You can download the full documentary in HD on their website.

As a side note, it’s because of PressPausePlay that I now have an IMDB page.

We are ecstatic to announce that Nimbi’s 0.1 version (which we call Version Gutenberg) has now been completed. This version is available as a private beta and is the first time we open up Nimbi to anyone outside our team. This is a very exciting step and our small group is pretty proud. If we were living in the same city there would even be champagne but instead we have to settle with a Skype high-five.

The 0.1 version of Nimbi offers the basic functionality of an ebook locker: you can upload an .epub file to your account and access it from anywhere through a web browser. You can also read your ebook from any iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad using Safari on iOS. Standard e-reader functions such as highlighting, commenting and remembering the last page you were reading are fully supported.
Version Gutenberg is the foundation of what Nimbi will continue to deliver in the future: a convenient and open way to store and access all your long-form text with a focus on usability.

We are giving out invite codes for Nimbi to a selected number of people – if you think you should join this group please contact us at hello [at] nim [dot] bi. We’re looking forward to reading the feedback!

When I had my interviews I was repeatedly reminded that the Radio 3 team was a unique group within the CBC and often acted independently from the rest of the corporation. To be honest, I wasn’t quite sure I’d believed this as it’s one of those things you say to someone you would like to hire. However, once I met the team I realized that they hadn’t oversold: the Radio 3 team very much feels like a start-up within the CBC so I instantly felt comfortable with the environment I joined.

The fact that I’m working part-time and therefore can continue to work on my other projects (such as the transmission events) made me quickly realize that I joined the right organization.

The projects that I’m working on at Radio 3 are exactly the way I like them: challenging, unique and based around digital music. I’m mainly focused on a secret digital music project but am also helping to run the CBC Radio 3 station overall – wherever I can add value. The guys are already doing such a great job and the last thing I want to do it to jump into areas that are working well and then mess them up…

Working for a Public Broadcaster in the digital space made me think a lot about what the CBC’s role should be within digital music. I feel that a trusted voice like the CBC has a lot to add in a space that’s constantly growing but I’m keen to do something that’s different and not imitate existing ideas. I want to add value to the digital music ecosystem and Public Broadcasters with their unique funding model can do this differently  than organizations that are relying on income from advertisers and/or subscribers. More on that later, as dig in deeper to the world of the CBC.

This story is not only interesting because it deals with a struggle of an industry moving their content into digital formats but it also highlights the battle between the interest of the content creator (the artist) and the content owner (the company that monetizes the art):

The book publisher HarperCollins wants torestrict the number of times their ebooks can be lent digitally through a library to 26 times. The reason behind this is that this is the number of times a physical book can be lent out in average is 26 times before it is ‘used up’ and no longer readable. This is of course a desperate measure to hang on to a business model that is changing due to transformation of technology and those kind of decisions (that we have seen many times in other content industries) are mainly driven by fear and lack of imagination on how to view new technologies as a business opportunity. It’s discouraging to see that the book publishing industry is making the same mistakes that businesses like the music industry have made many times over the last decade. An example is the fact that all big record labels used to insist that all their music is to be sold protected by DRM – a decision that has since been reverted (and regretted) as the disadvantages for the consumer outweight the benefit for the labels by far.

What makes this development even more complex is that the interest of the content creators is not always in line with what the industry thinks is best: various best-selling authors have spoken out agains HarperCollins e-lending policy (in addition to the more than 65,000 people that have petitionsed on change.org) and Ryk E. Spoor is giving a very good explanation on why lending of digital books should not be limited:

“Libraries — both school libraries and public libraries — are the foundation of true learning, literacy, and love of books. You can’t FORCE someone to love to read… but if you give them the opportunity, let them wander through the stacks (virtual or real) themselves, and choose their own path, they’ll teach that lesson to themselves.”

There is no doubt this struggle will continue over the coming years. But it will be vital for the industry not to alienate themselves from the creators and the consumers – otherwise they make themselves redundant within the ecosystem of digital content.

Last week we got 150 leaders and thinker from the Creative Industries together and managed to produced an event that seems to have been not only inspiring also highly enjoyable. Even though I have attended and spoken at many conferences over the years I had never been involved so closely in organizing one. So I can honestly say that I’m not used the the sense of achievment I feel when I watch the video below. All this was taking on the 10th and 11th February in Victoria and I think it speaks for itself.

Next up: Beijing.

transmission: GLOBAL SUMMIT 2011 from transmitNOW on Vimeo.

Jonas Woost on Jonas Woost from thenumber creative on Vimeo.

Over the last year or so, I noticed a worrying trend among corporate decision makers – as well as legislators around the world – who are trying to monitor internet traffic in order to prohibit unlicensed usage of copyrighted material (also referred to as ‘piracy’).  The part that concerns me most is the fact that not more people are outraged about this potential threat to our freedom of information.

Needless to say, digital files and connected computers have changed the economy around creative content and continues to do so. Companies and individuals that monetize media and entertainment content are all affected by the changes of distribution, consumption and discovery that come with digital technologies. Many of those organisations have reacted defensively to those new developments and have not fully embraced new technologies to try and develop new business models.

