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Clear Channel Buys Patent For Instant Live CDs 342
An anonymous reader writes "According to this Rolling Stone article, and this article at P2P, everyone's favorite monopolist, Clear Channel, is bullying DiscLive and other companies in the available-after-the-concert live CD business by forbidding them from operating in their venues.
Looking at the actual Clear Channel patent itself, it's obvious that, unlike what is said by their Instant Live program head Steve Simon, their patent is very specific, and doesn't cover all media types and all onsite production, so isn't CC just standing behind a bogus patent to continue to act like a monopolist? Anyone have prior art to invalidate their patent?"
Hello? Microsoft? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:2, Funny)
Acting like willing lambs to the slaughter? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:5, Informative)
They're the ones that banned a bunch of songs [f---edcompany.com] from their huge army of radio stations after 9/11.
Like:Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:2, Funny)
Now I am mad.
Death be to ANY radio executive who bans ANY AC/DC for ANY reason.
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:2)
Uhm. John Lennon as "questionable content"? U2? Dear Eris, the Beatles PREDATE the phrase "questionable content", so how can their lyrics contain said content?!
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:5, Insightful)
"Imagine" : The line "imagine all the people" could potentially trigger some bad images of the victims
"Sunday Bloody Sunday" : see above "Obla Di, Obla Da" : the line "Obla Di, Obla Da, life goes on." could potentially be construed as a disrespect to the seriousness of the situation. as if to say, big deal, move on.
While I totally disagree with governmental censorship, this is an instance of a company trying to be respectful to it listeners. The ban was temporary, and based on the fact that things were hard enough on many people as it is.
So try and keep in mind, that no matter the intention of a song (promoting peace etc...) If the lyrics are taken out of context (say you tune in mid song) I can stir some really upsetting emotions. Last thing I need is someone breaking down in tears on the highway causing a stir when it could be prevented.
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm getting awful tired of NPR talking about war, war, mayhem, death, army, war, and I might write a polite letter to express my views -- but if I don't want to listen on my drive home (and I don't -- whatever happened to the varied stories of all kinds that got me listening in the first place?), I turn the radio off or switch it to the CD changer. That's it.
Being respectful of people is allowing them to choose. Not doing it for them.
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean, there is no 'Freedom from being offended' in the Constitution, as far as I know. If there is, then it sure takes a LOT of fun out the 'Freedom of Speech'.
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:3, Insightful)
Songs like Sunday Bloody Sunday have nothing to do with a Wednesday on September 11. And the Beatles recording of Obla Di, Obla Da damn sure has little to do with it.
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:2)
John Lennon
I think the lines about imagining there's no Heaven, nations or possessions were probably seen as being unpatriotic/un-American or some such nonsense.
U2
Sunday Bloody Sunday is about the Bloody Sunday massacre in Northern Ireland. It's no surprise it gets banned everytime someone gets killed.
The Beatles
I'm stumped.
Reminds me of the time Radio1 banned songs like Something In The Air Tonight and Walk Like An Egyptian from being played during the (first) Gulf War so as not to offend our A
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:3, Informative)
Clear Channel (Score:2)
You're right, I replied too quickly with poor wording (like now :)
Still, the presence of a lot of those songs on such a list is "questionnable" to say the least. But Clear Channel knows what's best for us I'm sure.
Louis Armstrong on the list?! (Score:2, Insightful)
Louis Armstrong "What A Wonderful World"
I see trees of green, red roses too
I see them bloom for me and you
And I think to myself, what a wonderful world
I see skies of blue and clouds of white
The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night
And I think to myself, what a wonderful world
The colours of the rainbow, so pretty in the sky
Are also on the faces of people going by
I see friends shakin' hands, sayin' "How do you do?"
They're r
Re:Louis Armstrong on the list?! (Score:2, Funny)
--RJ
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:2)
I'm laughing, but I'm crying on the inside. What the fuck?
Bullshit. (Score:5, Informative)
A lot of weirdness happened in the days immediately following 9-11. The list was one of them, but it NEVER amounted to a company ban. Generally speaking, CC doesn't operate this way.
Another urban legend: that CC banned the Dixie Chicks after they mouthed off overseas. Some CC stations did exactly that, but it was a local decision, not through Corporate. We were told to make the call based on our own markets. The only company I know which actually banned the Chicks was Cumulus.
Re:Bullshit. (Score:4, Insightful)
Can't stand the heat? Get out.
Re:Bullshit. (Score:3, Insightful)
The sheep that believe everything they hear?
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:2, Funny)
Kierthos
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:5, Informative)
Ever since the FCC relaxed the regulations on how many stations a corp can own in a given market, CC has bought out most of their old competitors. IIRC, they own like 90% of the stations in some markets.
