Monday, January 14, 2008

What a Weekend!

What a weekend! Well now we're off and running let's review the first couple of days; absolutely splendid would be my thought, unbelievable how well and how fast and how nicely it's all come together, I share all those warm feelings that others have mentioned,a thousand thanks to el blimpo.
But I want to ask a couple of questions about posting music.
Some here seem to have managed it much easier than others, I fall into 'others', I finally was able to get a piece to play but not in a very satisfactory way and it makes me wonder why there are such differences. Blimpy's Missa Luba sits there with a picture and a start button, Nilpferd's 'groove' has a picture and it plays itself endlessly, even unasked, Darcey's Dad was in my league, he had to go next door to play his tune also but his was removed without a word.
I made a comment on RR that uploading photos to our sister site Picasa was so simple, all you do is select the pics and hit upload and voilla, there they are, I realise that one difference is that audio needs a gramophone and that may be why it's hard. But is it necessary that we all bring our own gramophones, couldn't the site have one that we could upload into?
If we're going to have to follow this, what I see as a complicated procedure for posting audio, putting it here, getting code from there, hoping you put it in the right place etc. and finally hoping that it will appear where you want it, then we're going to lose a lot of participation, I think many will reach the point I did where I said 'I can't be bothered with it.' And that defeats the whole purpose, so I think we need to talk about this and see what other options we have.

What does everyone else think?

15 comments:

nilpferd said...

The picture was my own, I pasted it using the function on this blog editor.
Hadn't noticed the continuous play with my clip, perhaps that's been fixed since Blimpy changed the link.
I agree that we need a way to listen to each other's MP3's which everyone can understand, and if possible in a way which coexists with existing copyright rules.

goneforeign said...

I wasn't complaining but everytime I opened the site your track came on instantly, unasked, where with mine you have to go next door to find it and then switch it on. Just curious about the difference.

ejaydee said...

Hi goneforeign, I just tried posting an mp3 or m4a and it seems to have worked. I used archive.org, once i uploaded the file, I looked for ages for the URL for the track, and realised I can access it by clicking on the size of the file. I then pasted that URl in the HTML code I got form the help page Blimpy posted in the comments section to "Testing". Hope it helps.

Blimpy said...

Hi,

I've had varied success with different methods.

A couple of things need to be decided.

1. There seems to be a choice between embedding music on the blog (with the wee player) or linking music files that can then be downloaded and played on one's itunes.

Which one of these do people prefer?

Or is would folks like to be able to listen to a song via the embedded player, but then have the option to download it if they want to keep it forever?

2. Embedding youtube clips is a piece of cake,

1. Find the video you want on youtube,
2. copy the code from the box that says "embed"
3. paste that code into the "edit html" window of a new post
4. click back on 'compose' and you'll see the youtube video
5. Write stuff underneath
6. Click publish post.

This is easy because the video itself is hosted elsewhere (on youtube's servers) and we just link to it.

With the mp3s, it's a case of finding a hosting site that allows "hot-linking". Hot linking allows tracks to play straight from an embedded player (archive.org does this) , lots of other free file hosting sites do not allow hot-linking as it massively increase demands on their servers.

As for the legalities of posting mp3s, well - if we don't own the rights to a piece of music, then it is indeed illegal to post up. However, I can live with this, as I legally buy far too much vinyl every year to be a threat to the music industry (which, imho, is doing a fine job of destroying itself without any help from anyone else).

The best way to get music embedded and downloadable, is to pay for hosting - that way we can do what we like with it (hot-link etc).

Does anyone have a .mac account or similar, as that comes with free webspace? I'm currently trying to figure out how to use the webspace my broadband provider, erm, provides me with to host mp3s.

There is an easy and simple solution to all this, we just need to find it.

Get googling folks!

Blimpy said...

Hi,

I've had varied success with different methods.

A couple of things need to be decided.

1. There seems to be a choice between embedding music on the blog (with the wee player) or linking music files that can then be downloaded and played on one's itunes.

Which one of these do people prefer?

Or is would folks like to be able to listen to a song via the embedded player, but then have the option to download it if they want to keep it forever?

