Beat-Play Press Machine

Today while perusing my Alltop page, I found a post titled: What will be the successor of the current user profile in online networks? by Eric Mariacher. In the post he stated:

My answer is: I guess LinkedIn is pioneering the "successor of user profile" with 3 specific features:
1. who you know - your network
2. recommendations from current and past colleagues
3. LinkedIn Q&A feature where you can advertize your skills by asking and answering question. from what I understand this is what you call "software usage".

When I read this, I needed to make a comment. LinkedIn is pioneering the successor of the user profile? If that's what pioneering is, then what is Beat-Play? These three features are cool, and very useful from a professional standpoint. They add reasons to have a profile, other than telling everyone that you're at the ski lodge for the week so robbers will have open access to your house.

Adding practical functionality is always good, but these uses alone are not enough. Not only should the profile represent you professionally and personally, but imagine if your profile information was tied to the content you view online, and your web use in general. Imagine if you accessed all of your favorite stored content through your profile. Imagine if you only needed one profile!

The future of profiles online will lie in the browser. It seems like a strange concept at first, but given a closer look, it just seems practical. There's literally millions of websites out there, and every one pretty much does something different, and useful. This goes back to my Toolbox post from last week. We need a place to keep all of these great tools, and the browser is the place to do it.



Browsers like Safari, and now Chrome, are beginning to offer quicker ways to access your favorite sites, by offering a function that shows you screens shots of your favorite websites upon launch, so you can easily 1-click and be off. However this is only a very small way browsers can save us time.

Many websites I use require me to sign up, register, and usually create a profile. For many people, this is a big deterrent from actually using some sites. There have been attempts by companies to create universal profile systems such as Open ID, and many others. However this also requires a person to create a profile, and then not all websites support these forms of identification, or they support one, but not another.

A better solution would be for the browser to house the user's profile information. Think about it. There are about 5 major browsers on the market today. Compared with the number of websites, which is the more universal medium? If even the top 3 browsers had systems to store profile info, the websites would have a much easier time integrating their logins with those browsers. Many websites already make Firefox Add-ons and widgets. It's become extremely easy, especially with the open source browsers, to integrate websites into them. Also, it wouldn't be too hard to sync a user's Twitter, Myspace and/or Facebook profile with a profile stored on a browser - the ultimate solution!

I cannot wait for the day when I go to sign up to a new website and it asks me to agree to the terms, and then I get a little box that says "Syncing to Browser Profile Data." That would sure save me a headache, and it could be an amazing thing for websites as well.

But hey, if the big browsers wait to long, then shit, I'll just have to do it myself. Browsers are for sure the future of profiles, and in my opinion, computing in general, even over OS's, just ask Google.

Written by: Dante Cullari Founder & President Beat-Play, LLC

Whenever I go to a music store or website, I always see Hip hop and Rap in the same section, and many times the terms are used interchangeably.

When you bring up this subject to people, there are many different responses. Most of the time people equate Hip hop to being the older of the two, as the real foundation for the genre. People also say that Hip hop has more of a Jazzy, upbeat feel. Rap, according to most people, is anything made after 1994. Most of what came before is considered Old school hip hop.

Some people say Hip hop is Dead. "Rapper" Nas claimed this a while back. I disagree..and I also don't consider Nas a "Rapper," though he is commonly referred to a one.

You may or may not know but I'm an independent artist myself. I actually happen to be a lyricist that mostly writes hip hop lyrics, but I also do some Rock and R&B. I would never classify myself as a rapper though, simply because of the bad connotations that the word is associated with. When I say connotations, I mean the subject matter that is in the songs.

The REAL difference between the two categories is lyrical content. Rap, I classify, as being a genre that focuses on particular concepts over and over again. The subject matter never really changes very much. It is almost like Rap is a mass produced form of music, and the artistic dynamic to the music is often lost.

However Hip hop on the other hand, which is still very much alive (overshadowed, but alive), has a greater value to the listener. It offers poetic and often insightful lyrics that give you a second reason to want to listen. Take a look at one of my favorite Hip hop lyricists, Emmanuel Jackson in the video below. He's unknown right now, but look out for him in the next couple years. Hip hop will be making a huge comeback. His style is also the closest to my own that I have ever seen and I have tremendous respect for his art.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tA8jnNts4ms]

I hope this post cleared this issue up for a lot of people. Rap is a mainstream pop genre that goes through fads faster than an elementary school, and Hip hop is a fundamentally pure art form who's roots are so deep that it will never really die. In fact, I think Rap may be in danger pretty soon, especially with people like Emmanuel Jackson emerging, who happens to feel the exact same way as me on the subject. The REAL difference is all about the REAL.

