RE: Fair Trade Music – The Responsibility of Indie Artists to Act

This is a response to a great comment I got on one of my recent posts: The Independent Fight Below the Belt – How South American Independents are Organizing. I thought this comment brought up an extremely important issue for independent artists that everyone needs to be made aware of.

Reader Comment:

Dante,
 South America is not alone in this idea. Here in Portland, OR we have organized a few hundred musicians around this idea through Fair Trade Music. Our goal is slightly different, we are trying to shift the local market of concert venues to actually pay the musicians they hire to promote their business and entertain their customers. At the moment most places that regularly have live music are forcing their employee costs and what little promotion they do on the artists. Keeping the lion’s share of money from ticket sales and considering the artists lucky they get what’s left. The problem Brian mentioned is a HUGE one and as you said it makes the artists not think of themselves as professionals and behave in a professional manner. Imagine if a bar or restaurant made it a condition of their contract with a beer distributor that the distributor pay their bartenders wage. How nice do you think that conversation would be? Have a look at http://www.fairtrademusicpdx.org, I would love to hear your thoughts on the matter.

Cheers,
Graham

Hi Graham, thank you so much for bringing this to my attention. I’m sure this is going on all around the country, and it’s main contributor is the problem Brian mentioned, where people’s outlook on the musician as a profession is just dismissive, and insulting. The only way to fight it is it to do exactly what you’re doing and organize.

It’s extremely important that you get the artists to hear about you and the issues, and help you act.

My plan if I were you, would be to create the standard business model proposal for your area that you would wish to see, and get all of the independent artists there to talk about it and agree to it. Then I would have them put pressure on the establishments to agree to abide by the terms, or the musicians will simply not play there. It has to be an organized and united movement.

At first, not playing at an establishment for not agreeing to the model may mean no shows at all, but if the promoter keeps trying to book shows and ALL of the artists turn them down unless they agree to the new terms, they will be forced to agree. The result in the end will mean more money for all artists. It will not work however if some artists do not want to sacrifice a few shows for a better result in the end.

If the promoter can find artists who will play for cheap, and not care about their rights to be taken seriously, the whole thing can fall apart. Every link in the chain matters.

This is an amazing cause you’re fighting for, and I will help you in every way possible. I think this needs to spread much further than just Portland, but even if one city can demonstrate success, it will give indie artists from other regions more of a reason to do the same, and it will give them a draft from which to build their own model for their city.

If I were you, I would start creating the model you would like to see, that would make everyone happy. It won’t be easy, but someone has to do it, and the standards need to be changed. It’s exactly what I’m doing with Beat-Play. I’ve actually taken a break from being a full time lyricist/performer/producer and focused on changing the standard business model in the industry, with the help of the internet, because without these standards being changed, my work is rendered less valuable, to me, and eventually to everyone else.

The system just doesn’t work. We need people that can sacrifice their true calling for a little, while they work to preserve the integrity of their dreams and their field, and secure the future prosperity of their industry, or there may not be any industry left to work in.

We need people like you who are organizing, and doing the work that needs to be done, so that others don’t have to. However, everyone does play a role, and independent artists do have a job in order for the hard work to be appreciated and felt. They need to come together, and agree to support things like a local fair trade music act, that can have tremendous results for themselves and all their peers if they do, and this is a duty which independents share that I cannot stress enough.

It’s our job to search these things out, and make these things known and we need to remember that in these especially hard times. Let me know if you need help drafting the language to make fair trade a strong ordinance in your area that all of the independent artists can agree on. It’s starts with organization, and we need to stick together. Thanks again Graham, for bringing this to my attention. I will do the same for others. And don’t hesitate to email me if you need help. Dante@musicwithoutlabels.com

Written by: Dante Cullari Founder & President Beat-Play, LLC

The Independent Fight Below the Belt – How South American Independents are Organizing

Being in Colombia for 3 weeks has given me an amazing picture of what it’s like on the other side of the equator, especially for independent artists and aspiring people all together.

There are a couple more limitations there than in the U.S., but for the most part, we all have the same problems. Even the solutions we have in the U.S. don’t solve our problems, so though South American countries may be farther behind, the same problems are left without solutions.

