[Merged] Free ad supported music downloads coming from major artists

[KsprayDad]

Story is from Reuters...hopefully its accurate


SpiralFrog, Universal in free music download deal
Tue Aug 29, 2006 8:25 AM ET



By Mark McSherry

NEW YORK (Reuters) - SpiralFrog, a new music download service, on Tuesday said it would make Vivendi's Universal Music Group's catalog available for free legal downloading in the United States and Canada.

The new advertising-supported service, due to launch later this year, joins the ranks of rivals battling for a piece of the digital music market in the shadow of Apple Computer Inc's dominant iTunes music store.

New York-based SpiralFrog said it would offer users of its free, Web-based service the ability to legally download music of Universal's roster, which includes U2, Gwen Stefani and The Roots.

"Offering young consumers an easy-to-use alternative to pirated music sites will be compelling," SpiralFrog Chief Executive Robin Kent said in a statement.

Kent said SpiralFrog's business model is based on sharing income from advertising with content partners like Universal.

The company's research revealed that consumers are willing to "pay" for their content by watching non-intrusive, contextually-relevant, targeted advertising, Kent said.

According to SpiralFrog's web site, Kent is a former chairman and CEO of media communications agency Universal McCann Worldwide.

SpiralFrog said its target audience is people between the ages of 13 and 34.

[NG]

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2006-08-29-spiralfrog_x.htm

Although the article makes no mention of country restriction CBC Business News update did say the service would be open to Canada and the US.

Finally the music industry is catching on that suing kids whose parents are on welfare isn't going to fix the piracy problem for them.

[yuprules]

You mean this article?
http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2006/08/29/spiralfrog.html

[alt130]

No need to wait for that service to start up, as downloading music from whatever source is still legal in Canada. I'd say this will be more of a hot deal for those in the US. Myself, I doubt I'd bite as I bet the files have DRM and probably pretty low (ie iTunes) bitrates.

Edit: DRM indeed. They're learning, but not learning enough.

[Politikil]

No need to wait for that service to start up, as downloading music from whatever source is still legal in Canada. I'd say this will be more of a hot deal for those in the US. Myself, I doubt I'd bite as I bet the files have DRM and probably pretty low (ie iTunes) bitrates.

Edit: DRM indeed. They're learning, but not learning enough.

I couldn't have said it better myself. Good post. I'll definitely send the link to some of my Yankee friends.

[growler]

No need to wait for that service to start up, as downloading music from whatever source is still legal in Canada.....

Do you have a reference on the legaility here in Canada? With all the legal RIAA battles I continue to hear in the news, I'm unsure of what the position Canada is taking.

[KsprayDad]

Do you have a reference on the legaility here in Canada? With all the legal RIAA battles I continue to hear in the news, I'm unsure of what the position Canada is taking.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/internet/downloading_music.html

The defeat of the Liberal government in the 2006 election also saw the death of Bill C-60, a package of amendments to Canada's Copyright Act, intended to crack down on the downloading of copyrighted material over the internet.
The introduction of the bill came after intense lobbying from the music industry. Recent court decisions have upheld Canadians' right to encode music and other information electronically and make it available on file-sharing networks.

The music industry says downloading music through file-sharing systems has been responsible for a downturn in sales.

The proposed changes would have:

Made it illegal to put copyrighted material into the shared directories of file-sharing systems, such as Kazaa or BitTorrent.
Made it illegal to bypass copy-protection mechanisms on copyrighted material.
Exempted internet service providers, such as Rogers, Bell and Telus, from copyright liability.
The music industry, as well as advocates for consumers of copyright material, are awaiting the Conservative government's successor to Bill C-60.
Courts rule against music industry on copyright law

In a unanimous 9-0 decision on June 30, 2004, the Supreme Count of Canada ruled that internet service providers are not responsible for paying royalties on music downloaded by users.

The court said although ISPs provide the hardware and technology, they are only "intermediaries" who are not responsible for what people download and are not bound by federal copyright legislation.

The decision is the latest legal blow to the music recording industry, which is trying to stop the unauthorized downloading of millions of songs over the internet. Musicians, composers and artists are not usually paid royalties when songs are downloaded to a computer over file-sharing networks.

In an earlier decision, in March 2004, a court ruled that internet service providers (ISPs) are not required to link pseudonyms on file-sharing networks to specific IP addresses.

The Federal Court of Canada ruling on downloading music from the internet was seen as a major setback by the music industry and a victory by internet service providers. That ruling was upheld by the Federal Court of Appeal in May 2005.

The Canadian Recording Industry Association wanted a court order to identify 29 uploaders that CRIA claims illegally posted hundreds of songs on the internet. Justice Konrad von Finckenstein refused and without the names, CRIA cannot take legal action for damages.

"No evidence was presented that the alleged infringers either distributed or authorized the reproduction of sound recordings," von Finckenstein wrote in his 28-page ruling. "They merely placed personal copies into their shared directories which were accessible by other computer users via a P2P service."

