Fairtilizer mixtape fourpack
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Fairtilizer has many many wicked mixes these days, as you know we play them on AudioPorn FM, but wanna make sure that everyone knows about these so we dedicate this post to four of them. Tracklists and download links are on the Fairtilizer pages, but you can stream bellow, or in the AudioPorn FM ;)
Stereo MC’s – Timestretch dj mix july 2008
[stream only Fairtilizer]
BLECH (part one)
[mp3 Fairtilizer]
The Orb – Full Orbient (XLR8R)
[mp3 Fairtilizer]
Modeselektor – Modeselektor’s Jetlag Mix (XLR8R)
[mp3 Fairtilizer]
Started, January 2007 by Olivier Rosset and Jean-François Groff, now CTO of Fairtilizer music company. Jean alone, has accumulated over 15-years of expertise in building professional web sites and e-business services. “More than 10 years ago, Jean-François Groff was with the creators of the Web at the CERN. Then he joined Netvibes, one of the emblematic enterprises of the Web 2.0. He argues that we are finally getting back to beautiful ideas of sharing that were imagined by the inventors of the Web” (NATIW Workshops). He analyzes the participative web and states that it forms, following the example of opensource languages, a powerful tool for creating collective value, also known as Creative Commons Licensing.
This has lead these two men to the founding of Fairtilizer; a web based music company that boasts itself as “an online community for people who care about music” (Jaiku/Fairtilizer). Fairilizer’s ‘About Us’ sections describes a community combined with unique tech tools that work to define a new generation of music media (Fairtilizer.com). A kind of media at the crossroads of music recommendation, music distribution and music services for labels and artists. Their claim is that traditional means of music channeling, consisting of television and radio are no longer trustworthy. The best way to find out about new, good music, they claim, is by word of mouth, mp3 blogs and p2p networks.
Fairtilizer is not a record company in the traditional sense. Record companies are known for bossing their artists around, forming a worker, supervisor relationship. Record labels are widely regarded as entities who own the copyright and control all of what is done with these copyrighted materials. Fairtilizer is a breath of fresh air as it steps in to a new role as a music company more about artists making relationships with a service. “Artists can now use one unified interface provided by Fairtilizer to distribute songs to blogs, web sites, social networks, and digital music stores…yes, even iTunes” (ReadWriteWeb). This new distribution model for the company is aided by an embedded audio player. “The player comes in four different sizes and has shuffle and auto play options as well as the ability to stream a customizable play list. Once embedded, artists can then easily track analytics like downloads and plays per country” (ReadWriteWeb).
BUSINESS:
Although Fairtilizer will provide tools for artists wishing to sell their music, the focus isn’t just on music sales. Instead, it focuses on providing all the tools an artist would need to get their music discovered, downloaded, shared, and distributed. The income for this new Music Company is impacted by music sales but according to Olivier Rosset, a former music exec and co-founder of Fairtilizer, it won’t be about who owns the rights to a recording anymore. Music will instead center around the URL. And at Fairtilizer, they want to be the company that best helps an artist get that URL, that single track, onto the most sites across the internet. This would then increase the amount of plays to the tracks held on Fairtilizer’s site. This gains attention to the hub for social interaction while Fairtilizer may tap into some of the publishing from these Artists. This may be a part of the ‘relationship’ the company makes with it’s artists.
Fairtilizer is making the best of it’s web based community to get the word out. The new music company has a strong presence in myspace (http://www.myspace.com/fairtilizer) along with being featured in numerous blogs throughout the net (http://www.discobelle.net/tag/fairtilizer/ as well as http://www.audioporncentral.com/2008/08/fairtilizer-mix.html). This kind of approach to the music industry is maverick although there has been so much talk about this new way of doing business. These blogs take different stances on the content and purpose of Fairtilizer. I is certain that one of the main percs for these blogs is the ability to link to Fairtilizers music online. This brings new attention to the music company as intended while still adding to the value of these related blogs by allowing them to feature CC works. Creative Commons “is a non-profit organization devoted to expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share.[1] The organization has released several copyright licenses known as Creative Commons licenses. These licenses allow creators to communicate which rights they reserve, and which rights they waive for the benefit of other creators” (Wikipedia). The Creative Commons licenses enable copyright holders to grant some or all of their rights to the public while retaining others through a variety of licensing and contract schemes including dedication to the public domain or open contentlicensing terms. The intention is to avoid the problems current copyright laws create for the sharing of information.
It still seems as though no one is sure of how the future will treat these companies. For certain, it is not the same approach as iTunes, which is good as separating yourself from an industry giant is paramount to any hope of success. In regards to any hope for real success, I is hard to call but certainly, there is a preference to those who start on the road first. They become the biggest winner down the line as they hope to find the new Industry model before the major labels are able to make the change. New ‘Music Companies’ should be aware, however, of the majors making a bid to shut them down. I am almost certain it is a matter of time before those who become successful in this model are bought out or shut down.