File sharing is often seen as one of the biggest reasons for declining revenues and there have been various strategies to stop people from sharing digital content via the internet; legal action against music downloaders has been a widely popular method with disastrous PR consequences for the RIAA and its member labels. Threats of the legal repercussion are often used in the movie business, too (“Warning: the unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted..”).

More recently (and potentially because of the ineffectiveness of the methods above) we have seen the trend where content owners, or their representatives, attempt to monitor internet traffic of individuals to see if any unlicensed content is being shared. One popular variation is that there should not be any legal action; instead, internet connection may be compromised after a certain amount of ‘offenses’. This variation has been discussed in Ireland (but was not blocked by the High Court) and was implemented in France. It has been widely discussed within the music industry.

In a letter to Google, various music industry organisations encouraged “ISPs and other intermediaries to take measures to deter unlawful activity”. While they have not been more specific what those measures could be, it is obvious that the industry is looking at the internet providers to take more responsibility in this matter. As a side note, the fact that those music industry organisations compared copyright infringement to child pornography in this letter is not only out of context in this discussion, but distasteful and misleading. I believe ‘disgusting’ was the term someone used in a conversation with me some weeks ago.

Unfortunately, there is a broad lack of understanding what monitoring internet traffic means for us: content accessed through the net is highly sensitive and personal, and privacy has to be guaranteed at all times in a society that praises freedom of information as one of the main pillars of democracy. While this sounds exaggerated, it is now that we all have to agree to a important principle: do we give digital communication and information the same status as we give towards more traditional counterparts?

Imagine a law, which would allow (or even force) your mailman to open all your letters and packages to see if there is any copyright infringing material sent to you, being passed. By the third time you received a pirated copy of ‘Brokeback Mountain’ you will not receive any more letters. Needless to say that this would be unconstitutional in most Western countries. Even opening a letter without the recipients permission is a crime in many countries.

In this context, Cory Doctorow has recently warned of “embedding control, surveillance and censorship into the very fabric of the information society’s infrastructure” and refers to the French HADOPI “three strikes” rule: “they’re sending out 10,000 legal threats a week now, and have promised 150,000 a week in short order. After three unsubstantiated accusations of infringement, your whole family is disconnected from the internet – from work, education, civic engagement, distant relatives, health information, community.”

There are two other big concerns I have with monitoring internet traffic to combat file sharing:

1. Often it is unclear to the consumer that files downloaded, or shared, are unlicensed. With the amount of free files on the net it’s easy to end up with content that has not been cleared with the rights-owners. Granted, common sense often helps navigation through those issues, especially for more popular content (eg. downloading all albums by ‘The Beatles’ for free on a Chinese website has probably not been signed off by EMI). But there are countless sources for amazing free independent music such as mp3 blogs and it’s often not clear what the rights situation is on those sites.

2. It seems that execution of any three-strikes policy is currently in the hand of the rights owner as well as the ISPs. I have not yet seen an independent agency that would set up a policy and deal with disputes. Giving the accusers the right to police themselves leaves far too much room for mistakes and even misuse.

To be clear: we need to deal with, and combat, illegal activity on the internet. And if this means having to wire-tap internet connections (of course with a court order) in order to prevent crimes then I’m fully supportive. The net should not be a law-free space; but a ‘guilty until innocent’ approach is not only limiting my civil liberties but also not practical in the process of building new business models for creative industries.

The market dominance of Apple makes many people argue it worries about every new competitor entering the market. Google Music has been hailed as the latest service that will be able to compete with iTunes and even though details have not been announced the music industry is already preparing for a big fight between the two technology giants.

In truth, the launch of a new music service, such as Google Music, probably has little influence on Apple’s real business, which is selling hardware devices.

More recently we have seen a priority shift within Apple’s ‘portable’ product range with the iPhone and iPad become hugely successful. What does that mean for Apples music business?

Quite clearly apps are economically more successful than recorded music and potentially also easier to ‘acquire’ for Apple without the need to negotiate with struggling and demanding major labels. With apps being to the iPhone/iPad what music is to the iPod, I assume Apple is not very concerned with any new music services launching even if they were to take market share within the music space from Apple. We also have to keep in mind that Steve Job and his team have always been less protective in the music space than we give them credit for: there are many music apps for iOS that could be seen as a competitor to Apple.

Of course there have been rumors for a while that Apple wants to launch a ‘cloud based’ music service. I see this less as an action based of the fear of losing market share against someone like Google but just as an upgrade to their existing service – with most Apple devices already being able to connect to the internet is just makes sense not to store music on the local hard drives but in the cloud.

Whatever Google will do around music, it will probably be successful but Apple is not concerned. There will be a Google Music app.

Photo: Mengfei Sh

It is with pleasure that I can announce signing up the team behind the Transmission conference as a new client. I will help them in the role of Director of Community Development.