P.S. I should have a EP out by the end of the year ;)

Written by: Dante Cullari (aka ilL principe) Found and President Beat-Play, LLC

The key to success is knowing something nobody else knows. It seems to me that too many of the people in the web or tech fields are strictly focused on what everybody else does know, and they don't take this information and use it to create the next big evolution, but instead, they try to create something that fits into what everybody else is already talking about, or are focused on at the moment, in order to fit into a perceived market trend.
There also always seems to be much speculation about what the next big trend will will be, but usually we end up being very wrong. For example, many people are betting on the tablet PC to be the next BIG innovation, however, I will suggest something later in this post that could make the tablet PC obsolete, and even if it isn't realized now, the chances are that someone will realize it eventually, and it will then take the place of the tab. I will give you a very recent example of why this issue occurs.

Currently, and widely because of this years CES Convention, the web is buzzing about tablet PC's and iSlate speculation, and eReaders. It seems to me that in both categories, there are many competitors with extremely similar products. At least all of the big brands out there seem to be following a trend. There aren't very many different solutions in terms of features and technologies.

How could they all have come out with similar products at the same time? The future of eReaders and portable PCs is so uncertain.. How could they all have come up with the same answers to the same questions, and especially when there are many different directions left unexplored by any of them?

It seems to me something fishy is going on, like they're all talking to one another.. However, the fishy big companies aren't the only causes of the problem. There just doesn't seem to be any push from new companies to completely out-do their bigger competitors and introduce an innovation that makes their competitor's products obsolete. Maybe it's lack of resources, but I know if I'm a venture capitalist, I'm going to invest in innovation*.

The one hardware example of a new company at least slightly distinguishing themselves from their competitors has to be Plastic Logic with their Que proReader (shown at top) that is designed specifically for business solutions. But as luck would have it, eReaders may be in danger of becoming obsolete all together due to evolving portable PCs that can do almost infinitely more.

I think the winner of this debate for the hardware would be Light Blue Optic's Light Touch 10 inch touchscreen projector; but even this has many problems, or holes, in functionality that could prevent this particular model from going to the next level. Imagine if this product was also a mini PC, but the screen expanded to Microsoft Surface proportions. It could potentially make the Surface obsolete, and in the process maybe the tablet PC as well, due to no limitations on screen size, with much less hardware, therefor less price, and the same capabilities. Why hasn't Light Blue Optics figured this out?

It's the same story with websites and apps. There's about 182,000 (not accurate) music websites out there, all with extremely similar models, and if not, with similar problems. For independent artists, they either charge you too much upfront without you being guaranteed results, or they're free but offer you no way to actually promote your music other than spamming people, or you need to use more than one site because one provides a tool that you need that the other doesn't have, and vice versa. There's many similar problems from a fan's perspective as well. Why can't someone come up with a website that solves ALL of these problems for everybody!?! (Beat-Play)

It seems that even with all of the amazing possibilities that the web is capable of providing, with a market place driven by poor competition, still, nothing is easy.

You might say "But Dante, it's not so easy to innovate in a field these days. Where do you even start?" And I'd say to you "But it really is! And you start with your competitor's products." An innovation doesn't have to be some huge evolutionary leap, like morse code right to Telephone, it just has to solve a problem that is currently put up with by society. Be the person to solve that problem, and your company should be off to a great start.

Try using your competitor's products. Put yourself in the shoes of the consumer. If you don't know what industry to start with, chances are you're a consumer of something..what problems do you face with products? I once saw a great TED Talk by Charles Leadbeater, about the occurrence of innovation. He talked about how the invention of the mountain bike didn't come from the R&D labs of major companies, but they came from the consumers. Avid bikers became fed up with the restrictions placed on them by the big companies, and they began modifying, and eventually selling their modified bikes. The mountain bike industry today accounts for 65% of all bike sales in America

By looking at all of the slate computers, and finding the fundamental problems, creating an alternative to these problems becomes a lot easier, instead of creating something that poses the same problems. It seems that many times the major company's definition of "compete" is to create a product with almost identical features as the other company's products, so when you're in the store staring at both of them on the shelf, you're so confused that hopefully you'll end up picking their product. This is either lunacy, stupidity, or treachery towards the consumers. I have a feeling there's a little bit of all three floating around in this marketplace somewhere.

