PlayLouder walled garden?
p2pnet.net News View:- PlayLouder MSP (PLMSP) is launching a new type of music pay service and claims it will change the face of digital music sales and distribution. PLMSP is an Internet service provider, based in the UK, which claims to also provide unlimited legal music downloads. Their Website indicates that the provisional retail price is 26.99 (pounds inc. VAT) per month for a 1Mbit/s ADSL connection but they will be adding a tiered service in the future.
PLMSP uses Audible Magic to track all licensed downloads within their network and utilizes “specially configured routers and firewall technology using ‘deep packet searches’ to identify and re-route all file sharing traffic. This process ensures that file sharing can occur only between subscribers within the PLMSP ‘walled garden’.”
This “walled garden” prevents their customers from sharing any files with people who use a different ISP if the file is recognized by audible magic. Although users can download licensed music files that do not contain digital rights management (DRM), the DRM is being applied by PLMSP itself via audible magic and their specially configured routers.
The ability to control how people can share music has been a longtime dream of the RIAA. They have been attempting to force P2P networks to filter their networks for a long time and they have even suggested that every ISP should police and filter the files users transfer on their network. On PLMSP, it doesn’t matter whether you’re trying to share a music file or family photos, all files must go through a filter.
Clive Rich, who is a Sony BMG employee, puts a positive spin on this filter by stating “What I like about PLMSP’s service is that it retains the sense of community and spontaneity which makes P2P and super distribution so attractive to consumers, whilst ensuring that this activity takes place within a framework in which the music can be tracked and rights owners get paid”
Apparently, being confined to sharing certain files with a limited amount of people is what Mr. Rich considers a sense of community and spontaneity.
However, even though this service severely restricts the way its customers can share and obtain their music, not everyone sees this as a bad thing. In his article, Cory Doctorow, who is the European affairs coordinator for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, called this service “the best thing to happen to the copyfight all year — maybe all century.” He also claims that this is what the EFF has been pushing for when they released their proposal for a Voluntary Collective Licensing Scheme.
However, the EFF has been critical of both DRM and filtering services such as Audible Magic and their Voluntary Collective Licensing Scheme proposal does not include a provision which limits customers to sharing licensed music only with those who use the same ISP.
It’s difficult to imagine how this type of service would be appealing to file sharers. Part of the reason why file sharing is so popular is because people have the ability to share songs with millions of people around the world. They have the ability to find rare songs or albums that aren’t available on pay services such as iTunes or at their local music store. It doesn’t matter if the person who has the file they’re looking for lives in another part of the world. There are no restrictions.
PLMSP is trying to present the idea that their service will make file sharing more enjoyable, but in reality it has the potential to be more frustrating since they are limiting their customers to sharing within their “walled garden”. According to PLMSP, they are hoping to reach 40,000 subscribers after one year. That’s a rather small garden when compared to P2P.
Their Website also makes several dubious claims without providing details. They claim that users can use any file sharing application such as eDonkey and Limewire to download music but they also claim that their service provides “no spoofs, no viruses, no lawyers”.
They don’t provide technical details as to how they can prevent users from downloading spoofs or viruses and the suggestion that its customers don’t have to worry about lawsuits when sharing music is complete nonsense.
Although PLMSP has made a deal with Sony, they have not made deals with every major record label. Since their audible magic software will only identify licensed music, it’s possible that users can still download and share music that’s owned by a major record label that has not made a deal with PLMSP. This means PLMSP customers face the same risks every other file sharer faces if they choose to share copyrighted material.
The major record labels are hoping that, if they can sugar-coat the restrictions placed on how music can be shared, people will accept an environment where everything is controlled and monitored. In the end, people will have to decide whether this environment is a walled garden or digital prison.
Drake Zamanov – P2PCore
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August 25th, 2005 at 9:28 pm
FreeWan Cell Users have even better options. They can configure apps such as LimeWire to share with peers both on the Internet and within their freewan cell. Anyone with a wireless router can configure it to allow other computers in the area to peer wirelessly. Mac address filtering can be used to block these other computers from leeching your Internet connection. I have been using this type of network for about 3 months. My neighbors and my family trade files back and forth. I have even shared files with a few wardrivers in the area
They cannot leech my Internet connection because I have only dialup. I also have about 150 GiGs of files as well.