The ruling stipulates that:

Downloading a song for personal use is not an infringement.


Placing a song in an on-line music-sharing directory such as Kazaa is not considered distribution.
In April 2005, the recording industry announced its intention to appeal the ruling.

The music industry claims the rising practice of sharing music on the internet is the reason CD sales are dropping. But a study released in March 2004 by Harvard Business School claims that swapping had no impact on sales.

Other surveys show the opposite result, claiming internet sharing of music does hurt sales. The Harvard study claims that the people surveyed – who were file-swapping users – did not answer truthfully when asked if they buy copies of the music they download. The authors of the Harvard study got permission to track the files being downloaded and then tracked the U.S. sales of the same music and found that an increase in downloading didn't correlate with a decrease in sales.

On June 27, 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favour of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios in its case against file-sharing companies Grokster and StreamCast. MGM, which is now owned by Sony, charged that the companies should be liable for facilitating copyright infringement by their users.

Donald Verrilli Jr., the lawyer representing MGM, successfully argued that file-sharing networks allow people to exchange billions of music and movie files without having paid for them. According to Verrilli, the music industry alone has lost 25 per cent of its revenue since these networks began.

LINKS:
Harvard Business School study (pdf)
(Downloading doesn't effect sales)


Stan Liebowitz, University of Texas at Dallas study (pdf)
(Downloading does effect sales)




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FAQ

Where does the money go when I buy a CD?

Of course, it all depends on the cost of the CD, but the Canadian Recording Industry Association compiled figures this summer. Out of 100 per cent of the cost:
4% is retailer profit
7% is label profit
9% is manufacturing costs
12% is artist and songwriting payments
12% is record company distribution, sales & overhead costs
13% is promotion and marketing costs
19% is recording, video and production costs
24% is retail store costs

How has file sharing affected the Canadian recording industry?

In Canada, the Canadian Recording Industry Association estimates losses to the Canadian industry at about $250 million in sales over the past three years. That's a 20 per cent drop in annual sales. This is despite the Canadian Private Copying Collective, which was formed in 1999 to offset royalties lost to digital file sharing. The CPCC taxes hardware and software that allows digital recordings, whether or not they are being used for music. It then distributes the money to composers, performers, publishers and record labels. The CPCC collected $28 million in 2000 and 2001. There is no similar program in the U.S.

From December 2003 until December 2004, the tax applied to MP3 players, as well, until the Federal Court of Appeal ruled that the terms in the Copyright Act that allow the levy on black media do not extend to MP3 players.

What about services for Canadians?

The first Canadian service for legally downloading music files from the internet – called PureTracks – launched on Oct. 14th, 2003. It has deals with the world's big international music companies, as well as leading Canadian recording companies, offering 175,000 tracks. So it will be much easier to find your favourite Canadian recording artists. Since then, other services, such as iTunes and the new Napster, have launched in Canada.

Do people pay to download music?

Initial figures indicate they have, and will. Apple's iTunes service generated 10 million downloads at 99 cents a song in the first four months of operation – and the service was then only available to Mac users in the U.S. Jupiter Research in the U.S. predicts that online music will grow from less than $1 billion in 2003 to $3.3 billion in 2008, when the internet will account for 26 per cent of U.S. music spending.

So, no more free music?

Well, not quite. There are still free services available, but a recent Neilsen/Netratings survey showed traffic on the major site, Kazaa, is down more than 40 per cent since the major record labels decided to sue internet downloaders for copyright infringement. But legal experts have said it may be difficult for those companies to come after Canadian internet users.

How are the big music labels reacting?

Legal downloading is a huge potential market for them. The five biggest (Universal Music, Sony Music, Warner Music, EMI Group Plc and BMG) have made deals with the pay-for-service file-sharing companies, and will be providing access to the work of their musicians. Leading label Universal Music Group slashed CD prices by almost one-third, pressuring its four rivals to follow suit. A recent Newsweek survey found that 48 per cent of consumers would be more likely to buy CDs than download if discs were a third less expensive. Some labels are trying to entice consumers with goodies such as videos or prizes.

[Politikil]

Do you have a reference on the legaility here in Canada? With all the legal RIAA battles I continue to hear in the news, I'm unsure of what the position Canada is taking.

The RIAA battles are happening mainly in the USA. The Canadian Supreme court has already ruled on the legality of file sharing in Canada, which can be viewed in a news article here (http://news.com.com/2100-1027_3-5182641.html).

There are many more articles you can read if you want to 'Google' for it as well. Some of the caveats are pretty interesting to read (for some people anyway), and I would suggest doing so if you feel compelled. I think there is also another thread here on RFD which has links to some other articles as well, if you decide to take a look.

[NG]

You mean this article?
http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2006/08/29/spiralfrog.html

I saw Fred Landgon report it live on Newsworld but the article seems to have the same jist.

For those saying it doesn't really matter in Canada because downloading MP3s is legal...well they are legal to do so (aslong as you don't upload) however a catalog release from a major label is much better than hoping someone is seeding the torrent you want.

