Recent twitter entries...

Free Music: Response to Reddit

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On December 28th, 2009 Music Without Labels & Beat-Play asked the public (using reddit), “What needs to happen in order for music to become free and the artist still get paid?” This is a very controversial topic right now seeing as piracy is one of the leading issues in the music industry today. Here is what some of the social media world and redditters had to say about this topic:

-Jigsus States:

“Musicans should make money in one way only; Concerts! If a musician writes a song, then he is entitled to be paid if some other band plays it in a concert.”

Musicians will continually reach out for money in other areas rather than limiting their income to shows alone. The artist is always deserving of profit based on the quality and popularity of the music, along with making money from merchandise sales. The artists do not have enough promotion to stay alive without being under a major label. This system can be beaten through modern technology online, where new music is heard at all times based on the interests you have in the music world. The music will be pumped out to new listeners at all times, doing exactly what any musician could ever want to promote their music, while giving them the percentage on music sales that is rightfully deserved.

-Guitarbuddy states:

“Most musicians supplement their music income with teaching and other non-music jobs. I am surprised by how often the ‘music should be free’ crowds rely on corporate products such as cigarettes, junk food, and mass produced beer.”

Artists today do not have an engine or any other outlet that allows them to produce the large amount of publicity found with the record labels. These promotional advantages found with the labels are greatly paid out with a large majority of the income paid back to the label. Therefore, most independent artists do not really excel on sites such as iTunes, barring in mind that they also lack in the fan base to produce a livable income.

-jmnugent states

“We have to break away from this ‘MTV cribs’ culture… The music industry is a victim of the same ‘cancer’ that is affecting lots of other parts of modern culture. We’ve developed this insanely resource-hungry ‘middle-structure’ that is greedy and unnecessary.”

The lavish life-styles expected are still foreseeable in a business model such as the one discussed above. The only difference is that the fans themselves finally determine the outcome of the artists’ success, rather than who is under the best label with the largest contracts. This way we won’t be forced to see the same musicians all the time when there is always an influx of extremely talented artists out there at all times, waiting to be heard.

-beefjerkier states:

“There needs to be an increase in the cost of online advertising.”

I believe the cost will go up with perceived value of a product (artist popularity). There also needs to be a system set up where artists have multiple ad streams, for example; they can track the visits to their profile, video plays, radio plays, blog views, ect… These all can be tied to a specific ad model, while being factored in with shows (which artists can begin to charge for tickets to online streams) and merchandise.

The push to create a model for music to become free and the artists to continue to make money is very popular right now. Here at Music Without Labels & Beat-Play LLC, we have the answers to the Music Industry problems today, and we are coming to you with the first online engine for independent musicians of its kind.

Written By: Mark G. Valente | Director of Operations | Music Without Labels & Beat-Play LLC

The Future of Social Networking

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Google’s approach at creating a better online social strategy is creative with the notion that they will nowuse all the data gathered from individuals such as, the things you like, the people you talk to the most, and most other online habits, to constantly connect an online community in a much larger scale with a greater impact on finding information. With this technology people will soon have the ability to remove the idea of having to search for information. Everything you could ever be interested in will now come to you based on your past. (Sounding more like ‘real-life’ online)

When someone writes a blog or article, they are asked to add tags to the page that best describes that specific article when people are searching. This idea of tagging is not yet obsolete, but more one sided in the case that only the article is tagged itself. Why not the individual as well? When signing up for a specific social network the user could then be asked to provide a certain number of tags they would use to describe their interests.

With this strategy, the individual can now be connected to the things he/she is looking for without the searching aspect involved. Constant media, news, and peoples will be connected to you with similar tags, enabling you to see new information all the time while meeting new people with similar interests to your own. This idea takes the large but very small social Internet and gives it the power to develop into the main global source for learning and sharing information.

Google is on the right track with harnessing the data gathered by their users to make a more personalized online experience, minus the underlying problem with telling people that you are keeping record of what they are doing. Once this becomes more apparent to the public, you will see a rise in concern. Personalized tagging is safer for the user to connect with people of similar interests while keeping the privacy of what they are viewing online.

