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Bluebeat.com - Can this be legit?
- Thread starter mysterytramp
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What's really confusing is that Wired "broke" this story on Friday. You'd think that EMI and Apple Corps would have their act together to find lawyers to enjoin BlueBeat.com to cease and desist by Monday morning -- if this weren't legit.
So maybe it is?
mt
So maybe it is?
mt
A few clues?
Maybe EMI & Apple Corps are working behind the scenes, and dont want to create free publicity for BlueBeat. However, we should look at the site itself. The library is substantial, although only a fraction of the I-Tunes library. Streaming sound delivery is high quality, and to my ear the downloads sound very good on my I-Pod. Navigating the site is easy and intuitive, suggesting that the designers are very skilled. The site has a help forum and from reading some of the dialogue the personnel at BlueBeat are earnest and helpful. The site offers unheard-of streaming of entire tracks, not just 30-second samples. Besides that, there is a raft of real information about the artists, their music, and their genres. Bottom line about the site: effort is too large and too genuine to not be intended for the long haul, which means legit. And legally (Im not an attorney) there are some clues the file information for BlueBeat downloads shows copyright 2009 BlueBeat.com. The web site Terms of Use is a formidable document that seems to say, in the usual boilerplate style, that We are legal, so dont try to pull anything on us. A comment on a MacWorld forum that appears to come from someone at BlueBeat states (quote) Our mp3s are fully-licensed audio-visual works and BlueBeat.com pays all applicable royalties ... If that is indeed the case, and if my other observations carry any weight, then my impression is that BlueBeat is legal.
Maybe EMI & Apple Corps are working behind the scenes, and dont want to create free publicity for BlueBeat. However, we should look at the site itself. The library is substantial, although only a fraction of the I-Tunes library. Streaming sound delivery is high quality, and to my ear the downloads sound very good on my I-Pod. Navigating the site is easy and intuitive, suggesting that the designers are very skilled. The site has a help forum and from reading some of the dialogue the personnel at BlueBeat are earnest and helpful. The site offers unheard-of streaming of entire tracks, not just 30-second samples. Besides that, there is a raft of real information about the artists, their music, and their genres. Bottom line about the site: effort is too large and too genuine to not be intended for the long haul, which means legit. And legally (Im not an attorney) there are some clues the file information for BlueBeat downloads shows copyright 2009 BlueBeat.com. The web site Terms of Use is a formidable document that seems to say, in the usual boilerplate style, that We are legal, so dont try to pull anything on us. A comment on a MacWorld forum that appears to come from someone at BlueBeat states (quote) Our mp3s are fully-licensed audio-visual works and BlueBeat.com pays all applicable royalties ... If that is indeed the case, and if my other observations carry any weight, then my impression is that BlueBeat is legal.
After a quick whois and a look at bluebeat.com's parent company, Media Rights Technologies, I'll admit I'm a bit confused. At first glance they appear to be proponents of DRM and think their "solutions" should be mandatory in every OS, portable music player, and digital music sales venue.
Apparently this company is for real and not only has beefs with Apple and iTunes, but also with Microsoft, RealNetworks, Yahoo and others. Here's a couple of the stories Media Rights Technology link to from their homepage. Interesting...
Media Rights Technologies Pulls iTunes From BlueBeat.com
Media Rights Technologies and BlueBeat.com Issue Cease and Desist to Microsoft, Apple, Adobe and Real Networks
Apparently this company is for real and not only has beefs with Apple and iTunes, but also with Microsoft, RealNetworks, Yahoo and others. Here's a couple of the stories Media Rights Technology link to from their homepage. Interesting...
Media Rights Technologies Pulls iTunes From BlueBeat.com
Media Rights Technologies and BlueBeat.com Issue Cease and Desist to Microsoft, Apple, Adobe and Real Networks
I've seen several blog entries about BlueBeat.com but they all seem to say the same thing. This Ars Technica piece, however, actually appears to have dug up something interesting.
mt
mt
And yet their own website claims that the items that they sell are also licensed by their owners. EMI suing them seems to negate that point though.
From what I have been reading, this site is using some very questionable methods to sell music that they haven't licensed using some bizarre loophole that IMO won't fly.
Time to end the 70-cent tax!
Assuming that BlueBeat has all licenses and certificates, and EMI does as well, it will come down not so much to legality as it will to the ultimate standing of the copyrights under which BlueBeat is attempting to sell music. It is worth noting that only the copyright of the recording is at issue. BlueBeat is claiming to pay all royalties to the artists. What this means is that BlueBeat was, until hit by Judge Walters restraining order, paying 9 cents per track to artists, however not paying the 70 cents to the record labels. That is why BlueBeat could sell tracks for 25 cents each.
As long as the artists get paid, do we really need the labels? Have we sworn allegiance to the labels to the point that we want to keep paying them 70 cents per downloaded track? Sounds like we have a record labels monopoly on our hands and it is time for some anti-trust action. http://images.macrumors.com/vb/images/smilies/smile.gif BlueBeat is trying to do this on its own. I would think that the public would get behind this. The labels hark from the Pleistocene era of CDs and LPs. We are almost into 2010 we download music and play it off our MP3 players. Lets scrap the labels and their 70-cent tax! And if we try really hard, we can learn to love 25-cent downloads. After all, maybe that is what they should really cost.
Assuming that BlueBeat has all licenses and certificates, and EMI does as well, it will come down not so much to legality as it will to the ultimate standing of the copyrights under which BlueBeat is attempting to sell music. It is worth noting that only the copyright of the recording is at issue. BlueBeat is claiming to pay all royalties to the artists. What this means is that BlueBeat was, until hit by Judge Walters restraining order, paying 9 cents per track to artists, however not paying the 70 cents to the record labels. That is why BlueBeat could sell tracks for 25 cents each.
As long as the artists get paid, do we really need the labels? Have we sworn allegiance to the labels to the point that we want to keep paying them 70 cents per downloaded track? Sounds like we have a record labels monopoly on our hands and it is time for some anti-trust action. http://images.macrumors.com/vb/images/smilies/smile.gif BlueBeat is trying to do this on its own. I would think that the public would get behind this. The labels hark from the Pleistocene era of CDs and LPs. We are almost into 2010 we download music and play it off our MP3 players. Lets scrap the labels and their 70-cent tax! And if we try really hard, we can learn to love 25-cent downloads. After all, maybe that is what they should really cost.