Daniel S. Menasche wrote: >>> Would there be a way to legally implement Freedora? >> History has shown the only way to succeed with any innovative music >> product is to build it first and deal with the legal issues later. For >> example, if this were built in a fashion that made it incredibly easy to >> "tip" music you like, and if it grows fast enough and enough people do >> it, its legality won't matter. But if you wait to get everything lined >> up and signed in triplicate from the labels up front, it'll never happen. > > The idea of "tipping" is interesting. But who would share their credit > card numbers in a system that is disseminating copyrighted content? > That is tricky.
The tipping needn't be secret or decentralized; it can happen totally in the clear using a standard, centralized, completely legal and legit web service. There's no reason to decentralize this part. The only part that requires decentralization is the transport layer. >>> For instance, what if the files were automatically encrypted while being >>> downloaded, and could be streamed only by a special player, in agreement >>> with the music companies? The special player could, for instance, >>> download commercials from time to time? >> Nothing that requires the sign off of the record companies has ever >> succeeded. I wouldn't recommend trying to break new ground there. > > Well, Pandora, SpotFree and others succeeded! Hah, no, success is profitability or selling to a bigger sucker. Neither of those have happened, and so far as I can tell, neither will -- the economics of cheap/ad-supported webcasting are simply impossible, and nobody who's tried has ever demonstrated otherwise. Bleeding through investor money at a frantic pace is not success; it's just slow-motion failure. -david _______________________________________________ p2p-hackers mailing list p2p-hackers@lists.zooko.com http://lists.zooko.com/mailman/listinfo/p2p-hackers