Written By: Mark G. Valente | Director of Operations | Music Without Labels & Beat-Play LLC


The Invention of the Toolbox, and How it Can Save Music

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What came first, the toolbox or the tool? This is not a trick question, it's obviously the tool, and we have proof. However, with the emergence of more tools, and more applications for these tools, it became apparent that another tool, a tool's tool, was needed: the Toolbox.

It is no different for the current state of the music industry and all of it's awesome web tools. I see the future of music going in one distinct direction in order for it to flourish the way it naturally should. It may sound cliche, but the only way true, good music(like the old days) will live on, is if the surviving community of great music decides to unite as one. This may sound like an empty gesture, but with today's standards, uniting is as easy as selecting and supporting ONE universal music social network online. It's almost as simple as a mouse click these days to organize collectively toward a common goal.

Once a single platform is established, the possibilities for collaboration and integration of all of the awesome sites and tools that are out there are opened up increasingly, and can benefit the users way more than the current set up. Third party apps can be integrated with the social network to expand the capabilities of the site and its users.

Also, a huge part of this platform should include an effective ad model, that is unobtrusive and that sponsors the content. Artists can track ALL of their plays, vid views, profile views, merchandise page views, shares, ect, and if they give their music away for free, they could then gain ad revenues based on popularity. The downloads on this network would also be very safe, putting an end to crashing computers and lawsuits.

Bands could be able to perform live streaming concerts and sell tickets on this platform, as well as their merchandise, and they can have their updates sent directly to their fan’s profiles. Band members could even eventually practice with each other from across the world if this system is created, leaving even the opportunity for new bands to form, where it would have been impossible before.

Having one music platform would open up the doors to a more efficient way of artist promotion as well. There could be a system where users follow people they share a taste in music with, and then the user's radio pulls songs from their friend's playlists when they press play. There could be many ways for users to control this. What this really means is the best free promotion an artist could get (and currently can't). For example, if my friend likes a song enough to playlist it, then it will get sent to me, and if I like it enough to playlist it, it gets sent to everyone who's following me, creating an automated word of mouth system that makes the music itself completely viral, as long as it's good.

There's currently no term for this, but it can be described almost as a 2-way status update, where a user not only receives the content, but passes on the content that they like. This amazingly simple, but innovative system. will have incredible implications, not just for the promotion of music, but eventually for any product.

Basically, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t have ONE platform online for music, and a million and one reasons why we should. It doesn't mean the end of all of the current music sites, it would just mean the integration of them all together, performing the role of a toolbox for all of the cool web tools out there. Imagine, before tool boxes, people only had access to a limited amount of tools at a given time; but with the toolbox, the options became almost limitless, given the tools. I see the future of this spreading generously throughout many facets of our lives.

Also in the future, along these same lines, could eventually be mobile hardware, as well as mobile apps that are universally accepted for music distribution. Then, of course, I hope we would do the same thing for TV and Movies, which would be to essentially free the industries, in almost every sense of the term. This system is inevitable and I am certain it will happen in this decade, just as sure as the invention of the toolbox was after the introduction of numerous tools. Organization is key!

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


Beat-Play Beta Overview

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We will soon be releasing the Beat-Play beta version to independent artists and fans everywhere. They will be among the first to EVER use this revolutionary new technology designed to completely break independent artists free from the plagues of the current music industry. The beta will include the following:

The Audio Component Auction -

This tool is designed to provide a fair and efficient way for artists to sell licenses of their work without paying for anything upfront. The auction creates an environment that will reveal the true value of the music, and will also be competitive. This makes the best situation for both artists and consumers.

The Music Social Network -

Beat-Play allows users to have their own profile and control panel to keep track of all of their favorite music and share it with friends. Beat-Play will soon become the ultimate music social network with the addition of the viral radio, where users will follow other users with similar tastes in music and anything in a user's playlist will automatically get sent to their follower's radios, at random, or by a user's control. This creates a situation where if the music is good, it will spread extremely fast through a network of playlists all connected by users with common interests.

The 3D Music Store -

This section intends to recreate the experience of browsing through a real music store. Users will be able to choose from a selection of avatars to navigate around within this 3D virtual store, full of racks of music able to be previewed and purchased effortlessly.