2. Embedding youtube clips is a piece of cake,

1. Find the video you want on youtube,
2. copy the code from the box that says "embed"
3. paste that code into the "edit html" window of a new post
4. click back on 'compose' and you'll see the youtube video
5. Write stuff underneath
6. Click publish post.

This is easy because the video itself is hosted elsewhere (on youtube's servers) and we just link to it.

With the mp3s, it's a case of finding a hosting site that allows "hot-linking". Hot linking allows tracks to play straight from an embedded player (archive.org does this) , lots of other free file hosting sites do not allow hot-linking as it massively increase demands on their servers.

As for the legalities of posting mp3s, well - if we don't own the rights to a piece of music, then it is indeed illegal to post up. However, I can live with this, as I legally buy far too much vinyl every year to be a threat to the music industry (which, imho, is doing a fine job of destroying itself without any help from anyone else).

The best way to get music embedded and downloadable, is to pay for hosting - that way we can do what we like with it (hot-link etc).

Does anyone have a .mac account or similar, as that comes with free webspace? I'm currently trying to figure out how to use the webspace my broadband provider, erm, provides me with to host mp3s.

There is an easy and simple solution to all this, we just need to find it.

Get googling folks!

goneforeign said...

Blimpy: Re the two options and downloadable etc. I've mentioned this a couple of times on RR, with a desktop recorder, there's free ones out there, if you can hear it, you can record it. The one I use regularly is a Wiretap [Mac only] It allows me to record with one click in any format, hence I don't have to download anything, I just listen and record and save to the desktop and file it. I'm not clear on the difference between embedding and linking, I gather the procedure I followed with the code and archive etc is linking? Is it possible to have a 'something' [probably got code in it] that sits at the top of the site that has all the legwork automated so that we could hopefully upload directly to it or worst case import in one click from archive? As you may suspect I'm an ignoramus in these matters.[the ignoramus is not related to the hippopotamus.]

Blimpy said...

For my most recent post (Who needs originality?) I used Podbean, which is free and really easy to use.

You upload tunes, they store them, then you can make loads of custom players with as many or as little tracks on them as you please, and podbean even provides the handy html code for copying and pasting into a new post.

nilpferd said...

Here's a mail from the Hippopotamus..
I don't really want to download stuff, if I like it enough I'll buy it myself. I'd just like to be able to post stuff for others to listen to, and to hear things I didn't know about.
Maybe you should post a voting box on the sidebar- 1) download 2) listen only etc.
I'd say it would be better if you just had to click a player to hear the music, rather than being redirected.
In principle I'm with you on the "I buy so much music.." justification, Blimpy, but we should perhaps avoid the download option, to make it clear that we're not intentionally violating copyright regs, etc.

Blimpy said...

I agree Nilp, maybe we should only use the direct download option for rarities not available through conventional means.

Other than that, something like the Podbean player is very good. Or that Deezer thing that folk are currently struggling with.

Mnemonic said...

I'm in agreement with Nilpferd and Blimpy in that I'd be happy to listen rather than download, except for obscurities that aren't available any other way. Embedding from YouTube was a breeze - one click to embed and one click to create new topic. Now, if I can only sort out Deezer...

nilpferd said...

Podbean looks good, I've logged on, will try it soon.

Anonymous said...

I'm a bit confused by podbean. I've uploaded a song, but now I can't find it to put it with an embeddable player. Help? I have an iMac, and I think it came with a .mac account, but I've never looked into it. I'll check it out and let you know.

Blimpy said...

Hi steenbeck

on podbean:


1. Go to "Upload", upload some stuff.
2. Click"my playlists" at the top
3. Click new playlist
4. Choose single or mutli track player
5. Put in the titles
6. Copy and paste the code into html window of new post
7. Bingo!

goneforeign said...

Steenbeck: You might have got a freebie but .Mac is $100 a year normally, there's a rumor going around that Jobs might announce today that it's free, hope so.

steenbeck said...

My problem is that after I put in the titles, when I press "continue" it just goes to make new playlist window, with no indication that it knows I have a song on there somewhere. I'll keep playing with it. EVentually, it will all make sense. Thanks for the explanation, Blimpy.