[mehrens2112]

Originally Posted by Nightfly

If you opened a site I would definitely shop there..because you would be
very unique....we only wish that was true...

I don't have the technical know how to do it, but I know what I would do. I would make it a one time fee, would make sure that artists are getting paid to keep making great music.

My model would be this...
- Every member pays a one time fee. Members would then recruit other members and get points or credits (or even cash) for bringing on new members (similiar to network marketing).
- New or Indie Artists would be signed to the site to post their music for whatever they want to charge for it (free if they want). Similiar to what Myspace is trying to do, but take it even further.
- Established artists and their labels can put music on the site, promote in any way the see fit and charge whatever they want, however if they do not achieve the agreed upon number of downloads for the song/albums in a given time, then they would have to give it away for free and work with advertisers below to get people to the site. This would possibly drive the record companies to promote more, and embrace the changing technologies more.
- Myself and a team would then go out and get advertisers to sponsor the site to help pay for this and eventual tour promotion/festivals. Before the customers tracks download, they catch a quick advertisement for "X" product and if they are interested, then they can check the product out, if not their music downloads.

Any ideas to add, please do so.

[mehrens2112]

Originally Posted by mehrens2112

I don't have the technical know how to do it, but I know what I would do. I would make it a one time fee, would make sure that artists are getting paid to keep making great music.

My model would be this...
- Every member pays a one time fee. Members would then recruit other members and get points or credits (or even cash) for bringing on new members (similiar to network marketing).
- New or Indie Artists would be signed to the site to post their music for whatever they want to charge for it (free if they want). Similiar to what Myspace is trying to do, but take it even further.
- Established artists and their labels can put music on the site, promote in any way the see fit and charge whatever they want, however if they do not achieve the agreed upon number of downloads for the song/albums in a given time, then they would have to give it away for free and work with advertisers below to get people to the site. This would possibly drive the record companies to promote more, and embrace the changing technologies more.
- Myself and a team would then go out and get advertisers to sponsor the site to help pay for this and eventual tour promotion/festivals. Before the customers tracks download, they catch a quick advertisement for "X" product and if they are interested, then they can check the product out, if not their music downloads.

Any ideas to add, please do so.

Oh and your choice of download types would be FLAC's. 320 or 192 KB MP3's

[seva]

Originally Posted by mehrens2112

I don't have the technical know how to do it, but I know what I would do. I would make it a one time fee, would make sure that artists are getting paid to keep making great music.

My model would be this...
- Every member pays a one time fee. Members would then recruit other members and get points or credits (or even cash) for bringing on new members (similiar to network marketing).
- New or Indie Artists would be signed to the site to post their music for whatever they want to charge for it (free if they want). Similiar to what Myspace is trying to do, but take it even further.
- Established artists and their labels can put music on the site, promote in any way the see fit and charge whatever they want, however if they do not achieve the agreed upon number of downloads for the song/albums in a given time, then they would have to give it away for free and work with advertisers below to get people to the site. This would possibly drive the record companies to promote more, and embrace the changing technologies more.
- Myself and a team would then go out and get advertisers to sponsor the site to help pay for this and eventual tour promotion/festivals. Before the customers tracks download, they catch a quick advertisement for "X" product and if they are interested, then they can check the product out, if not their music downloads.

Any ideas to add, please do so.

Interesting but this wouldn't work, you would spend too much money and then when if you get popular you would get sued and shut down as big labels don't like anyone making money but them


Seva

[seva]

Originally Posted by mehrens2112

If I was guessing, and this would be a total guess...I would say they go out and buy the cd's and then upload the tracks. Of course that is pure speculation. If I were doing it, that is what I would do. That way you have the back-up in case all the servers crash or something else happens.

No-one is buying any CD's and then uploads them (talking about stores). And only idiots or cheap store owners can allow to have all on the same server and loose everything if something goes wrong. Our HDD died and did you guys noticed this?! No as we have all backed up online. Once you loose all uploading again will take months, who knows how long it will take in skyline case. Backup servers are expensive but all you guys can see what happens and what are loses when somehting goes wrong.

here is simple math in skyline case (them because "they database went down")
as they claim they have 21,000GB of music
If they have 100mbit/s Upload link (I doubt that) it would take around a month just to upload all again. More realistic is 10Mbit/s upload speed and then you come to nice number of 250 days just for uploading... Guys don't mix upload speeds with your ADSL or cable internet...with that you're lucky if you have 1mbit/s upload

Seva

[radioshoes]

I too have noticed that when a new album gets uploaded to a blog or torrent site, it very often appears shortly afterwards at certain Russian stores too - regardless of how fantastically obscure it might be. Equally, if a new album - usually one you really want - steadfastly refuses to appear on any blogs, it also tends to be a no-show everywhere else. Call me a cynic, but I suspect this may not be entirely coincidental.