Credit System -

Beat-Play will use a currency system of credits, which can be added to a user's account using a credit or debit card. Users cannot purchase anything without adding credits to their account. This is to save users on transaction fees that Beat-Play would have to charge every time a user makes a purchase with their card. Once the credits are transferred into an account, the user can make purchases without entering any additional information or getting extra charges per each of their purchases. Just another way Beat-Play saves the users money.

Beat-Play Beta Promotions to Get Involved In:

Vibe-rater Widget -

The Vibe-rater is a widget consisting of a selection of "vibes" which are actually playlists related to a particular mood or vibe. A user will select their vibe and each song in that playlist will then be displayed and can be rated, with links back to the artist's information. The Widget is viral and embeddable on many different social networks and blogs. The Vibe-rater will not exclude any genres and can therefore be very effective at introducing people to types of music that they don't normally listen to. It will also be linked to a user's Beat-Play profile. The music selected for the Vibe-rater playlists will be among the best on Beat-Play, and it will be rotated monthly.

To start, the music will be selected by a group within the Beat-Play team, but in the future, amendments will be made to let the users decide what music goes best with each vibe, and we will also accept suggestions for new vibes. The Vibe-rater will undergo many additions and enhancements, as Beat-Play does the same, such as getting users engaged and involved in sharing the widget between friends and giving them incentive to do so using things like personalized "vibes."

What is Beat-Play?:

It's like iTunes without paying

It's like iTunes for independent artists

It's like Pandora but with your friend's playlists

It's like Pandora without obtrusive ads

It's like Ebay for music

It's like FYE but online

It's like Virgin without the long lines

It's like TheSixtyOne.com - the games, + way more functionality

It's like SoundClick.com plus innovative free promotion

It's like SoundClick.com without the fees

It's like Facebook for All of Music

It's like your dream, but it's reality...your reality.

It's the Revolution!


The "Metagraion" of the Web

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It only make sense that with the floods of content floating out there waiting to be surfed, there would be some better tools put in place for finding and organizing the content that interests you the most.

So how is content found today? I think it would be safe to assume that Google is the number 1 way people currently find content on the web that they're looking for specifically. It works great. It will show me any content or any websites that even contain the keywords I'm looking for, but when it comes to using the search results for a specific function, Google isn't always so specific. In other words, there's many things Google can't/doesn't do.

Say I want to find some good new songs on my favorite music website. Since I obviously don't know specifics about the actual content I'm looking for, I should stick to generalities, and things that I know I will like, but while still being as specific as possible(because I'm picky). I should be able to select genre/s, mood/s, and type in keywords in order to find the music I'm looking for. However the problem I may have here is that the website I search in might only search the keywords from a tag database of content on that website. That is really limiting.

For example, if I do a search for the word "Peace" it should show me not only every song that has Peace as a tag, or in the title, but it should search other data that may have a relationship to songs, like a song's lyrics that can be found on a totally separate webpage. These links between content that is the same, and that can provide more info about a specific topic or piece of content, should be tied together, regardless of website integration, in order to deliver better search results. It's kinda like a google search where the whole web is being searched, but with predefined filters, in this case, on type of content, artists that appear on that website, genre, mood and keywords/tags.

Essentially this is an advanced search performed from the site of interest, that offers a far more practical way of using the google search method, to meet a specific need like finding great new bands(that I like).

I call this linking of data with similar source material and using it to perform a specific function within an application, Metagration. Taking meta information and integrating it across unnecessary(but currently present) web boundaries is the key to relevant and successful searches. Connections between content should be made automatically in this way.

This may involve eventually classifying content as a specific type or kind of content. For example, there could be a song and a movie with the same name, and they also may both have some keywords in common, but they may be completely unrelated. This would be inconsequential if the title of the song on say the lyrics page could be "classified" somehow as a Song, so that when searched, the classification for this title will be taken into account as well.

A reorganization of the web like this is not easy however, since the question arises, who will implement these changes? There's no web maintenance crews to come and upkeep the infrastructure, like with state highways, or an elected group of officials in charge of looking out for the best interests of the web..but maybe there should be..

