Hi, ericb sent me your way.  I'm one of several people starting an ann 
arbor internet radio station, A3Radio.com, which is a subset of a larger 
project, called AnnArborAlive.com, an attempt to organize A2's culture 
and share it globally (in our write up we often compare the idea to old 
town halls...i saw the GREX logo...).  The radio station is the first 
piece of the project to get off the ground and we are in immediate need 
of a linux person or two to help us get one of our servers going (we 
plan to use iceS for now).  I think this will take just a few hours as 
we have much in place already (Suse 8.0, icecast server, server located 
on fiber,etc...)  

We also need a couple of people to stay on and help design the overall 
architecture of the station.  we plan to be a state of the art internet 
station with as many as 30 channels across all formats (blues, 
classical, bluegrass, talk, opinion, spiritual, techno, theatre, etc. 
etc... pretty much whatever people want to do), so audio experience (or 
interest) would be a plus.  

if you're intersted and can help, need more details, etc. you can email 
me, griff@annarboralive.com, call 761-MUSIC, or ask Eric if i'm at the 
top of the park (tonight for sure, friend is in the Witch Doctors):)  

Thanks...

35 responses total.

p.s. forgot to mention...local music channel and distribution is one of 
our top priorities.  If you have or know someone who has a local music 
collection who would be intersted in airing it, please let me know.

   ((( spring agora item 292 now linked as music item 105 )))

Can we get one of those channels to carry the unusual music, such as filk?

no problem, you just gotta find an AJ (audio jockey)to produce it....

is that the music that sticks to your lips??

I'm the Eric he's referring to.  I've worked with griff, and will happily 
verify that his project is legit and sincere.  He's a strong proponent 
for and of Ann Arbor musicians and has been for a long time.

Does A^2 still have a really distinct culture?  It seems to me we're
getting kinda yuppified.

There is a very active original music culture in Ann Arbor, much of which 
is devoid of identifiable yuppie influence.

Exactly what is the plan to either pay the per-listener per-song
royalties just set by the Copyright Office, or avoid them?  If you
haven't got this taken care of in your business plan, this whole
thing is a non-starter.

If they're playing local bands that haven't been signed by a record company,
isn't it a non-issue?

Yep.

Interesting.  I suppose if this new royalty plan sticks, it might encourage
more internet radio stations to focus on local acts like this.

we have contingency plans if the current royalty payments continue, 
keeping in mind that they are only in place until Jan 1, when they are 
required to be renegotiated.  It appears that congress is ready to 
squash the whole royalty thing (the royalty is to compensate for lost cd 
sales by the way), saying that the current interpretation is not what 
they had in mind when they passed the DMCA (ie. it was meant to promote 
business, not suppress it)  I'm also hoping that people are interested 
in news and views programs (no payments of any type and low bandwidth) 
so that people have a chance to the hear something other than the 
right-wing sheep-herding spin that is currently being propagated 
nationwide.

Speaking of non-yuppy, did anyone have a chance to see the mostly naked 
power trio at gallery 212 last night???

Can put on a show that gives the right wing sheephearding side of thiongs?

Go for it, Bruce.  You'd probably get listeners.

Okay, if you only play local, unsigned acts you're fine... but as
soon as they're signed you might get the choice between paying the
exorbitant royalties or not being able to play them any more.

That would be a pity.  "They made it, so we can't broadcast their
music any more."

  And make sure they don't ever cover any old standards, or sample
  anything under copyright control..

Covering older songs would just mean you'd have to pay the songwriter
royalties everyone's had to pay all along.  Those are not too unreasonable,
though they aren't cheap, either.  You still wouldn't have to pay the
recording copyright royalties the RIAA has created.  (Remember, there are
two copyrights involved in any piece of recorded music.)

Re #16:  I thought the new royalties only applied to recordings,
not to sheet music.  If the band performed an old standard wouldn't
only the BMI/ASCAP royalties be applicable?

It just occurred to me that this could make covers a lot easier to
hear on Internet radio than major-act performances, and a lot more
profitable for stations to broadcast.  This doesn't just shoot the
RIAA in the foot, it blows their whole leg off.  Gonna be fun...

  I didn't mean to imply that cover versions would require royalty
  payments (though prolific sampling probably would..)  What I should
  have said more clearly is that cover versions would also require
  licensing payments, although to ASCAP and BMI..  Those who have 
  pointed out that the ASCAP/BMI licensing plans are a whole lot less
  extreme than the webcast royalties originally being discussed are
  correct but they still might be a burden on an independent local
  operation like this one..

I just "discovered" internet radio, thanks to the newly-updated iTunes 3.0.1
on my iBook.  Wow - lots of selections!  Time to start thinking about
broadband again...

I'm enjoying that too.  I'm also amazed at the quality of sound coming
from those two little balls.

The speakers in my iBook are pretty tiny, and the sound matches the size. :(
Still, there's that audio output jack.

Radio Havana!

