Is turntable.fm legal?
allthingsd.com
allthingsd.com
Or would it be a reason for founders to ask for more money, under the idea that they need a warchest of funds to fight expensive lawsuits?
On the other hand, being in a legal grey area could be seen as a barrier to entry for people who don't want a potential litigation nightmare hovering over their heads.
As a simple example: turntable allows uploads. What happens when I upload an MP3 from a band that isn't part of the MediaNet catalog? And at what point does streaming radio become a "digital locker"?
(source: http://www.mndigital.com/services/content-fulfillment.html)
Seems pretty compelling that as a customer of MediaNet, their service (aside from uploads) is totally legal, unless MediaNet is somehow not.
But they could simply turn off uploading should they be called out for that--I should have addressed that in my original comment. My guess is that much of the community wouldn't care if that feature was gone.
Most of the big public rooms are founded on playing pretty obscure stuff. The indie rock rooms could survive but the electro and dubstep type rooms would definitely die.
I have no idea what the usage patterns are (do most people hang out in big public rooms or small rooms with friends?) but a pretty big segment would complain if uploads went away.
In my time at a label I tried to work with them, but their technology is kind of awful, so I wouldn't be shocked if Turntable is looking for a better partner.
Essentially they are a proxy between the label catalogs, reporting for royalties and DSP's (digital service providers) who license and distribute content.
Or as I referred to it internally, the "API Model"
Regarding the user uploaded stuff, that's under DMCA.
Of note: Turntable really falls into two licensing camps: DJ and listener. Very different terms required.
These guys have much better tech.
I don't know any start-up making significant $ from mp3 referral sales. Tops they may make couple grand but that is not much when you are getting 5m uniques(won't even pay for the streaming; and making 2k from mp3 affiliate sales is tough even with 5M uniques.)
I'd say it's astonishing he doesn't know internet radio station have existed for ages. It took a little bit more know how before getting getting put on the web, but its always been there.