Every move that Apple makes in the digital sphere has implications on the digital entertainment world and last week’s announcement of the iCloud was no exception. As predicted, the company’s new cloud service stores the data that exists on various computers, smartphones and tablets to the virtual space so that that calendars, mail, contacts, photos, music and documents will be seamlessly updated on all your devices. Apple’s ubiquity and the fact that the iCloud is such an all-round data product means that it has already surpassed Amazon and Google’s cloud music services. It makes you think – where is Microsoft in all of this?
Apple’s iMatch feature is their answer to Google Music and Amazon Cloud Drive in terms of the management of music libraries. Firstly, iCloud means that any music you have bought from the iTunes Store in the past or future will automatically be available for your other devices: whether that’s a PC running Windows Vista (but not XP), a Macbook, an iPad or an iPhone.
Apple managed to secure what Google and Amazon could not: agreements with the major music labels. Most interestingly, for $24.99 a year (only available in the U.S for now), iMatch will scan your existing iTunes library for music you haven’t purchased from iTunes. It matches those songs with their equivalents in the iTunes Store and automatically adds the 256kbps iTunes version to your iCloud library. If no match is found, you can upload the song to the cloud yourself. The number of unmatched songs you can upload is limited to 25,000.
Reaction to iMatch was mixed. Many commentators seemed disappointed that the iCloud didn’t instantly revolutionise our entertainment habits. Apple are not offering a music streaming service to rival the likes of Spotify, rather they are offering fancy synchronisation of your existing music collection. While it’s true that with major label support and a catalogue of 18 million songs, iTunes would be the ultimate streaming service, that is not within the interests of Apple. Their modus operandi is to sell more of their iOS devices.
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Last week I concluded this column by stating that while you throttle bandwidth or block websites for people caught illegally downloading music, you’ll have a harder time changing the habits of the young people who have been downloading music for free for as long as they’ve been using the computer.
It seems the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) have already recognised this and have actually produced a cirriculum for teaching respect for intellectual property and responsible use of the internet to school children.
It’s called Music Rules! and its website claims it “informs students about the laws of copyright and the risks of online file-sharing, while promoting musical and artistic creativity”.
It offers teachers and parents free materials from its site which includes activity sheets to make kids think about the effects of downloading. They range from asking the student to write down what a singer, producer or DJ would say about the effects of “songlifting” to asking them to interview friends and family about where they got their music and put the results in a chart. By the end of the cirriculum, students sign a pledge to never download music and to respect intellectual copyright law.
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The UK’s creative industries and artists have been discussing file-sharing in public recently. Ever since business secretary Lord Mandelson outlined his plan to bring in legislation similar to the Eircom/IRMA agreement here to boot off file-sharers after three warnings, musicians have been writing letters and blog posts about the issue. The problem though is that no-one can agree on anything.
As part of the FAC (Featured Artists Coalition), a team of musicians including Billy Bragg, Pink Floyd’s Nick Mason and Blur’s Dave Rowntree have criticised Mandelson’s plans with Mason quoted as saying “The last thing we want to be doing is going to war with our fanbase. File-sharing means a new generation of fans for us”.
As pointed out though by Lily Allen on her myspace blog , that’s all well and good for established artists like Pink Floyd, Radiohead and Blur but what about emerging artists? Allen’s thoughts are perhaps more realistic as they reflect a more recent successful artist who knows she’s lucky to have paid off her record company advance. Ms. Allen also quite rightly reasons that as record company bosses “start to lose big from piracy, they’re not slashing their salaries – they’re pulling what they invest in A&R,” meaning less room for development and less room for new acts. Her blog sparked replies from both Matt Bellamy of Muse and James Blunt, neither who agreed with her point of view entirely. Allen has since set up a blog at http://idontwanttochangetheworld.blogspot.com to post her fellow artists reactions to her post (which she’s now deleted due to insulting comments). Continue Reading..»
It wasn’t an April fools joke. The fourth installment in the X-Men series – X-Men Origins: Wolverine starring Hugh Jackman was leaked onto the internet via BitTorrent networks in a DVD-quality, full-length and unfinished state last Wednesday, a full month before official release.
The leaked version is said to be a rough cut of the film with missing special effects, temporary music and sound. A slideshow of images from the movie shows scenes lacking full CGI, action sequences with stunt ropes and green screens clearly visible. Continue Reading..»