All I know is that this kind of organization and integration could really benefit a lot of people in a number of different applications, and it's obviously already been discovered(I'm sure I'm not the only one too), so I predict we will see this shift in the near future of the web. And if no one else does it..shit I will..because it has to happen sometime. What good is the web as a tool if it could be better, but isn't? Take Down Those Walls!

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

Why Buy Cable when the Web is the Ultimate On Demand?

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I don't have cable at my house and haven't for 2 years now. I'm 21 years old and savvy enough to realize that the internet is the ultimate on demand. I bought the cheapest Dell they made a year ago, the Inspiron(about $300 then, $250 now) and hooked it up to my big screen TV via VGA. I love that computer because it does nothing more than stream video online and it works great.

I watch all the movies that are out in theaters, online when they come out, to see if I should see them in theaters(Avatar). I watch all of the new Tv shows when they air and I even get access to paid channels & events like payperview, HBO, NFL Redzone, ect. I watch all sports games streaming live in surprisingly good quality. If I miss an episode I can watch it anytime. I can start watching an older series from the very beginning, like Lost or Mad Men, even when the TV season is way ahead or not on TV. I can even watch classic throwbacks like Mork and Mindy, M.A.S.H., and for my generation, Rocko's Modern Lifeand Are you Afraid of the Dark?



I use mostly Tvshack.net, Myp2p.eu, and Veetle.com and purchase a Megavideo subscription for 19.99 for 3 months which I've renewed several times. The reason I buy the Megavideo subscription is because it's one of the only players that you don't have to wait for loading before you play the content(usually). It is free but after 72 min a message comes up saying that you have to upgrade or wait an hour before resuming.


I LOOVE the internet. This system is WAY better than paying $100+ per month for comcast cable!

I am also the president of a music website soon to be in beta that will allow content creators to give their content away for free by still making money on unobtrusive ad icons, and utilizing discovery engine like social networking tools to tie content and people together and deliver the content right to them, with literally the click of a button. We will be in beta in 4 months and will officially be the only website to offer actual solutions to all of the problems for independent artists in the music business today. We will eventually move throughout the whole entertainment industry. For more info on our structure check out my latest blog entry: File sharing 3.0: The Fall/Rise of the Pirate at http://mwl-beatplay.blogspot.com/


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


The Conversion to Web 3.0

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Web 2.0... What really is it? There are many answers, and also still
many questions left to be sorted out. According to Wiki, Web 2.0 is all about social media and establishing networks between people to increase interaction. This is the process of forming and strengthening connections to people in a much wider scope
than was previously possible. This is a very crucial and extremely important step to further the web's evolution.

The next inevitable step in the process however, we can call Web 3.0, which will be all about building stronger standard tools across these newly formed networks, and making the content easier for the user to experience, in order to increase the value and efficiency of web use.

The Web is itself, a tool, of many sorts. However because there are so many different applications for web use, there are even more different kinds of tools, each that offer something different, and this is especially true when it comes to social networks. Right now, if a user wanted to use all of these tools in an integrated way with the content, for example, with Twitter and all of their various 3rd party tools, they might be out of luck because they will most likely be forced to launch a new application for each new tool.

There needs to eventually be some sense of universal organization, as one web community, in order for different websites to work together to integrate their content and their tools, so that the experience is made that much better for the users. Web 3.0 is all about building better filters and organizations in order to stretch the reach of content, while making it more enjoyable and less overwhelming.

My Favorite Discovery Engines:
Reddit
Alltop
PostRank
Twitter
Digg
Tumblr Wire

Would I benefit from seeing and accessing all of these tools from one place? You betcha.


The process of Web 2.0 is not fully complete yet of course. We are still working out which kinds of connections are the best, most relevant, and most valuable to us; but my estimate is that the transition between 2.0 and 3.0 will be complete in the next 8-10 years. I'd say we're at 2.4 right now.
And it's even already begun. Browsers like Explorer, Safari and now Chrome are featuring quick navigation to the user's favorite sites at launch, by utilizing easy to use graphical interfaces to display the different websites.

I'd expect innovations in this field to continue to come from web browsers, considering they can be classified as much more web universal than a website could really be. The start of this kind of technology is one more small step for the web, and truly one giant leap for mankind.


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