For example, in Colombia they don’t have iTunes. In fact, they don’t have any major website for them to sell their music to their fans in Colombia, and even if they did, most people don’t have credit cards, so it’s hard for them to pay.

In America, we have iTunes, and a 1000 other websites that allow you to sell your music, in exchange for one high percentage or another, and the people here do have credit cards, but they still don’t buy their music. The problems are the same, but they are not so apparent at first glance.

Even if Colombia had iTunes they would still have problems. They need a website that allows them to make money from their music not directly from their fans, but through advertisements or sponsors. That way people not having credit cards would not matter.

The big problem though, here and there, is promotion. iTunes, nor any of the other websites I’ve seen (and I’ve just about seen 85% of them, including a lot of start-ups that are in, or almost in beta) provide a practical and efficient form of promotion for independent artists that is both free and incredibly effective.

That’s what we all need! We in the U.S., though we like to think the opposite, are still very far from realizing any real solutions.

What Colombia does have, that the U.S. doesn’t to the extent, is the organization of the independent artist communities. There are thousands of creative and amazingly talented independent artists in Medellin, Colombia, where I was primarily, and their drive is incredible.

There is not really a want in the artists to get signed there, though they do have some small independent and some major label recognition. The artists there however, do a pretty good job at realizing other ways to get paid, and they also take the independent artist title pretty professionally.

There’s one group of indie artists in particular that I was introduced to, who meet weekly to develop strategies for how independent artists can stabilize themselves in their community and support themselves. They also have a publication that they developed to keep people in the loop. It is called Revista Musica, http://www.revistamusica.com/ or translated, Music Magazine. They refer to themselves as an amalgamation, not just a group. It’s really that simple.

This is their Vision, as translated by Google:

Use Music Magazine as a means to enable the production of national and international concerts of national artists, from the understanding of our musical expression as a competitive resource and a chance for social development.

I filmed an interview with one of the key members of the organization, and I will post it sometime this month for sure. There is actually a LOT of great footage from my whole trip that I will definitely share on this blog.

One great strategy that this group brought up was for the whole team of independent artists to talk with their local government officials about merging the independent music of the city, with the tourism of the city. Their idea was to use the artists as another resource to draw people in. Anywhere there is a public tourist spot, there should be independent artist’s music playing…Museums, Mono-Rails, Parks ect..

This was one of the most brilliant ideas I’ve heard in a long time as a strategy to proliferate the music. It seems like the people there just think harder about the issues, maybe even because there aren’t as many other options available. I think the lack of a cloud of options around them is actually more beneficial to them getting the desired results.

I talked to another artist who was telling me about trying to get his band’s music to play before a movie starts, or in elevators, or certain public bathrooms. Their thinking is very multi-dimensional.

It’s awesome that they’ve discovered the practical perception that the music itself can be a tourist attraction. And it turns out that selling that idea to their local government, being as it does make a lot of sense, isn’t really all that hard. They are in talks with them now, and plans seem to be moving forward.

I will most certainly track the progress of this awesomely innovative independent artist movement going on in Medellin. I am sure that they are not the only ones around the world banning together like this. After all, the problems are the same everywhere, but I would hope that we in the U.S. try to look past the fog of bad options that can sometimes cloud our view, and I hope we embrace measures to ban together in order to accomplish our true, shared goals, and learn a lesson from our peers in other countries.

Written by: Dante Cullari Founder & President Beat-Play, LLC

10 Sure as Sun Big Innovation Predictions for the next 20 Years in Tech

Click this picture for another awesome and interesting blog on Web 3.0!

Note: All predictions are based on a firm understanding of current technologies and the popular trends that seem to be prevalent. It is only by assuming that these trends will continue, that any actual predictions can be made. There are no real guarantees that anything will happen for certain, there are only conjectures.

I should also note that the following is in a particular order, and is meant to be viewed together, as separate pieces of one whole picture, assembled one at a time. Some of them need to be explained first in order to understand others.

1.Computer Imbedding– There will come a time, and I’m sure it’s not hard for you to imagine, where computer technology will become so flexible, that we will go crazy trying to figure out what we should integrate with it next.