These are some of the people to blame when you complain about the "Top 40" and "Boy Bands" that make so much money. They're the ones that put them on the air, for whatever reason.
Re:Hello? Microsoft? (Score:2)
Prior Art (Score:5, Funny)
Back in 1988, I recorded a Pet Shop Boys concert on DAT, and got mugged outside the stadium. Does that count as instant distribution?
Re:Prior Art (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Prior Art (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Prior Art (Score:5, Interesting)
No pity for these venues. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Prior Art? (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't this an instant recording of a live event? Hasn't this been going on for 20 years?
Re:Prior Art? (Score:5, Informative)
And, even though I realize that most of these bands that allow live recordings or even actively encourage them aren't exactly your garden variety pop band many of them seem to have quite a following. Maybe the grassroots, word-of-mouth approach isn't that bad afterall...
Re:Prior Art? (Score:3, Funny)
Nah, thats just hippie bs. Look at the failure of linux, *bsd, gnu, etc.
Re:Prior Art? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Prior Art? (Score:3, Insightful)
Did he? Did he really? I don't believe anybody has yet proven that such actions cause the band to lose sales. In fact, it's quite possible that this increases the band's sales because a lot more people get to hear of them, and hear their music. And remember it's very easy these days to produce a value added CD with extra goodies like photo albums etc, so that even if somebody does have a bootleg, and likes the band, they're quite likely to buy the offi
Grateful Dead URL (Score:2)
Re:Prior Art? (Score:3, Informative)
No, CC are claiming they own the patent to the process of a venue taping the concert, and selling CD's at the merch stand after the gig. Thus "Instant Live CDs" [slashdot.org]
I think bands like Phish have done similar things [livephish.com] but i'm not sure if that site would be prior art (they're not selling the discs AT the concert - but a day later online)
Re:Prior Art? (Score:5, Insightful)
Can I patent the idea of selling MP3 downloads of each track as soon as the track is finished?
Re:Prior Art? (Score:4, Insightful)
Can I patent the idea of selling MP3 downloads of each track as soon as the track is finished?
Repeat after me:
Processes are patented, not ideas.
Processes are patented, not ideas.
Processes are patented, not ideas.
Clearchannel has a process for producing a CD of a concert in time to sell to the people that attended the concert. They are trying to bully others with that patent, but it is unclear (to me, at least) whether or not the others are infringing on their patented process.
Re:Prior Art? (Score:2, Informative)
A great idea if you ask me, I've certainly never seen anything like it here in Scotland.
Re:Prior Art? (Score:3, Informative)
I'm certain there's other prior art though as this patent was only filed in 2001. This is also an obvious invention, so it all adds up to a very shaky patent.
Re:Prior Art? (Score:2, Funny)
I think I'm going to patent "Process of urinating through big media corporations letterbox" and seeing how far I get
Re:Prior Art? (Score:3, Funny)
Have a few beers beforehand, you should be able to get six feet or more!!
Re:Prior Art? (Score:5, Informative)
Anyway, the dead's policy can be found here [dead.net]. And yes, I remember this, its been going on since 1965 (the year the dead started). And yes, the grateful dead are the most successful touring band in the history of rock. Yes, I have hundreds of CDs worth of their shows. For those of you that are into bands that are into playing music vs. making a buck off of a hit or two there are thousands [archive.org] of great sounding shows to be downloaded. Its legal, its fun. (Thanks for not spelling grateful "greatful"
Re:Prior Art? (Score:2)
Definitely Prior Art (Score:5, Informative)
I recall seeing a show on Discovery about a year or two ago about how the Grateful Dead have been recording their own live shows and selling the CDs right after said show for several years as a way to side-step the commercial distribution channels. In the show, they reported that their net income increased many-fold over what they were paid from their RIAA member distributor (Imagine that, directly selling their CDs and taking all the profit vs getting $0.01 out of every $!)
Also, as others have mentioned, this most definitely is both obvious and a natural evolution of recording equipment capabilities. This "patent" should have been denied, since they're attempting to generically patent an existing process by merely putting a few time sensitive words in.
Re:Prior Art? (Score:3, Informative)
Texas Uil (Score:2, Informative)
In other news... (Score:3, Funny)
I can't wait (Score:2)
~S
Prior art? (Score:4, Informative)
It's all about the .cue file (Score:3, Informative)
Cdrecord has had the ability to record from stdin since its creation.
The patent covers adding track start/end cues during the performance and then using the equivalent of 421 burners [theregister.co.uk] (or any other plurality of digital media recording devices). Can a user of cdrecord pipe in a .cue file created in real time?
Money? (Score:2, Insightful)
I think, however that you lost sight of the big picture. Making Money. I support Open Source, but what takes priority, the client with 5k in his hand asking for a website, or my to-do list for my blog software, or another OS project.
