tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12505562.post1842851155615328200..comments2024-03-15T11:42:21.265-04:00Comments on The Patry Copyright Blog: IFPI and Mussolini’s Italy; Sony and GracenotesWilliam Patryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12987498082479617363noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12505562.post-24648787616056529522008-04-27T03:26:00.000-04:002008-04-27T03:26:00.000-04:00"I create CD's of my own music, and without being ..."I create CD's of my own music, and without being prompted, iTunes opens up and tries to guess to which published songs my melodies are similar---and attempts to re-name them"<BR/><BR/>You can turn that CD look up feature off in preferences. iTunes uses a crude look up feature in conjunction with Gracenote. It checks the length of the CD, the number of tracks and the length of those tracks to try and estimate which CD is being ripped. iTunes does not access the audio fingerprinting technology of Gracenote.<BR/><BR/>I do think it is interesting that Sony will be able to monitor it's own sales and sales of its competitors to a certain degree as consumers rip their CD purchases to their computers. It seems highly likely that Sony BMG will get it's hands on the metrics generated by Gracenote even though the purchase is by Sony electronics.<BR/><BR/>And it will be interesting to see what Apple does. Gracenote is a key to iTunes being easy to use for ripping. Typing in CD data is an enormous pain--especially for 99 track sound effects disks! It seems, though, developing a competitive database would be difficult and it is hard to know if Apple would bother given their emphasis on iTunes downloads.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12505562.post-7345072067776303532008-04-26T10:34:00.000-04:002008-04-26T10:34:00.000-04:00I create CD's of my own music, and without being p...I create CD's of my own music, and without being prompted, iTunes opens up and tries to guess to which published songs my melodies are similar---and attempts to re-name them. <BR/><BR/>Somewhere along the way, as an upgrade from v. 3 to v4, Apple thought I wouldn't mind if my computer 'called home" to verify myactivities. I think users should note when this happens and object.<BR/><BR/>http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/commentary/listeningpost/2006/11/72105<BR/><BR/>Eliot van Biskirk interviews Steve Scherf about the metamorphosis from user-generated database (CDDB) to corporate Gracenote.<BR/><BR/>(quote) "Among other things, detractors claim the company built a profitable business on the backs of unpaid volunteers."Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12505562.post-70271269817426671542008-04-26T09:35:00.000-04:002008-04-26T09:35:00.000-04:00Shane makes a good point. Another angle on this is...Shane makes a good point. Another angle on this issue is that Sony may use Gracenote to monitor its competitors. There is an interesting discussion regarding this at The Industry Standard regarding Sony potentially using Gracenote to pressure Apple:<BR/><BR/>http://www.thestandard.com/news/2008/04/23/will-sony-play-nice-apple-or-turn-screws<BR/><BR/>A natural progression will be for Sony's competitors to drop Gracenote for alternative services which do not let the wolf into the henhouse, so to speak.<BR/><BR/>It is a mystery why Sony paid so much for a company that is easily replaceable, and has limited utility. It would appear Sony paid far too much.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12505562.post-88767871329079299092008-04-24T16:56:00.000-04:002008-04-24T16:56:00.000-04:00The Insider blog makes a good point that the elect...The Insider blog makes a good point that the electronics arm of Sony not the music arm is the one buying Gracenote and that Gracenote makes a fair bit of change in deals with auto companies for some sort of high end auto sound systems.<BR/><BR/>Sony electronics and music arms have had conflicting values and priorites, much to the detriment of the electronics side, who pretty much lost the mp3 market by making music players that only played copy protected, proprietary Sony formatted music. In that case the electronic arm's love of proprietary formats and the music arm's hatred of mp3s combined to create a perfect storm combined with lousy software for transferring songs. Sony, the portable music pioneer, is not a key player in the portable music player market in large part because of those early stumbles.<BR/><BR/>Sony also has a prior history with track info on CDs. The standard Red Book format created for Audio CDs has no track or album information ("metadata") on it at all. In the 90's Sony created an extension to the format called CD Text that allowed music producers to encode metadata on standard Audio CDs and have it read by compatible CD players. For some reason this format never took off and the inclusion of CD text is still spotty on commercial CDs and even on players. iTunes, for instance, won't even read the CD Text data even though it can write CD Text data to the audio CDs you burn!!!*<BR/><BR/>So, owning Gracenote is a natural purchase for Sony. It also includes audio fingerprinting technology to identify songs by means other than the CD's number and length of tracks. But it also seems likely that Sony BMG will manage to get its hands into this purchase, and, if necessary access all the IP logs and user data on CD rips, as well as the audio fingerprinting IP. The potential for abuse is there.<BR/><BR/>*iTunes inability to read CD Text is baffling. The CD Text on commercial CDs is likely to be more accurate than Gracenote because much of Gracenote's data is croudsourced--submitted by users. It is especially odd given that iTunes **writes** CD Text. One possible explanation is that it was a requirement of the record companies to make CD ripping less convenient and to make it harder to burn protected tracks to Audio CD with CD Text and give them to someone else who might more conveniently rip them to their computer if iTunes could read the CD Text that had the track info. Who knows? It is very, very odd. And more odd things may happen once Sony completes its purchase of Gracenote.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12505562.post-30321534553505001672008-04-24T14:29:00.000-04:002008-04-24T14:29:00.000-04:00An article in the Guardian makes shane's point too...An article in the Guardian makes shane's point too: http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/04/23/sony_buys_gracenote_all_your_cd_ripping_are_belong_to_us.html<BR/><BR/>But then see the very different take here at the silicon Alley Insider blog: http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/4/sony_buys_cd_information_company_gracenote_for_260_millionWilliam Patryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12987498082479617363noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12505562.post-40781539768988918442008-04-24T14:02:00.000-04:002008-04-24T14:02:00.000-04:00The purchase of Gracenotes has a lot of potential ...The purchase of Gracenotes has a lot of potential effects.<BR/><BR/>Most CD's have no track information on them whatsoever, so programs like iTunes access Gracenotes to make an estimate of what CD you are ripping and provide the album and track information so that you don't have to type it in by hand. This means that Sony will now be able to track the majority of CD usage around the globe and have the IP address of everyone who rips a CD they have purchased using a program that looks up the track info in Gracenotes.<BR/><BR/>Given Sony's less than ethical history of regarding CD ripping (trying to make it impossible by secretly installing mal ware on Sony CDs, and more) I see this purchase as potentially ominous.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com