People only pay attention to the products of existing companies when it comes to hardware. The web is the only medium where mass mainstream media advertising can have absolutely no effect on the success of a website. In other words, a website can completely explode, seemingly overnight, with no TV commercials or billboards up initially whatsoever.

For almost every other major industry, advertising could make or break you, which is why new competitors don't arise very often. But, it turns out that the internet and social-ecommerce could very well offer a solution to this problem as well, especially with the massive networks of people being created by the Web 2.0 revolution. However, how the internet can make advertising obsolete is a subject for another blog.

For now, if you're a consumer who wishes they weren't constrained by company or brand restrictions, then now is the time to do something about it, and come up with the solutions to those problems. You might as well, the big companies aren't going to solve them. The key to success is knowing something nobody else knows...or admits..

Written by: Dante Cullari, Founder & President Beat-Play, LLC

*However it is worth noting that most venture capitalists are probably in their 50's-70's and they've seen so much innovation in their lifetimes, that to them, they kind of have the outlook that enough is enough. They may even resent the fact that the world will continue to advance without them. At least this is my theory. I also happen to think the world would be a much better place if run by intelligent people in their 20's. I should also note that I'm 21 :).

If you spend more than 6 hours daily online then you are addicted to the internet, according to studies done in China. Opinions vary greatly on the subject. Some people don't even believe you can be addicted to the web, or that it is really a bad thing.

It seems to me that a lot of the Chinese studies on the topic may be pretty biased, due to their beliefs about the web and web restrictions. However the fear of web addiction has made it's way over to this side of the world too..but why?

I think the biggest contributor to this kind of thinking in the US and Canada has to do with people believing that getting out and enjoying some old fashion fresh air is a much better way to spend one's time than cooped up in a room on the computer.

For some reason when people talk about this, they always seem to paint the picture of some overweight guy in a dark windowless basement hacking away at his computer with a hot pocket and a Slurpee next to him, like you could turn into him if you spend too many Saturday nights surfing. This is their worst fear.

To the contrary, the web can help you educate yourself about better eating habits, exercises, sports, and other things that can contribute to a healthier life.

It's pretty sad when people (mostly of the older persuasion) misjudge, and underestimate the amazingness of surfing the web.

Sure playing a saturday pickup game is great, and going to a BBQ is a great way to socialize, but honestly, when you consider all of the possible knowledge to be gained on the internet, not to mention all of the real interaction you can have, it doesn't make sense to limit yourself only to your surrounding area.

The web has the ability to open people up to the world. It's like watching a Planet Earth Documentary. It can show you things you would have never in a million years dreamt about, and it can teach you about them. It's the ultimate when it comes to expanding one's horizons.

Sure not everybody uses the web to gain useful knowledge. Some people are addicted to things like online poker, or buying things on ebay, but the potential for the amazing growth of knowledge, and at such high speeds, far over-shadows any negative that could potentially prevent it from occuring.

The internet doesn't shut you out from the world, it simply brings the world to you..pretty much all of it. It takes you places you can't go in real life. A great example would be touring the Pyramids and the Sphinx with infinite resolution on Photosynth. It's literally the next best thing to actually being there. The detail is amazing!

I think as the web ages, and innovation rates increase, we will start to see a change in the mindset of people who believe the web does not enhance our lives. For me, there's never too much. I'd like to see the progress made when everything we do in some way is tied to this vastly powerful matrix of information.

I think it's time we stop focusing on how technology makes people lazy, and start realizing that tremendous amounts of work can get done by simply sitting on the couch with a laptop. Of course, going to the gym every once in a while doesn't hurt either..

Written by: Dante Cullari, Founder & President Beat-Play, LLC

I thought I'd talk a little bit today about song recommendation engines, as far as where we are currently with the technology online, and how it can get any better.

First of all, we've all heard about Pandora's Music Genome Project. They actually have a very dedicated staff that goes through each song for about 10-15 minutes and reports on a list of many different musical variables. The results get fed into the algorithm and BAM, there's your playlist.

Last.fm does something very similar, but they use different variables, and many sites, like thesixtyone.com, use a "similar" function that introduces you to music with similar variables.

So how do you tell which one works the best? You'd almost have to go through and look at the variables they use to tie music together. It would be almost impossible to tell if the site could have played you a better song than the one it did. Streaming music seems to be the way to go, but right now I believe the biggest factor in people's choices between these different websites may be the design appeal and ease of use. That, and the lack of anything better.

There are several problems I see with this picture. Number one is that it never seems like a good idea to use a tool that has no clear distinction between it's competitors. There's gotta be one that's better, but in this case it's too hard to tell, or would take too much effort. This most likely has a lot to do with the fact that these concepts are no new, and no one has really settled on one ultimate solution, yet people do have their favorites of the moment.

