independence

DMGI merges with The Orchard

Last week, Digital Music Group (DMGI) agreed to a merger with The Orchard. Reading through the details--summarized nicely by the New York Times--it appears that this is more of a buyout than a merger, with The Orchard owning 60% of the combined company, which will retain the DMGI name.

I met DMGI founder Mitch Koulouris back in 2004 when he was first raising money for the company, then called Digital Musicworks International (DMI). He and one of his associates (who's since moved on) were very excited about their business plan, which he called the first all-digital record label. … Read more

Independence - from your vendor - Day

Today is Independence Day here in the United States - a day of reflection and fireworks. It's the day that everyone here but I broke free of Britain to "live free or die." (I still work for a UK-based company, so I'm John Powell's indentured servant. :-) In 10 days, we'll also celebrate France's Bastille Day (when the cry of "Liberte! Egalite! Fraternite!" echoed beyond La Belle France, shown in this wonderful Delacroix painting.)

So it seems appropriate to reflect on how open source provides basic freedoms to IT departments and developers worldwide. I experienced this firsthand this morning on conference call with my team and a partner company, both in Europe. (No, they didn't seem to care that it was a US holiday.) A call that would have taken days or months to determine licensing rights to our software took...10 minutes. Frankly, had Alfresco not undergone some licensing changes in the past the call never even would have happened.

Open source licensing enables companies to collaborate without involving attorneys, business development teams, etc. You grok the license, you take the code, you abide by the license. That's it. Highly efficient.

And free. Free as in freedom. Freedom that makes a big difference to end customers and to partners alike.… Read more

TuneCore vs. CD Baby for digital distribution

Hip hop giants Public Enemy will release their next album via digital distributor TuneCore, according to a story in yesterday's New York Times.

As a musician who's recorded a lot of CDs with unsigned bands, I'm a longtime fan of CD Baby, which provides an online store for selling physical CDs, as well as digital distribution through iTunes and other online services. How do the services compare for digital distribution?

CD Baby charges a one-time $35 fee for each album you want to sell through them (digital or physical), and takes a 9% cut of each download. … Read more

Social cinema for the masses

There's no shortage of video on the Web, but how to separate the grain (feature films) from the chaff (videos of your cat)?

Less than 1 percent of films produced worldwide actually get distributed in the U.S., according to Jaman.com. Hence the new product Jaman, showing at Demo 07 just now.

Jaman cuts out the middleman and lets independent North American filmmakers and South American and South Asian filmmakers get their cinematic works online. For a fee of $1.99 to rent and $4.99 to buy, people can then sift through and watch any of the … Read more

Liberated Films gets independent, charitable

Despite the year of video coming to a close, the surge of video hosting sites hasn't really stopped. Jumping into the fray is Liberated Films, a niche site aimed at bringing film enthusiasts and filmmakers together. Liberated Films takes it one step further with a charity service they intend to implement once they have a large enough user base. After-tax profits would go to user-selected charities or help organizations.

As on other video sites, films are served up in Flash with a short advertisement at the start. Videos range from short cartoons about alcoholic reindeer to full-on mob dramas. … Read more