Business today thrives on one company working against the others, being first to market still carries some value, I think that this is what CC is doing. Plus, If I'll say, If I s
Re:Money? (Score:2)
Patenting this idea (is less than)* being first to market. In the patent scenario, they're using the (nanny?) state to avoid having to be first. Hell they could sit on the patent and avoid having to do anything. In the second case, they're competing.
Maybe I missed the point.
In general, I'm more interested in where my money goes than what I'm getting. With my discretionary income at least. People are pretty focused on what they want though. Dunno why. My personal desires aren't very high on my list
not fair! (Score:2)
When I saw this on Ars Technica [arstechnica.com] yesterday, I was going to put another mark on my slashdot ESP [waglo.com] - I was sure to see this come up. Oups, I forgot it in one of my 50 browsers now open...
Hmmm, crispy. I just hope not everyone will run away scared by this. The patent will hopefully be invalidated, or shown not to cover the whole process.
Churches Do It Every Sunday (Score:5, Interesting)
Some of us consider that a performance, and its been done on tape for over 30 years.
Re:Churches Do It Every Sunday (Score:3, Insightful)
If the "church" method is well established, then it goes a long way into invalidating the new patent as being a logical improvement based on newly available technology.
Re:Churches Do It Every Sunday (Score:5, Insightful)
Because we all know, and ClearChannel and the RIAA have shown, that digital technology makes everything magically different. Just like the Internet.
Re:Churches Do It Every Sunday (Score:3, Interesting)
Live MUSIC cd (Score:2, Funny)
Oh wait a minute, Live Music CD's
invalidate patent? sure .... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:invalidate patent? sure .... (Score:4, Informative)
BT Loses Case Over Hyperlink Patent [slashdot.org]
ISTM there's a dual standard... (Score:3, Interesting)
On the other hand, when it comes time to enforce the patent, anything that looks vaguely like the patent is forbidden.
So, you could build a Direct-To-CD system with technology pre-dating the pa
Patent requirements... (Score:5, Interesting)
However, this concept is rather obvious - record a concert from various audio and video sources then compress the data onto a CD. If they have a patent on this process, then it might be defendable. But I can't see how they can defend the concept of recording a live concert onto a CD.
Re:Patent requirements... (Score:2)
My mistake. Although the patents that I have seen defended successfully, are those that have been written by experts.
And it looks like the patent is specific to recording events (in this case, sound events) to a file that's parsed into tracks on the fly
There is a brief mention of video recording in the patent.
TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to the field of producing digital audio and video r
This patent (Score:4, Informative)
IANAL, but it seems as though if you capture each song, and then edit them after the song is captured, then you have invalidated this patent.
Invalidated or circumvented? (Score:2)
Clear Channel==Download Festival (Score:5, Interesting)
The idea is that your ticket to the event entitles you to "download" up to about 40 minutes worth of music (IIRC) from the event, using a "secure" DRM system.
My wife and I went last summer and I went to download my "fair share" of the music when I got home. Guess what? The music is in a proprietary format and you need a special client to be able to download and decode it. The client is only available as a Win32 .EXE
Sorry guys, I only have Solaris and Linux at home. I emailed and protested politely and was ignored. The client is called Wippit. I emailed them and got no reply, despite the fact that allegedly they welcomed feedback from non-Windows users asking for clients for other platforms.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Clear Channel==Download Festival (Score:2)
If you run Solaris ANYWHERE you deserve what you get.
You mean a stable, if unexciting and by-third-parties-under-supported platform? Yeah, I think you're right.
Re:"we welcome feedback" (Score:2)
I want my live Slayer!
church sermon tapes (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:church sermon tapes (Score:2)
Solution (Score:5, Insightful)
In its current format, it is just being abused by big business to stifle innovation, and as a means to create an income though suing anyone any everyone who even remotely does something similar to what they have a patent on.
This is the only solution, and should be done as well as a complete re-write of the copyright laws, and civil lawsuit laws, as they too are now just a revenue stream for big business.
This is also fast becoming the case here in Australia too as Australia becomes America through the FTA (Free Trade Agreement).
Well that is my AU$0.02 (US$0.014178) worth.
Third of Nine
Ya know what? (Score:4, Insightful)
Screw patents.
If you can't get people to buy it from you, then move out of the way of those who can.
This is getting insane.Re:Ya know what? (Score:3, Insightful)
The entire borken legal system is part of the problem.
Prior Art (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Prior Art (Score:2)
How can one patent this?! (Score:2, Interesting)
Tivo? (Score:2)
Re:Tivo? (Score:2)
For removing commercials at record time, Tivo is actually less effective than a VCR. On a VCR, I can hit pause when the commercials start, and unpause the recording when they're finished. But on a Tivo, the best I could do would be to stop the recording during each commercial break -- which would mean starting a new recording after each one. Plus, since the Tivo grabs whatever was in its live buffer when the record button is pressed (a very neat feature
Nothing left than a big laughter at the US (Score:2, Interesting)
Nothing more to say
In other news..... (Score:2)
Casey Jones, you better watch your speed! (Score:2)
Anyone have prior art to invalidate their patent?