That brings me to the second problem with this picture, which is a fundamental one. The current song recommendation engines all use the song's variables to tie the songs together, and then tie you to the songs by entering a song or artist you like. This a pretty cool, but your control over your music ends after you enter your favorite artist or song.

Music is such a social thing. It seems to me that our playlists shouldn't be controlled by similarities between songs, but similarities between people.

There needs to be a system where I can follow people that I share a taste in music with(my friends, favorite band members, ect). Then anything in those people's playlists will get sent to my radio player, at random, or at my control. This not only ensures that you'll hear only the best music, but also it will automatically update you when new songs are out, and it doesn't bind you to one genre, or one sound.

If you're like me you could listen to 4 or 5 different genres, back to back. This system would also allow for filters on things like genres, moods, tags, ect, and could create a much more custom listening experience.

Also for new bands, this would almost take the place of promotion, because it is basically automated word of mouth and is the epitome of viral. With this model, who knows, you could be the one to discover a band for your whole generation.

I don't know about you, but I think that sounds a lot better than trusting variables and algorithms. This model will actually be out soon. It will be included in my website, Beat-Play, coming out in beta this April, 2010. It will be undergoing many changes early on in the beta process, but we hope to get it all fleshed out by June.

When it comes to the internet and all of the crazy, complex, and really cool tools out there, it's best to keep this thought in the back of your mind: "Is this the experience I want?" If the answer is "I don't know", then there's usually a problem somewhere, and also a void waiting to be filled.

For more info about the Beat-Play beta check out the BeatPlay Beta Overview

And to sign up to beta test, visit: http://MusicWithoutLabels.com

Written by: Dante Cullari Founder & President, Beat-Play, LLC

For any independent business owner, even if you're an independent artist, being your own boss is tough. How do you stay on top of everything when you're being pulled in a million different directions? Especially when there's so many different responsibilities to keep track of? Here's a couple tricks I've used to stop my own anxiety.

First, when I felt that the list of things I was in charge of was too big to even remember off hand, I made a spreadsheet. At the top left I wrote "Action Items:" Then below I listed all of the actions I go through(or should) almost daily, such as Blogging, Research, Drafting, Email, ect. Then every day I check off the categories I did and list the specific projects I worked on.

It helps me in a couple of different ways. It lets me know which areas I'm hitting the hardest and which ones need work. It also lets me track how much is actually getting done daily, and it gives me something to be proud of. Also it pushes me to be more productive so I can have the simple joy of checking off those boxes.

There's just one other crucial step in this process: Get a clipboard. For some reason, there's something official about having a clipboard with information regarding the productivity of your business. It is reassuring, and especially when your office is your living room or your basement, and your environment might not be so "official" looking, having something that represents that order to your business is important, and having things organized like that goes a long way for your peace of mind.

One more AWESOME and similar organizational tool for any business owner, that can sky rocket your productivity, is called the Mini Day Method. Check out that blog post for more info, it is REALLY worth looking into.

Today's Advice: Don't stress, buy a clipboard!

Written by: Dante Cullari, Founder & President Beat-Play, LLC

Sounds like not much would get done..but it could be more fun. In today's smart phone social culture, information is more readily available than ever before. As of now, no one really knows the full repercussions of this on our society, but some signs have already begun to pop up.

Probably the most obvious is Mark Zuckerberg who is now 25 going on 26, and was only 20 when he started Facebook in 2004. 6 years later his website has over 350 million members and even old lame people are forced to jump on. Why is this? Because Mark came up with a better way to use the web as a tool to communicate than was previously in place. In my opinion, this could have only come from a younger person.

Being born in 1984, the exact year 29 year old Steve Jobs and Apple Computers launched their most famous product ever, the Macintosh, Mark Zuckerberg had grown up with computers. He was even programming in middle school; something which a decade before would have been reserved for only the most experienced hardware and tech nerds, and something which may not have happened if it wasn't for people like Jobs and Woz.

For my father(58), to have seen the transformation from black & white photos and TV to all of the ridiculous gadgets made available today, like 3d printing and color multi-touch phones, just to have had email would have been sufficient. Email works soo much better than what he was used to growing up, that imagining better is made much harder, and seemingly useless in his eyes.

The bar with the younger generation is being set way higher, and we can expect this trend to continue exponentially. Another point to make is the rate at which change and innovation in business online can occur. Computers and the internet make everything amazingly easier to edit, update, change, delete, recover, and so on. This new medium has the potential to implement changes on a society scale much faster than was ever possible in the past, and increase our societal advancements exponentially as well, to follow along with the trend of doubling microchip capacity every 1-2 years.