Hopefully this'll catch on. Even on usenet there's still decades of content locked in a vault somewhere by the labels that hasn't seem the light of day for years.

[KsprayDad]

I saw Fred Landgon report it live on Newsworld but the article seems to have the same jist.

For those saying it doesn't really matter in Canada because downloading MP3s is legal...well they are legal to do so (aslong as you don't upload) however a catalog release from a major label is much better than hoping someone is seeding the torrent you want.

Hopefully this'll catch on. Even on usenet there's still decades of content locked in a vault somewhere by the labels that hasn't seem the light of day for years.

As per the 2005 ruling, uploading a song to a p2p service or having it available on a p2p service is not illegal in Canada either...and alot of the files on p2p are at higher bit rates than commerical downloads no?

I'll still use allofmp3 as the cost is reasonable for the security of not having to deal with torrent/p2p.

[KsprayDad]

More news...EMI now added to Universal...

By Reuters
http://news.com.com/SpiralFrog+strikes+deal+with+EMI+Music/2100-1026_3-6112581.html

Story last modified Wed Sep 06 04:27:02 PDT 2006

SpiralFrog, a new online music service, said on Wednesday it had signed an agreement with EMI Music Publishing to authorize SpiralFrog's use of EMI's music catalog for legal downloading in the United States via SpiralFrog's advertising-supported service.

SpiralFrog said the agreement with EMI Music Publishing follows its deal with Universal Music Group, a unit of Vivendi, announced last week, which allows SpiralFrog to offer free downloads of Universal's songs.

"It is a very exciting concept which fuses advertising with music downloads and other services to recapture consumer demand which has been hijacked by online piracy," said Roger Faxon, Co-CEO of EMI Music Publishing.

"Anytime we can create a new revenue stream for our songwriters and combat online piracy, you will see EMI Music Publishing leading the charge."

The rights of EMI Music and Universal combined include artists such as Sting, Nelly Furtado, Jay Z and Kanye West.

The SpiralFrog service, to be launched in December, experiments with a new business model that is funded entirely by advertising, as opposed to the pay-per-song model of Apple Computer market-leading iTunes music store.

[glenvb]

Time to bump this, since Spiral Frog is now live in Canada (but not the USA!).

Haven't tried the service yet myself, but it looks like they have a pretty good selection.

[Kalel]

Can someone post the approipiate link to the music site and not the site where one can read that related articles.

[glenvb]

Can someone post the approipiate link to the music site and not the site where one can read that related articles.

Oops, sorry.

http://www.spiralfrog.com

[yuprules]

Oops, sorry.

http://www.spiralfrog.com

Wow, I actually posted in this thread back in 2006. I can't believe it finally launched, spyware free...yeah right. NOTHING is free that doesn't have some sort of "spyware" on it.

From Privacy policy:
We also collect information during your visits to the Site including the music you download, the song selections you make for Play Lists, frequency of your visits to the Site and Search terms entered. We will also collect information such as your IP Address and, via tools provided by third-parties, collect information about your usage of our site for purposes of administration and promotion of the Site.

[AndrewRFD]

Posted... a year later. Let's see how this turns out. Thanks for the very early notice.

[cap]

I was wondering how they could afford to give away all those songs for so little advertisement on their site. Sure the downloads are artificially slowed down but that's still not enough.

The answer is you don't own these songs. SpiralFrog is based on the principal of Napster ToGo. This is a subscription service that happens to charge no monthly fee. The nice thing is they give you the option to copy the songs on up to 2 portable devices. Napster charges $15/month for that. Keep in mind you will need Windows Media Player to sync your mp3 player to update the licenses. I expect you will need to do this every month after you renew your subscription.

You can copy the songs to your mp3 player using Windows Explorer in MSC mode, but that will not transfer the license. My mp3 player asked me to sync with Windows Media Player before it could play the song.

The faq claims they have 800000 songs and expect to add another 800000 by the end of Sept 2007. Their search engine knows about 8 million songs so search results often show songs you cannot download.

[gordholio]

I'd rather get my albums from other sources. Ads are so pervasive in our society; it's like life is one big advertisement and not real.

[cap]

We will also collect information such as your IP Address and, via tools provided by third-parties, collect information about your usage of our site for purposes of administration and promotion of the Site.

All sites do that to some degree. That's how they know what percentage of people that looked at a product eventually buy it. They can also figure out how many people drop off at every step of a long checkout process. Many third party companies offer to analyze a company's web site using hidden url's in the downloaded page for tracking purposes. That's very different than a spyware.

Hopefully that's all they do. I'm nervous about the Download Manager ActiveX that keeps running in the background.

[cap]

I'd rather get my albums from other sources. Ads are so pervasive in our society; it's like life is one big advertisement and not real.

You only see the ads while browsing for the music you like or during the download. On top of that, there are not that many ads on the page. This is very reasonable if you can live with the idea of a subscription service.