Lucas said something that inspired Chris Grigg, and I among others posted a reply:

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Subject: RE: pho: Blogging of Rhapsody playlists
From: Lucas Gonze (panix.com)
Date: Mon, 31 May 2004 22:55:14 +0100

I’m sorry to see conversation about playlists get pulled onto the old P2P
merry-go-round.

Done right they are a form of hypertext that makes music a first class
object on the web for the first time. They are a supremely social and
community-oriented technology. They are an evolutionary algorithm for
developing hits. When they are portable enough to be syndicated, they get
drawn into the orbit of RSS, weblogs, and web-scale architecture.

Talking about filesharing, stealing and the RIAA in the context of
playlists is not wrong, but since playlists don’t add anything to that
conversation it strikes me as a waste.

- Lucas

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Subject: pho: RE: Blogging of Rhapsody playlists / music::
From: Chris Grigg (grigg.org)
Date: Tue, 1 Jun 2004 05:36:19 +0100

At 5.55p -0400 2004.05.31, Lucas Gonze wrote:
>…playlists…
>>
>Done right they are a form of hypertext that makes music a first class
>object on the web for the first time.
>…

Now .that’s. an interesting architectural concept. Maybe a new URI
scheme… not http:: … but rather, music:: …?

music::The_Beatles/Sargeant_Pepper’s_Lonely_Hearts_Club_Band/She’s_Leaving_H
ome

So instead of the Domain Name System and our DNS servers, we’d have a
global Artist Name System and everyone would have their ANS server.
The albums/songs tree for each artist could be browsable, allowing
artists to publish their definitive “disc”-ographies this way. A
client request to a specific song or album path could return either
the audio recording(s) itself, if the artist wants to do that, or
else a unique ID for use in searching a separate set of content
servers (Rhapsody, iTunes, p2p, anything). Maybe with hints on which
content server(s) the artist recommends/prefers you use.

Gotta think about this a little more.

– Chris G.

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Subject: RE: pho: Re: music://
From: Crosbie Fitch (cyberspaceengineers.org)
Date: Tue, 1 Jun 2004 21:22:02 +0100

A guide to publishing a music recording online. (just to start the ball
rolling as ’twere)

1) Ingredients
~~~~~~~~~~~

* “MyDigitalMaster.Dat”

This is a file that represents the highest quality version of your music. It
doesn’t matter what format it’s in, but it should be good enough to derive
any other format from. We’ll call it the digital master.

* You have a website, e.g. http://www.example.com

2) Identifying your recording
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You need to create a serial number for your recording.

Download the following command line utility:
http://www.fourmilab.ch/md5/

Let it generate a serial number for your file like so:

MD5 -L -N MyDigitalMaster.Dat

It will output a number like this:

609f46a341fedeaeec18abf9fb7c9647

You also need to create a name for all formats of your file. If your
recording was entitle “Yellow Brick Road” then you might name files of it
‘yellowbrickroad’.

3) Creating a place for your recording on your website
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Create a new toplevel folder on your site with exactly the same name as the
serial number, e.g.

http://www.example.com/609f46a341fedeaeec18abf9fb7c9647

All web pages and other formats of this recording that you create will go in
this folder.

4) Describing your music recording
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Create a default web page for this folder that describes this recording to
your audience, e.g.

http://www.example.com/609f46a341fedeaeec18abf9fb7c9647/index.html

5) Making compact/low quality versions of your recording available for
direct download

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~

Create a version of your recording a format of your choice, e.g. MP3, WMA,
AAC, Ogg Vorbis, etc.

Name this file appropriately, e.g. yellowbrickroad_128.mp3
Note that the ‘128′ is the bitrate.

This can be linked to from your index page (or anywhere else) as:
http://www.example.com/609f46a341fedeaeec18abf9fb7c9647/yellowbrickroad_128.
mp3

6) Making the digital master available for download
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you choose to release the digital master then copy MyDigitalMaster.Dat as
the file ‘master’ and make it into a torrent as described here
http://bitconjurer.org/BitTorrent/guide.html, such that the link to the
master will become:

http://www.example.com/609f46a341fedeaeec18abf9fb7c9647/master.torrent

Because it’s the master its format does not need to be identified.

Note that you are implicitly granting the public the right to download and
perform this master privately. Any other rights you wish to grant can be
described separately.

7) Indexing, cataloguing, and format information
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Given a DTD (to be developed) all information concerning this work should be
specified in an XML file called 609f46a341fedeaeec18abf9fb7c9647.xml

—————————————————————–
This is the Pho mailing list.
Help?! http://www.pholist.org/help.php
—————————————————————–

http://artist.com/index.html is the artist’s home page.

http://artist.com/song1/index.html is the home page for one of their songs.

Perhaps you’re suggesting that it should be a subdomain? Thus http://www.fred.com is the artist’s primary website, http://singer.fred.com is the site about the artist and http://song1.artist.com is the site about their first song?

Each song needs a home page.

In many cases, songs will deserve their own websites–or, at least, the song home page will be an index to other web pages about and/or relevant to the song.

Cheers!
y

[1] http://blog.dbtune.org/post/2008/05/14/Data-rich-music-collection-management

The tricky thing about playing pages-with-audio is knowing when the song is over, so that the master controller can manage the playlist as a whole. If the media renderer is in the target page, it would need to communicate with the controller. In client software like songbird or foxytunes it’s possible for the client to arrange out of band comms using browser extensions. If the controller is pure AJAX, you’d probably need a cross-frame technique like local cookies; but how to figure out when the controller in the target is hosed? Tricky hacking ahead.

Also, it’s an interesting incentive for them to push their licencees to support this whole mechanism, and as a result to help the mechanism get started. They should be adding contract clauses to require that they own the WOAF (or analogous) field.

@teru, man, you outclass me by a long shot. Thinking about the mixter case, it would be totally natural to have the cchost set the link to point to the song page there. The ccmixter song page could manage mixbacks, and listeners could follow from there to any page you want to set as your personal link.

I’d just like to add from a remix point of view, trackbacks to these pages for remixes, videos containing the song, podcasts it was featured in, etc… linked to the song page (like for remixes at ccmixter) would also make the web a nicer place.

What you guys are talking about makes so much sense. Even to someone like me. : )