Some probable solutions that I think will last will be the clear glass computers, such as in mirrors, shower walls, and cars. I suspect toilet will be a winner, and also probably even the walls of our homes, hopefully being merged with something like Rachel Armstrong’s Metabolic Materials.

Imagine waking up in the morning and watching your news while in the shower, or getting a jump on your emails, making a list, or putting in a coffee order down the street, all using much improved voice to text. Computers in everything? There may just be a point when we say “Why not?”

2. Free Streaming Content – This is a subject I talk a lot about. I know this is possible because I’ve designed a solution that creates an environment where the more users access and share the content, the more ad revenues the content creator gets. This is done using more creative ad model methods than the currently standard, annoying and obtrusive ad model used online. My model also includes a similarly reciprocal process of promotion, like an automated word of mouth between friends on a social network.

3. Open Browsers – The browsing experience online will be completely different. Everything will be super organized, and super custom. Since intellectual property will no longer be an issue, remixing and sharing of things like apps, whole websites, and of course any entertainment media, will be completely open to the public. The best content and apps will rise and get shared a lot, and the not so good ones won’t, kinda like a virtual Darwin evolution. People will be able to combine the pieces of their favorite sites into one site and be able to share their breakthroughs in efficiency, with better designs arriving all the time, and with the people doing the work getting rewarded justly for their efforts. Innovation, efficiency, and developing the most useful and valuable tools will be full time, self-employed jobs online, along with all aspects of entertainment, in the not so distant future.

4.3D Virtual Environment Integration – Once virtual technology advances a little bit further into the mainstream, you will see a huge shift in how our societies are structured. This is where you might really start feeling like you’re in the future. With 3D virtual environments, and something as simple as peripheral vision glasses with some sort of amazingly clear fractal image technology, interacting with the world will be completely re-defined.

Say hello to the Matrix, or Avatar meets Grand Theft Auto(without the gangs – course, you can’t die anyway). With amazingly real graphics, everyday tasks can be transformed. A person’s movements could be tracked (again maybe using Rachel Armstrong’s technology fuzed with wall censors) which could be cool for things like sports or other games. You almost can literally do anything you want. You can be on a roller coaster, while in your living room, or you could walk over the middle of the grand canyon looking down, if you had the guts. Almost anything is possible, including 3D social networks and teleportation or worm-hole graphic travel from website to website.

For practical purposes, Virtual 3D technology could put an end to retailers having to have actual stores. In addition to movement and touch, eventually even smells and tastes will come into play, and already have begun to. Store clerks & cashiers at the stores can still be real people, and they can simply oversee the transactions and help people with any specific questions.

One of the coolest possibilities is whole city maps that can be re-created in a virtual environment using pictures, building plans, maps, and infrastructure schematics. People can walk down the same streets, can gather for events in a city from ANYWHERE In the world, walk into the same stores, get the same experiences, but more efficiently. If this happened there would be no need for the sheer number of business related buildings.

Going green can mean going virtual for a company. It cuts down on overhead, cuts travel expenses, its makes the company look good, it’s more efficient and convenient for customers by a lot, and it expands access immensely. The result would be the land once occupied by business, to be occupied only by people and people dependent services like food, mail, doctors, ect. The land could be cleared of concrete and can open up space for much more nature, gardens, farms, protected lands, or recreational areas.

Traffic to high profile areas will be cut, thus less death due to travel, and less pollution. People would not need to walk home from work, or take a taxi, or really leave their houses other than to travel, meet with friends, eat out, enjoy life, ect. If the hour is bad for a run, the option to stay at home and do it safely is there. City crime will cut tremendously, also due to the surge in jobs online, which will also cut stress, and the greener landscapes will provide better scenery. “Inner Cities” will go from being claustrophobic, to completely out in the open. Also with this technology, you would see the true meaning of World Trade, as shopping in different countries becomes incredibly easier and more reassuring.

The home office will rule. You can go to work and even realistically interact with co-workers, all while at home. People already use second life for things like school and retail. This transformation to 3D Virtual worlds I believe will begin in the next 20 years, but let’s hope that when it does we don’t leave a bunch of empty skyscrapers sitting around rotting.

