Apologies ... until industry copyright issues has been settled with regards to streaming music, or downloading artist's files (wether mp3, mpeg4, asf, liquid audio, RealMedia etc etc), I have decided to reduce all media on this site in both quality and length (now 30 seconds, and mono).

The copyright issue is a contentious one at the best of times, but when it comes to the internet the whole issue becomes even worse. Artists, record companies and publishing companies make their money by selling their music, and the rights to play that music. The internet circumvents all that by allowing direct public access to music, with international distribution and copying. Now with new codecs and music formats, there is also no noticeable degradable effect when converting a track off a CD into a file that is readily exchanged or streamed over the net.

First, a little history: When I first started putting together a website for a friend's band, back in late 1996, I used RealAudio 3 to convert .wav files into a compressed enough format to make it viable for use on the internet. The .wav file was recorded directly from a hand-held DAT player. Most people on the net had 28k connections (with 33.6 for the lucky few). A streaming RealAudio file was just about listenable (or download the whole thing at 500k+), but if you liked the song, you realised that you had to contact the band to order a CD or tape.

At the time, I was also playing with the first versions of Audiograbber. The only real benefit of this was it gave me a cleaner (loss-less) file with which to encode from, although to get good results, you had to be aware of certain technical features of your particular CDROM player. As RealAudio improved, and went swiftly to RealAudio 5, the quality of the music improved, and I could now listen to a whole RealAudio version of an album through my speakers, with impressive reproduction of bass etc. Another band that I was working with, weren't happy about putting more than 3-4 minutes of each track online (as a techno/dance band, their tracks averaged 7-8 minutes), as people had no incentive to contact them for the actual CDs. Their main market was selling the track direct to compilation labels anyway.

Around this time, I went to work for a large ISP with permanent net access. A group of us on the late shift were downloading large high-quality RealAudio tracks at work, then burning them onto CD's and taking them home. The quality was only just acceptable but still had to played through a PC due to the format. 56k modems were just around the corner. I came across the RealServer/Producer software packages which allowed a user to stream RealAudio tracks so that they were listenable, but not downloadable onto their hard-drives. This was ideal for the bands that I worked with, so this was the option that I eventually went with. Streaming audio at 56k was still acceptable but defintely still encouraged people to experience better sound by sending off for the CD. Fans sites were starting to spring up with full RealAudio tracks (downloadable files, as few ISP's offered RealAudio streams at the time).

CDROM technology improved to the point where Audiograbber worked with most CD's without having to play around with technical settings etc. It was very easy to grab your favourite track from an album into .wav format. mp3 was a little known format, although you could get files easily on the net to convert .wav into mp3. The band-sites that I worked on started to have .mp3 files as a downloadable option ( approx. 3mb per track). As they were unsigned bands, there were no licensing or copyright issues.

Late 1998, I worked on an online music magazine that wanted to put RealAudio clips on its website, alongside the latest single/album charts or its reviews. For a small startup, the fees that the record companies were asking for this privilege were extremely prohibitive, yet fansites were still putting full RealAudio and mp3 clips on their sites without licenses or approval. Record companies were starting to approach these sites about removing them, with little effect.

And so to 1999 ... the introduction of RealJukebox saw easily available freeware that could directly rip audio tracks off a CD and convert into RealAudio or mp3 (although it covered itself by getting users to agree to a non-piracy agreement first). Programs such as 'napster' allowed people to easily locate an mp3 music track over the net and download it. Personally, I found it ideal for locating all those old 80's tracks that I virtually had no chance of finding physically, but I was also using it to get the latest singles from my favourite artists. Yes, if I had it on my PC at work, then I felt no need to go out and buy the single as mp3 was almost CD quality. Piracy? Well, yes. This is exactly what the record companies want to stop.
I will have to admit, I'm not much of a CD single buyer anyway, so the mp3's that I downloaded made little difference to my decision to buy, or not to buy the single. In fact, in some instances, they probably encouraged me to buy the album, because I found tracks that had been ripped from the album, that I liked, and subsequently I wanted to hear the entire album, so went out and bought it.

So record companies want to stop piracy? mp3's are the internet equivalent of bootleg tapes, but what of other formats, lower quality formats? Well, this is probably where the publishing companies want to stop piracy. They make their money (amongst other things) on airplay. Easily available tracks in RealAudio is probably the equivalent to listening to it on a mid-range radio. Not brilliant, but it hits a spot. So, the big question is, .....is a fan hurting the artist they admire by putting their music on a website? The answer to that is probably yes, although the fans intention is to showcase their artists music, or for it to reach a wider audience. But it definitely impacts on revenue, wether going to the record company, the publishing company, or ultimately the artist.

When I started the Billie Myers fansite, I put up all the tracks on the album, and some from the singles on the site in RealAudio format (28k). I didn't consider that I was affecting sales because the quality of the tracks was relatively poor. My intention was to showcase the album. Later, I re-did the tracks using the RealAudio G2 codec, which gave a clearer, better quality sound, although the issue of copyright was nagging me, so I moved them to streaming tracks, rather than downloadable. However, in order not to exclude visitors with lower speed modems (bandwidth challenged?), I still gave the option of downloading the files, although this wasn't the default.

Certain tracks, such as the TP2K remix of 'Kiss The Rain', I had virtually no chance of locating physically, and only had in .mp3, but I was still reluctant to put an .mp3 file online. I actually differentiate between the formats of .mp3 and RealAudio quite considerably. If your intention is to showcase a track, then you can do that with RealAudio. MP3 is a totally different format, and in my opinion is actually a subsitute for a CD single. I want to showcase Billie's music via my fansite, but not encourage piracy or breach copyright. Funny thing about copyright, is that if the company that owns the copyright says that it's OK, then it's OK.

So, my conclusion? In order to showcase Billie's music, I can do that quite adequately with a 30 second clip, in RealAudio format. The same with the pop video (RealVideo or .asf) All I need to do, is to get the OK from the record/publishing company for those 30 second clips. To do this, I need to convince them that a 30 second clip in RealAudio 7 or G2 is not detrimental to ongoing sales. Strangely enough, I also need to pitch my argument at someone within the record company who has the authority to say it's OK, else the next thing I'll get is an email from their legal representatives.

So, thats the story. Rather long winded, for which I apologise, but the intent is not to just say 'hey Mr Record Company, I'm putting music online, like it or not' but to explain why, at this moment, I have removed all audio and video clips from the site.

So what is the industry to do about piracy? mp3's and RealAudio files are so easy to create at home, and exchange via the internet, with very little intent to defraud the record companies on the part of the fan. It is almost impossible to come up with some version of MacroVision to protect CD's from being ripped, as the technology is too well entrenched. In my opinion, the record industry needs to follow the trend towards online digital music distribution, and work in a protection system at this stage. This is already the case with existing formats (Liquid Audio, Windows Media) that have built in copyright protection, and only play where a user key is validated. But, what happens if a user downloads a track, and his PC crashes? CD singles and albums were never so fragile, and the realistic viewpoint is that hard-drives DO crash. Anyway, this is another discussion, although related.

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