (Score:4, Informative)
I suspect BBC Worldwide will pay the BBC for a license to sell this content.
Parent
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overlords (Score:2)
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They could be charging for the continued storage and bandwidth needed to capacitate the service.
In that way, the service could be self-supporting (as in not requiring more funding from outside sources to run).
Or at least, that's what I hope (seeing as no pricing information was given).
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Why should the British people give things away for free outside Britain?
Besides, the BBC don't own everything that has been produced or broadcast by them. Often the institution is supposed to provide a platform for young talents to develop (e.g. world class comedy) or generate high quality news and current affairs reporting (which *is* given away free globally).
I'm not a huge fan of the license fee; there doesn't seem to be much public service broadcasting at the moment and the news does get a bit of a pro-
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International community tries so hard to fund them (really!) and yet they don't allow us to pay for their great content and have it.
It is getting way more surreal every day. I know americans who would pay to get iPlayer content right now and they are people which Hollywood couldn't sell a single byte.
BBC can actually make profit and wouldn't need tax payers money if they figure out what "putting your content to internet" means.
About ad supported streaming? Virgin of UK tried it, failed.
As a pessimist, let m
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Only music? (Score:3, Interesting)
I have the HHGTG books, I taped the TV series from PBS, and bought the DVD of the movie, but I have never heard the original radio play. Will it be available at this new BBC store? If it is, I want a copy!
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According to Wikipedia (so it must be true, right?) "Special editions of the Primary and Secondary Phases have been announced by the BBC for release in November 2008. These have, according to the BBC, been given "a thorough clean-up and remaster" by Dirk Maggs. ":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy_(radio_series) [wikipedia.org]
If I was a betting man I'd say that once they've sold a pile of them they'll be rebroadcast on Radio 4 or BBC7 some time next year...
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It's good BTW.
And if you're trying to cover all the media, don't miss the game [wikipedia.org] which was partly penned by the man himself.
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God damn the "No Tea/Tea" puzzle. Along with every other one in that game.
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Oh, don't forget that the game is freely playable online [bbc.co.uk].
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I am working on the long lost sequel to that game. Where someone forgot to apply the DST patch to the Restaurant At the End of the Universes time servers, thus causing the entire space-time continuum to be not curved, but totally bent. Before the Universe explodes at your pleasure (TM), unfortunately when you are still on Earth, you must buy the new game and hitch a ride back to Magrathea to consult with the mice about the patch. Unfortunately, when you try to download the patch from Microsoft/Sirius Cyb
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I used to have cassette tapes of the first series. Well it was before teh Intarweb, couldn't download it so I just taped the suckers. Lost now. But I thought the TV series was lame and the movie even more so but the radio series was inspired. The book just doesn't capture it either. I will eagerly grab them if they are available. Even, ahem, pay for them.
How about a way for for non UK people to watch (Score:3, Interesting)
I'd be happy to just watch their damn videos. Hell I'd even pay a small subscription fee to do so. Providing it worked properly on mac and linux.
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I shouldn't have to go though questionable means to get to content I'm quite willing to pay for.
Only one question (Score:4, Informative)
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Will the music you buy be DRM free? I only buy from Amazon now because I'm not up to buy my music five or six times in my life. I just want to buy it once and use it however I damn well please.
I buy only music that comes on discs because I'm not up to buy music that's of poorer quality for more money.
GOON SHOW!!!! (Score:5, Informative)
Absurdist humor fans should really check this out, if they have it.
Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan, Harry Secombe.
If it plays on my Linux box, I want the set.
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Prices (Score:2)
So the BBC tax takes off of people BY THREAT OF PRISON £135-ish a year*, and now that the British public has paid for all the content the BBC are hoarding, they are expected to pay yet again.
I thought the RIAA is an American cartel not a UK one.
* You have to pay this tax even if you never watch the BBC on your tv, instead watching foreign satellite tv etc.
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It's about time! (Score:2)
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Well, you can get some of them at http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwtwo/churchill_audio.shtml [bbc.co.uk]
Re:Questions: (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
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2) Who on this planet is going to pay for the dubious pleasure of hearing such eardrum-torturing melodies as the intro music to, oh, "Absolutely Fabulous"
Dylan's "Wheels on fire" in a version sung by the fabulous Julie Driscoll - I would.
And then there are all the live sessions from the John Peel show - They are priceless. I still have some low quality mono real audio files of Elastica produced by John and downloaded a good few years ago when the Beeb still mounted them on line. I would live to have them in a good quality lossless format.
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the bbc do a lot of live sessions, and quite a few of them produce original content (hell bbc leeds & reading site has a clip of biffy clyro doing an acoustic cover of killing in the name of atm) im hoping this sort is the stuff that will be for sale, and its not just another music store.
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Re:DRM'd to death like iPlayer (Score:4, Informative)
Parent