5.Same-Day Delivery Online Shopping – With everything now being purchased virtually, from food to clothes, it will all have to get delivered right to your house. The biggest problem right now is shipping time and cost. I suspect the solution to this lies in big warehouses. With retail businesses already not needing physical stores, warehouses are the only necessity. I visualize a model where local delivery services like FedEx or DHL start renting out stock room space and delivering to every street everyday, like regular mail. Imagine the time this could save. You could put in a grocery order from lunch at work, and have it at your house in time to get home and make dinner. You wouldn’t have to waste the time stopping by a store, waiting in line, and getting stuck for a second time in rush hour. This would also have a positive effect on the environment, leaving cars off of the road for longer, and it could cut down on accidents. The delivery vehicles could also be electric or some sort of hydrogen harnessing water powered vehicle. Another way the internet can literally save lives, and maybe even our planet.

6.Flying Automated Cars – This will represent another huge breakthrough for our society. It would free up any time spent traveling for other, more productive things, and it also would mean faster speeds, faster arrivals, and more practical long distance trips. People would never really get lost, and accidents would be reduced dramatically. There’d be no rush hour or no traffic. The world really would be a less stressful place.

You’ve seen the Discovery Channel show.. Cars would all talk to each other and would be able to make sure they never come in contact with each other, like automated air traffic controlers. These technologies are already being realized. Rumor has it that the U.S. government has even already started designing air vehicle licenses, but who knows for sure. With this notch on our belts, I’d say we’d be pretty deep into future culture at this point.

7. Blogosphere Awakening – Basically this is an information revolution that begins by bloggers taking over as the main source for news worldwide. I believe this will happen as better technologies are developing in the fields of home production, film and sound recording. I see there being a trend more towards vlogging as time goes on. Having bloggers be the main source of news would just mean more sources. More choices and opinions represented, rather than the usual 2 or 3 that are represented on traditional news networks, and more information for which to base one’s own opinion.

The premise for the new model is simple. It’s like books on tape. Listening to a book is always faster than actually reading it. It’s no different with a blog. Blogs transformed into Vlogs would allow users to get through more information faster, and actually feel a relief from the overwhelming flows of information that they want desperately to absorb in a manner that will one day be referred to as “as old school as an actual book.”

Just right now I have about 16 tabs open in Chrome, all blogs that I want to read later. Imagine if I could press play, and all of them would play in the order I put them in, and I could be listening to them now as I type this, instead of having to read it all later, each on a different website. Trust me, this technology will be out sooner than you think 😉 (don’t be surprised if you see some vlogs coming from this blog in the future).

8. Wirelessly Charging Devices – There are rumors of Apple creating an iPhone that is powered by solar technology. This is truly the wave of the future. There are also some crazy technologies that supposedly allow you to get a charge from a WiFi connection somehow. And who knows, Tesla could have been up to something when he built those big towers to harness energy from the earth’s magnetic fields. This technology could prove to be so important, especially for emergency situations, that it’s my guess that we will gain significant ground in this area within the next 20 years, and the solutions are already beginning to emerge.

9. Global Wireless Internet Access – This is something that’s benefits are so tremendous, that 20 years from now, with all of our capabilities, we would be negligent not to do it. Especially with wireless devices charging from solar or magnetic fields, having a working device with global wireless not only would mean the TV show Lost wouldn’t have lasted more than a week, but even while they were waiting to be rescued, they would have been pretty well entertained. In addition to emergency situations, global WiFi could help connect a range of devices together to talk to one another, further the reach and expanse of knowledge and information all over, and especially transform areas mostly cut off, into areas with new opportunities and resources. It’s the World truly connected.

10. Wireless Everything– I’m sure you’ve all seen the TED video about Wireless Electricity. If not, give that a look. This technology really isn’t far off. It’s hard to think of now, but just take a look around the room. Look at all of the wires coiling and protruding from every corner. If you’re like me and are into music recording and production, you know, when you move a studio, or need to re-set one up, you’re literally up to your neck in cords. We don’t think about it now, but we really are in the dark ages still relatively speaking. 20 years from now they’re going to be looking at wires with looks as baffled as when we look at old telephone switchboards from the 50’s and 60’s, with the huge matrices of connections horribly branched out all over the place and the terrible inefficiency and complication. Wireless…is just a no brainer.

