What If We Had Internet Audio Everywhere?

from the it's-everywhere,-I-tell-you,-everywhere.. dept

Mon, Sep 15th 2003 1:21am — Mike Masnick

While the RIAA is suing away and some folks are trying to come up with newer business models that actually embrace file sharing, some people are saying that things like "file sharing" and "downloading" are already old ideas - and the music industry should leapfrog that to the next generation of internet audio everywhere. The idea is that they would set up a system that would allow access to any song ever made for instant audio streaming, including a ton of metadata and a spectacular search engine. Add ubiquitous high speed wireless technology to the mix and why would anyone ever need to have a local copy of a song? You want a song, just call it from the internet and it will play - wherever you are, on whatever playback device you want. And, with the search engine, you can do some creative searches - such as looking up all songs done by ex-members of a random band. Of course, there are some technology hurdles - but the biggest missing link in this equation is the always on, ubiquitous high speed wireless part, though, some think WiFi will eventually provide that connection. That might be wishful thinking. I also think that the process of setting up such a system would be too costly for most companies to undertake on their own. Still, it's yet another business model out there for a world where digital music is encourage, instead of denounced.

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Tatum, 15 Sep 2003 @ 7:29am

Absolutely right
I'll admit I am biased, but after using Rhapsody for more than a year, I see no reason to have to download music. As soon as you can download to your portable in Rhapsody (and Real/Rhapsody already had deals in place with wireless carriers), this "vision" will already be in place.

The existence of this and similar services will not stop piracy, but it can drop it to more reasonable levels as *most* people don't have the patience or time to deal with the "free" services and would rather just get music when they can get it.
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Patrick, 15 Sep 2003 @ 10:53am

Ubiquitous music
There was a Qwest (they pronounce it 'quest' BTW, not Q-West) advertisement--I believe at least 2-3 years back--that expounded this very idea with music and movies. Person in backwater hotel/diner asking what's on TV/jukebox--"we have every song/movie ever made, yadda yadda". Of course, the reality was (and continues to be) that we're still a long way from having the bandwidth to make it work--way short on both last mile and backbone, as well as QoS. However, the day will come.

patent #xxx,xxx,xxx--Ubiquitous media service: method for providing content on demand to electronic device(s)...
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