Another reason for the breakthrough successes of many younger entrepreneurs may very well be their "naive" outlooks on the world. They seem misaligned with reality's crushing sting and unfazed by thoughts of the many hopeless boundaries awaiting. However they're amazingly successful..how could this be? Check out this excerpt from an AOL Small Business Blog titled A Teen Millionaire's Three Principles to Success

"I’ve been fortunate enough to make my first million before graduating from high school and buy my own house at 20. At 21, I’ve now put away enough in savings and other investments that I could practically retire today . . . if I wanted to. But of course, that’s the last thing on earth I’d want to do. I just enjoy it all too much. Not to say the money isn’t important, but frankly, it’s not why I do what I do. I do it because I love it." - Cameron Johnson

I can hear the passion in his voice just reading his words. Is this naive, or relevant? Actually, the answer to this question is a bit peculiar.

We are in the middle of a strange paradigm shift where the technology created by the older generation has effected society so much, that most of the problems that they faced in the past can be solved by this new technology. This doesn't mean however, that the problems have been solved, because the older generation has somewhat failed, or has been slower to realize, that this is possible. Now though, It does mean that many members of the younger generation are beginning to realize these solutions that the internet and computers provide, and we're beginning to implement them at tremendous paces.

Here's a great analogy:
It's like if the inventor of the light bulb was blind, and couldn't really see the potential for his invention, so it sat idle; until one day another thinker with sight comes along, sees the potential, and installs telephone poles to carry the light around the globe. Now with this first invention of the light bulb, any innovator after will be able to see and work much longer, increasing the productivity for these potentially younger generations, solving potentially many problems at once, that would not have been solved if the potential of the lightbulb had not been realized. It wasn't enough just for the invention to be created, but the potential had to be reached. Younger generations will always find new applications for great inventions. Thomas Edison would have never imagined 3D Imax Movie Projectors, or LEDs.

The internet's progress has almost been put on hold compared to how fast it could be moving, because of the failure of the older generations to realize the true potential of computers, and especially the net. The main problem right now is that all of the best innovators are mostly too young to afford to maintain a start up, and only the most savvy, or lucky ones, actually make it.

This reminds me of a story. I've actually had the pleasure of meeting and talking with Doug Herzog, the President of Viacom. This is the same Doug Herzog who was president of Fox a while back and decided to cancel Family Guy..a mistake which the younger generation would haunt him with until he eventually left a year later. He was also featured in an episode of South Park that wanted to show a picture of the Prophet Muhammad, but Doug decided to censor it, which earned him a place in the show.

We met to discuss my business plan for Beat-Play. (BeatPlay Beta Overview) I won't get into that right now, but one of the first things he told me was that he really had no idea what was going on at MTV on the "ground level." He said he was just "so far separated from it." After explaining my model to him, he couldn't understand how Beat-Play was any different than iTunes. He couldn't see how a completely free website that could solve piracy, promotion, and revenue problems for independent artists all over the world, was different than paying 99 cents for mostly artists heard on the radio. Me being 19 at the time, and him being unwilling to be schooled by a "kid", I thanked Doug for his time, and strolled out.

This was one of the first signs of this "Senior blindness" that I had encountered. The truth is, iTunes doesn't even begin to solve the problems the music business is still plagued with, but I guess being able to download music onto a mobile device you fit in your pocket is far enough away from old 45's and 8-tracks that it's easier to settle for the current circumstances. It may be better than before, but that doesn't make it good! Also, a problem that still occurs to this day is that the problems with the music industry have been around so long that it's not even feasible for many people that they could actually be solved..probably because before the internet, they couldn't be..

This is a great quote from Inc Magazine blog titled A Portfolio of Young Business Owners

"Only five years ago, two enterprising teens might have mowed lawns to earn spending money. Today they can start a company on the Web. That's how it worked for the co-founders of Switchpod, Weina Scott and Jake Fisher. And, oh yeah, they live 1,440 miles apart--she's in Miami, and he's in Rochester, Minnesota."

Now wait until the younger generation reaches the full potential of the internet. Imagine how many other problems will be solved by more efficient organizational structure embedded into our societies.

Dare I say this is the first time in history that the younger generation may actually know better than the ones before it. Well..isn't that what you would hope for? Things have changed..now it's just up to people to realize it.

Written by: Dante Cullari, Founder & President Beat-Play, LLC