So that’s it; a great look at what our future holds in store for us if we continue down the roads that we are currently following. It’s a much safer, more in-tune, healthier, more efficient, and much more pleasant place to be. I for one cannot wait until all of these amazing technologies are truly recognized. I encourage everybody to do their part in supporting the growth and ongoing development of these technologies, and I hope to see you on the front lines leading the way. Until then, that’s where you can find me. Thanks for taking the time to read my blog and please, offer your thoughts. Here’s to a great future.

Written by: Dante Cullari Founder & President Beat-Play, LLC

How to Promote Your Music Without Spamming!

What I’m not going to do in this post is give you a list of 10 things you can do today that you probably already know about, or that aren’t going to help you stand out at all. What I am going to do is give you a reality check.

So you have 2 choices to start out with:

1. Start from the beginning and learn the background information needed to take a well-measured, strategic approach to the problem

or

2. Take the shortcut and go straight to THE ANSWER, a little further down on the page.

The Beginning

The state of the current mainstream music industry is horrible. It’s a sinking ship that even the rich guys wish they could jump off of…but they can’t. However this does not spell the end of the music industry, just the “mainstream” one.

It turns out there’s a whole other living, breathing, and relatively healthy independent music industry that runs parallel to the mainstream, but is hugely overshadowed, even though is have substantially more artists than the mainstream one.

So how do you stay on the ship that’s not sinking while getting noticed? Well remember, the overshadowing ship is sinking, and it’ll eventually go down.

But waiting sucks! And then once the mainstream goes down, how is the independent music industry going to be organized enough to stay afloat?

The answer comes with some patience, and the abilitity to make the right move at the right time..but there is more to it than that.

What people don’t see is what’s actually making the mighty giants fall. Guess what? It’s called the Internet. The wait won’t be so long after all, because while this force pushes the mainstream down, this same force is lifting the independents up. There’s something to be hopeful about here.

The current problems with music online still involve promotion, and of course piracy. But I’m proud to probably be the first to tell you that these two problems can be completely solved, if we use the Internet the right way. It doesn’t mean the solutions are in place right now, but it does mean that they exist…I’ll show you in a minute.

However, solutions like these don’t just happen. Whenever there’s masses of people demanding change, it usually takes some sort of inside organization or committee to actually go through the process of orcheastrating and implementing that change for the rest of the masses. There has to be a representative of the people to structure the new rules. But who will delegate this committee for the independents? Will there be a vote or what?

There will be no vote..just a group of independent artists who want to see these problem solved, and who won’t wait for other people to do it for them. It will be someone who just decides to take charge for everyone, because they realize someone has to. So who will this group of people be? Well, it’s nice to meet you, my names Dante, and I’m the leader of the Beat-Play team.

THE ANSWER

So there are two major problems here. One is piracy, and one is online promotion/distribution without spamming. It turns out, the solution to both of these problems comes from the same, simple tool.

See the reason these problems still exist is because indie artists don’t have the right tools to take advantage of the golden opportunity sitting right in front of them(Read above to see what this is). As a fed up independent artist, I’ve spend the last 3 years designing these tools that can take independents to the next level, and now they’re ridiculously close to hitting the web.

The solution starts with a social network..but not just any social network. It’s got to involve the WHOLE independent artist community, and then spread to the fans. Once this network is set up, the end(or irrelevance) of piracy, and promotion without spamming, can occur.

Here’s where the tools come in. Imagine on this social network, you have a radio player that follows you everywhere, similar to thesixtyone.com. On here though, you can follow people with similar tastes in music as you, (your friends, favorite artists, ect) and any music saved in their playlists will automatically get sent to your radio when you press play, either completely randomized, or by your control. You can put filters on genres, tags, moods, playlists, new or old content, and there’ll be many other options eventually. If you like a song enough, you will put it in one of your playlists, and then anyone following you will automatically get introduced to it. What this does for the independent artists, is create a completely viral system of automated word of mouth. If the music is good enough, it will get passed on. If it isn’t good, it won’t go any further.