I've just checked my collection of web radio links, and found that 
sonicnet and webradio both bit the dust sometime in the several months 
since I last listened to them.  I miss them both.

And, in the classical field specifically, Beethoven.com apparently now 
wants to harvest your e-mail, and claim the right to send you junk mail 
in perpetuity, if you want to listen to them at all.

I guess I'd better set up a dummy account on Yahoo or somewhere if I 
want to listen to them again.

Change "webradio" to "NetRadio".  Sorry.

The last report I saw indicated that around 1000 USA internet radio
streams had shut down in the wake of the copyright royalty ruling.
 
David, have you looked at BBC Radio 3?  I love them for their world 
music programming, but outside of the 21:00-24:00 block (UK time;
4 pm - 7 pm Eastern or 1-4pm where you are) they seem to have a very 
good classical music lineup.   Many BBC programs are also available
for listening on demand, though I haven't checked out the on-demand
classical offerings.
 
(And for your folk tastes, I suggest the Mike Harding Show on 
BBC Radio 2.)
 
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3
http://www.bbc.co.uk/folk
http://www.bbc.co.uk/celticroots   (not sure about this link)

Thanks for the links, Ken.  I particularly like their storage of 
programs, so that one can listen to a given program at one's choice of 
time.  This is particularly useful because 1-4 pm is the time I'm most 
likely to be listening to Internet radio.

The problem is, though, that Radio 3 is very talk-heavy.  It's great 
for listening while driving through Britain, but I find this kind of 
radio very distracting while I'm trying to work.

Ah.  I was thinking more of Radio 3's heavy performance schedule, 
which usually has very little talk with it; but most of the performances
aren't available on demand, and aren't aired during your peak 
listening hours. Poot!

Not exactly clear to me what time of days those heavy performances 
are.  I don't recall hearing much of that during daytime listening to 
the station while in Britain.  Evening programs were somewhat better, 
but that'd be approximately the 1-4 pm time slot Pacific Time ...?

Regardless, however, I've made one extremely talk-heavy but very 
satisfying discovery on the BBC web site, and that is their Discovering 
Music programs at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/classical/discover.shtml

This is a series of 45-minute programs, each analyzing (usually) a 
single work of music, playing excerpts and showing how it fits 
together.  Not too technical, though occasionally for me a shade too 
untechnical.  There is the risk of falling victim to the analyst's 
hobbyhorse, but most of the ones I've listened to so far are really 
excellent.  After Robert Winter's now-deleted Voyager CD-ROMs of 
Beethoven and Stravinsky, these progrmas are the best device for 
explaining classical music to curious but untutored listeners that I've 
heard.

How difficult is it to download those programs and burn them to CD?
Can you get them via ftp as opposed to streaming?

Russ, your question shoots right off the scale of my technical 
knowledge.  I count myself learned in merely knowing what you're 
talking about.

The BBC shows are not packaged for FTP downloading, only for streaming.
The collection of "Discovering Music" shows which David has discovered
don't seem to be any different in that respect than the rest of the 
BBC radio archives.

In the "BBC" radio item, I think, there have been discussions of 
a Windows program called Total Recorder which lets you capture the 
streams and make MP3 files out of them; it seems to be a time-intensive
process.   My technical advisor is trying to figure out an 
equivalent process for Unix, and it seems somewhat daunting just 
getting the BBC's Real Audio stuff running on Unix.

David: as for the Radio3 schedule, you need to look at the schedule 
link at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3.   I think it's changed a lot 
since you were last in Britain, with arts talk, Late Junction and 
Andy Kershaw now getting the evening time block.

Re #30:  Most streaming protocols just shovel packets out and whatever
gets through, gets through; this is okay for real-time stuff where loss
of data is acceptable, but not for applications where integrity is
vital.  ftp is another type of protocol, which will request repeats of
any data packets which don't make it and it takes however long it takes.

ftp isn't any good for real-time applications, but if you could ftp the
back shows you could dribble them into your computer over slow lines,
low-quality lines, or whatever.  It could take all night for a one-hour
show, you don't care.  When it came time to play back, you'd have a
guaranteed complete copy right on your hard disk (or on the CD you
burned it to).

Maybe one could put a bug in the BBC's ear about this...

Lack of an FTP archive is almost certainly due to the current 
interpretations of copyright law which treat streamed media as 
temporary copies and downloaded files as permanent ones.
The BBC has explained on their website that copyright law interpretations
do not allow them to implement a rewind button on the archived 
program, because a listener might back up over a particular juicy
part and record it.   As it is, the BBC does things which would not
be allowed for USA webcasters, such as (often) providing a playlist
which the listener can consult before playing the program.

        Turn off all other sounds on your PC.  Sound card line-out to
MiniDisc line-in.  Re-use the MD once they are re-downloaded to PC
from MD and archived on CD.

Interesting, I haven't had any problems rewinding these BBC shows.  I 
just push the little moving tag in the Real Player window to the left a 
ways, and hear again whatever I want to.

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