Everyone who has ever been to Transmission (or on of the TransmitCHINA satellite events) knows it’s not the usual music industry trade show but a think-tank style conference that focuses on finding solutions and inspiring ideas. It does not compete with the other numerous networking and deal-making formats. We will now make sure that we can continue the conversations that we kick off during to conference dates past the last day of the event and have a dialog throughout the year. That’s what I will mainly work on.

For our next big event in February we will broaden the focus from the music industry to additional creative digital industries and build a hub for people that want to develop ideas around the economy of digital media and entertainment.

I invite you to follow TransmitNOW on Twitter or Facebook to be part of the conversation.

Music streaming services are a great way for fans to access, consume and discover music on the Internet. They also offer bands and labels great ways to get discovered, build a fan-base, and, for some, there is even some money to be made. Unfortunately there are many misunderstandings about the different services on the Internet and this post will (hopefully) clear up some of the questions that Bandzoogle members, and other DIY musicians and indie labels might have.

So, what exactly are “streaming services”?

The “ownership” of music has become less relevant over the last years. Many people (myself included) don’t feel they need to own any CDs, vinyl records and mp3s if most music is available on the Internet to listen to. Ownership results in maintenance and responsibilities: we have to clean records and make sure they don’t get damaged. We have to back up our mp3 collection and make sure we keep the format up to date (who knows if mp3 as a format will still be relevant in five years ?).

A great alternative to the above is using a music streaming service to access music. The files are stored “in the cloud” and we only access them through the Internet as opposed to owning them. Typically, you will not pay every time you listen to a track but you will pay a subscription fee, or there will be advertising that you will be exposed to in order to listen to the music for free.

What is important to understand (and this is where it gets tricky) is that there are basically two types of services: “radio” and “on-demand” streaming.

The “radio” option is borrowing its name from a technology it has little to do with, but it refers to the fact that it’s more of a hands-off experience. A “radio” streaming service will play a music selection that you cannot directly decide. You might chose a genre or an artist you like and tracks will be streamed to you that are similar to what you have selected. It’s a music discovery experience to help finding new music based on what you already like. The only influence on what you will hear is that you might be able to skip or rate what you are listening to (helps the service personalize your playlist) but you will not be able to decide exactly what is playing next. Streaming services like Pandora and Last.fm fall under category “radio”.

“On-demand” streaming is a more active music listening experience where the listener can directly decide on what they want to listen to. It feels and often looks like an online jukebox where you can listen to specific tracks, whole albums or build playlists.  These kind of offerings can really replace a CD collection: if the service has all the music that you like there is no need to own the recordings any more. Spotify, Rdio, Rhapsody, and MOG are examples of an “on-demand” streaming service.

The reason why it’s very important to understand the difference between those two types of services is that the licensing and royalties structure work very differently in each one. Without going in too much details, a “radio” service would only pay a fraction of the royalties an “on-demand” service is paying, due to the different type of music consumption in each service. Also, a “radio” service might pay the royalties to a collection society (such as SoundExchange in the US) and an “on-demand” service might pay steaming royalties directly to the artist or label. All this also depends on the country the service is operating in. And that explains why some services are not available in countries where agreements are not in place. Confusing, I know.

As an artist, how can my music get on one of the streaming services?

Just like traditional record shops, most streaming services don’t deal with artists or smaller labels directly.  This is because very small teams run those companies and they do not have the resources to deal with thousands of artists every day. There are some companies out there that might be able to help you get on some of the streaming services; ReverbNation, CD Baby, Ditto Music and Tunecore are popular with DIY musicians, and companies like IODA, The Orchard and IRIS deal mainly with independent labels. Keep in mind that they might not be able to get you on all the different streaming services.

Is it really worth it that I add my music to those services?

There have been many discussions on the web about the amount of money that is paid out to artists by streaming services and those numbers seem to be low. But they aren’t. Every one of the big streaming services (certainly the ones mentioned above) are paying out millions of dollars every year to the music industry. There are a lot of misleading articles out there (such as this one) that make it look like the money paid out is very small. But, I like to make the comparison between traditional FM radio stations and streaming services: the digital services pay out much more to artists and labels per listener than the FM equivalents – and in the U.S. the FM stations are not paying anything to the artists (only to songwriters).

One thing I hear a lot is that music streams might cannibalize sales of music and therefore some artists are understandably hesitant to make their work available for streaming. I have not yet seen any hard evidence that anyone sells less music because fans were able to stream their music. In fact, music streaming is a great way to promote some of the products that cannot be digitally delivered through the Internet such as tickets to gigs, merchandise or limited edition premium CDs/LPs.

So should your music be available for streaming? I think every artist should make sure their music is available on the new services. Other than the fact that there is ultimately some money to be made, there is a much more important argument: your music has to be where the fans are so the “old” music industry don’t even have the choice to fight this development and progress. The days where artists and labels can control the music and decide where fans will find and consume it are over. This might not always be advantageous for the musicians, from an artistic or financial point-of-view, but fighting this development is not only hugely frustrating but also a waste of time. Every musician is an entrepreneur, and part of that means you have to understand your market and be reactive to changes quickly.

Looking forward to feedback and questions: feel free to leave comments here or contact me on Twitter or my blog.