This could completely take the place of traditional promotional methods today, and not just with music, but it could apply to almost anything. There..simple. Now that the promotional problem is solved, let’s take a look at the piracy issue.

Say I’m a really great musician, and now thousands of people are listening to my music thanks to this new promotional tool. Well, it’s still safe to say that if I sell my music, people will still somehow get it for free. So the other logical option is for me to give it away for free directly. Then I can track whenever someone safely downloads my music, plays it, shares it, views my profile, my videos, my merchandise store, my streaming concerts, or whatever other cool stuff comes to be supported on this platform. What I do with these numbers is submit them to the social network platform, who will give me ad revenues based on the numbers of people I’m attracting to my content. There will be different brackets of artists, each worth a specific amount for advertisers. The most popular artists will get the highest percentage back.

What makes this beautiful is that the ads don’t cost more to implement for the social network, but the advertisers will get charged more for the popular artists, leaving that increase to go straight to the source: the artists. It is also worth noting that the ads do not have to be big, obtrusive, flashy banners. They can simply be little icons in the corner of a radio player that serve a very important purpose: allowing people to get your music for free! With these tools in place, making money from your music will be as simple as uploading it and giving it away, as long as you have a decent size network to help the start of your music’s spread.

Everyone is connected to everyone. Your friends know people you don’t know, and you know people they don’t. The chain is continuous; it never stops, just goes full circle. Taking advantage of this fact online is not as hard as you would think, and this could spell real change for independent artists. The internet is itself, a tool. It’s this tool that has enabled it’s users to dislodge and divert traditional mainstream methods, and it’s this tool that creates the opportunity for the other tools necessary in order to build newer, lasting structures. These tools WILL give independents the upper hand, once people learn to use them.

The strategy for now..stay patient! Don’t sign with a label! Don’t even sign up for ASCAP or one of those rip offs. Streaming is the future, and ad revenues can always be tied to a stream. As for this social network, and these tools, they’re coming! They’re in development right now, and they will be in beta by the spring of this year, 2010! Remember, we need the whole independent community to get behind this in order for it to work. So spread the message, spread the ideas, and spread this post. The future of music is a lot brighter than people may think.

Contact the Beat-Play Team for more information.

Written by: Dante Cullari Founder & President Beat-Play, LLC

The Invention of the Toolbox, and How it can Save Music

What came first, the toolbox or the tool? This is not a trick question, it’s obviously the tool, and we have proof. However, with the emergence of more tools, and more applications for these tools, it became apparent that another tool, a tool’s tool, was needed: the Toolbox.

It is no different for the current state of the music industry and all of it’s awesome web tools. I see the future of music going in one distinct direction in order for it to flourish the way it naturally should. It may sound cliche, but the only way true, good music(like the old days) will live on, is if the surviving community of great music decides to unite as one. This may sound like an empty gesture, but with today’s standards, uniting is as easy as selecting and supporting ONE universal music social network online. It’s almost as simple as a mouse click these days to organize collectively toward a common goal.

Once a single platform is established, the possibilities for collaboration and integration of all of the awesome sites and tools that are out there are opened up increasingly, and can benefit the users way more than the current set up. Third party apps can be integrated with the social network to expand the capabilities of the site and its users.

Also, a huge part of this platform should include an effective ad model, that is unobtrusive and that sponsors the content. Artists can track ALL of their plays, vid views, profile views, merchandise page views, shares, ect, and if they give their music away for free, they could then gain ad revenues based on popularity. The downloads on this network would also be very safe, putting an end to crashing computers and lawsuits.

Bands could be able to perform live streaming concerts and sell tickets on this platform, as well as their merchandise, and they can have their updates sent directly to their fan’s profiles. Band members could even eventually practice with each other from across the world if this system is created, leaving even the opportunity for new bands to form, where it would have been impossible before.