If this were to be the case, maybe we should just think of our payments as a kind of finder's fee. Works for me . . .

[Nightfly]

Originally Posted by mehrens2112

I don't have the technical know how to do it, but I know what I would do. I would make it a one time fee, would make sure that artists are getting paid to keep making great music.

My model would be this...
- Every member pays a one time fee. Members would then recruit other members and get points or credits (or even cash) for bringing on new members (similiar to network marketing).
- New or Indie Artists would be signed to the site to post their music for whatever they want to charge for it (free if they want). Similiar to what Myspace is trying to do, but take it even further.
- Established artists and their labels can put music on the site, promote in any way the see fit and charge whatever they want, however if they do not achieve the agreed upon number of downloads for the song/albums in a given time, then they would have to give it away for free and work with advertisers below to get people to the site. This would possibly drive the record companies to promote more, and embrace the changing technologies more.
- Myself and a team would then go out and get advertisers to sponsor the site to help pay for this and eventual tour promotion/festivals. Before the customers tracks download, they catch a quick advertisement for "X" product and if they are interested, then they can check the product out, if not their music downloads.

Any ideas to add, please do so.

I quite agree with Seva it sounds like a nice fantasy(and your heart is in a good place) but it is a unrealistic working business model.
Plus I will not watch adds for music..

[approaching oblivion]

Originally Posted by mehrens2112

If I was guessing, and this would be a total guess...I would say they go out and buy the cd's and then upload the tracks. Of course that is pure speculation. If I were doing it, that is what I would do. That way you have the back-up in case all the servers crash or something else happens.

Guess I'm naive too, 'cause that's what I thought would happen. My image has always been of some Russian guy sitting at a computer all day surrounded by stacks and stacks of cds that he has to rip before his shift is over.

I did read awhile back that there was a site based in Mexico or South Amercia that was actually d/l stuff off allofmp3/sparks and then putting it on it's website for sale.

I've wondered for awhile if other sites did it too. For example, one of my vinyl records that I've been trying to find in a good guality d/l, Jefferson Starship's "Spitfire", is only available in a fixed bit rate of 128 on Sparks. It's also on LegalSounds and MP3Fiesta, but at the same bit rate of 128.

[approaching oblivion]

Originally Posted by seva

No-one is buying any CD's and then uploads them (talking about stores). And only idiots or cheap store owners can allow to have all on the same server and loose everything if something goes wrong.
Seva

Guess if none of the sites actually have the physical cd, then that explains why there's such a hodge podge of quality on them. I'm not fanatical about bit rates. My hearing is shot from too many years of concerts and my stereo system is far from high end, so 192 works for me for the most part. Back in the old days when I file shared on sites like Audiogalaxy, then 128 was fine for free stuff being shared, but I won't pay for 128.

[squash54]

Originally Posted by approaching oblivion

Guess if none of the sites actually have the physical cd, then that explains why there's such a hodge podge of quality on them. I'm not fanatical about bit rates. My hearing is shot from too many years of concerts and my stereo system is far from high end, so 192 works for me for the most part. Back in the old days when I file shared on sites like Audiogalaxy, then 128 was fine for free stuff being shared, but I won't pay for 128.

I also draw the line at 192 kbps. However, I have to admit that a lot of music just does not sound noticeably different where the compression is 256 kbps instead of 128 kbps. This is because the complexity of the source material is not such that a higher compression rate is necessary.

As a dinner party trick I have DL'd the same track from Sparks at 128 and 256and asked my guests to pick the difference - even the so-called audiophiles rarely score better than 50% if the track is a recording of a solo piano, for example. And this is not because I have garbage speakers - they are fitted with Scan Speak Revelator drivers and reproduce music with incredible detail.

Also, for a lot of people, the kids in particular, file size is really important if your portable music player has a fairly small hard drive. Given the choice of a thousand tracks at 256 and two thousand at 128, its a no-brainer for them.

Cheers,

Squash

[mehrens2112]

Originally Posted by approaching oblivion

Guess if none of the sites actually have the physical cd, then that explains why there's such a hodge podge of quality on them. I'm not fanatical about bit rates. My hearing is shot from too many years of concerts and my stereo system is far from high end, so 192 works for me for the most part. Back in the old days when I file shared on sites like Audiogalaxy, then 128 was fine for free stuff being shared, but I won't pay for 128.

I have mostly high end stuff, but I honestly can't tell the difference anyway. WAY too many concerts for me too. But, I guess I'm spoiled from another trading world that shall remain nameless for the purposes of this conversation and the audio geeks (I mean audiophiles), so I stuck to ripping to .wav and converting to FLAC/SHN or APE. But nothing beats Vinyl!!