Having one music platform would open up the doors to a more efficient way of artist promotion as well. There could be a system where users follow people they share a taste in music with, and then the user’s radio pulls songs from their friend’s playlists when they press play. There could be many ways for users to control this. What this really means is the best free promotion an artist could get (and currently can’t). For example, if my friend likes a song enough to playlist it, then it will get sent to me, and if I like it enough to playlist it, it gets sent to everyone who’s following me, creating an automated word of mouth system that makes the music itself completely viral, as long as it’s good.

There’s currently no term for this, but it can be described almost as a 2-way status update, where a user not only receives the content, but passes on the content that they like. This amazingly simple, but innovative system. will have incredible implications, not just for the promotion of music, but eventually for any product.

Basically, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t have ONE platform online for music, and a million and one reasons why we should. It doesn’t mean the end of all of the current music sites, it would just mean the integration of them all together, performing the role of a toolbox for all of the cool web tools out there. Imagine, before tool boxes, people only had access to a limited amount of tools at a given time; but with the toolbox, the options became almost limitless, given the tools. I see the future of this spreading generously throughout many facets of our lives.

Also in the future, along these same lines, could eventually be mobile hardware, as well as mobile apps that are universally accepted for music distribution. Then, of course, I hope we would do the same thing for TV and Movies, which would be to essentially free the industries, in almost every sense of the term. This system is inevitable and I am certain it will happen in this decade, just as sure as the invention of the toolbox was after the introduction of numerous tools. Organization is key!

Written by: Dante Cullari, Founder & President, Beat-Play, LLC

The “Metagration” of the Web

It only make sense that with the floods of content floating out there waiting to be surfed, there would be some better tools put in place for finding and organizing the content that interests you the most.

So how is content found today? I think it would be safe to assume that Google is the number 1 way people currently find content on the web that they’re looking for specifically. It works great. It will show me any content or any websites that even contain the keywords I’m looking for, but when it comes to using the search results for a specific function, Google isn’t always so specific. In other words, there’s many things Google can’t/doesn’t do.

Say I want to find some good new songs on my favorite music website. Since I obviously don’t know specifics about the actual content I’m looking for, I should stick to generalities, and things that I know I will like, but while still being as specific as possible(because I’m picky). I should be able to select genre/s, mood/s, and type in keywords in order to find the music I’m looking for. However the problem I may have here is that the website I search in might only search the keywords from a tag database of content on that website. That is really limiting.

For example, if I do a search for the word “Peace” it should show me not only every song that has Peace as a tag, or in the title, but it should search other data that may have a relationship to songs, like a song’s lyrics that can be found on a totally separate webpage. These links between content that is the same, and that can provide more info about a specific topic or piece of content, should be tied together, regardless of website integration, in order to deliver better search results. It’s kinda like a google search where the whole web is being searched, but with predefined filters, in this case, on type of content, artists that appear on that website, genre, mood and keywords/tags.

Essentially this is an advanced search performed from the site of interest, that offers a far more practical way of using the google search method, to meet a specific need like finding great new bands(that I like).

I call this linking of data with similar source material and using it to perform a specific function within an application, Metagration. Taking meta information and integrating it across unnecessary(but currently present) web boundaries is the key to relevant and successful searches. Connections between content should be made automatically in this way.

This may involve eventually classifying content as a specific type or kind of content. For example, there could be a song and a movie with the same name, and they also may both have some keywords in common, but they may be completely unrelated. This would be inconsequential if the title of the song on say the lyrics page could be “classified” somehow as a Song, so that when searched, the classification for this title will be taken into account as well.

A reorganization of the web like this is not easy however, since the question arises, who will implement these changes? There’s no web maintenance crews to come and upkeep the infrastructure, like with state highways, or an elected group of officials in charge of looking out for the best interests of the web..but maybe there should be..

All I know is that this kind of organization and integration could really benefit a lot of people in a number of different applications, and it’s obviously already been discovered(I’m sure I’m not the only one too), so I predict we will see this shift in the near future of the web. And if no one else does it..shit I will..because it has to happen sometime. What good is the web as a tool if it could be better, but isn’t? Take Down Those Walls!

Written by: Dante Cullari, Founder & President, Beat-Play, LLC