Howsabout every Grateful Dead concert from the 70's and beyond? IIRC The Dead encouraged bootleg taping and selling of their concerts.
can anyone explain? (Score:4, Insightful)
CC vs Artist vs Pepsi. (Score:4, Insightful)
I wonder if CC is looking at the live disk as a promotional opportunity to sell to advertisers, and that's why they're barring artists use of their own live recordings? I guess they figure that if they have the patent, they can control the use of the technology, and then turn around and lisence advertising on the live CD to Pepsi, or Budweiser, or whomever is willing to pony up the cash to have their ads "inserted" onto the live tracks.
And I doubt there are many artists who would be willing to do that on their own, given the backlash from fans.
Makes sense (Score:2)
Which made perfect sense to me.
Corporate fascism (Score:4, Insightful)
Prior art, everywhere... (Score:5, Insightful)
"In one embodiment, the present invention provides an event recording system that has an event-capture module, an editing module, and a media recording module."
That's a recording studio.
It just happens to be at the event, and the timeline is compressed to enable them to sell copies by the time the concert ends. There is no invention there at all, just a bunch of blue-arsed audio-engineering flies. As for prior art:
Re:Prior art, everywhere... (Score:3, Insightful)
I should really sit down and write some instant response form paragraph which says this because I invariably end up having to set someone straight about this in almost every slashdot patent story.
unoriginal (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe they could patent the actual recording/distribution kiosk design, because that would take some original, creative engineering to make it work. But the idea of "selling CD's after a show" is nothing new.
Betcha not a one... (Score:3, Insightful)
At the risk of being off-topic but kind of still on-topic, have you all seen where PanIP's lovely "Automated Sales" patent got overturned recently? Unless PanIP can convince the USPTO to overturn its decision, it looks like there will be no more lawsuits against e-commerce companies coming from PanIP, unless they think they can stand on just their automated transactions patent, and that one under review, too.
There's a link to the story at the old website of the PanIP Group Defense Fund, at youmaybenext.com [youmaybenext.com].
Soul sucking evil bastards (Score:5, Interesting)
You can read more about them on the "All around the world - Pixies live" forum on frankblack.net [frankblack.net] for one. There service is a GOOD THING and it hurts no one but the greedy bastards at Clear Channel. You should have seen the smiles on the 1000 or so people who go CDs that night. Everyone was HAPPY.
In our corporate run world soon we will all be slaves to the patents and morals of a handful of monopolistic companies. We can line up and listen to whatever clear channel wants us to listen to and pay them a hefty sum to do so.
It just makes me sick to my stomach. Every GOOD THING in the world gets taken away. Call me a whiner, but this just depresses the SHIT out of me.
It's a completely bogus patent (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:It's a completely bogus patent (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Time for an anti-trust suit (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Slashdot Groupthink (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Slashdot Groupthink (Score:5, Insightful)
The hard work of transparent windows is not to come up with the idea, but to implement proper support for it in your windowing system. By using transparent windows in your system, you automatically publish it, thus there is little or no value in the patent publication. Same with business methods: by using them, you make them known.
The patent system was never designed to allow monopolisation of every cool idea (otherwise we'd also have patents on book plots and drawing styles), because that results in blocking all independent creators who build something based on that idea. Of course, big businesses love that, because a patent on an idea is much broader than a patent on a particular implementation/invention and thus gives them a much broader monopoly, but it's bad for the free market and society as a whole.
Have a look at this presentation [ugent.be] for more on the idea/invention difference, the goals of the patent system and how software patents work against them.
FWIW, I'm posting this from my iBook and my other computer is a G4, waiting to be replaced by a G5. So I'm definitely not some anti-Apple zealot, many would even claim the reverse :)
Re:The myth of the Clear Channel monopoly (Score:5, Informative)
---
(Cut from various sources)
The once small company has quickly grown to over 1200 stations, collecting approximately 20% of all radio advertising dollars and programming over 60% of all rock radio stations.
Clear Channel's largest competitor, Infinity/CBS, owns roughly 180 stations.
Within individual markets, such as Denver, Clear Channel controls every station broadcasting certain popular formats and their attendant desirable target audiences. In 2000, Clear Channel purchased SFX, Inc. (now renamed Clear Channel Entertainment), the largest concert promoter in the country.
By threatening vulnerable artists and labels with reduced or off-hours air play on the only stations likely to air their songs, Clear Channel pressures artists, labels and concert venues into sweetheart deals with its promotions arm.
Channel has directly retaliated against artists who spurn their services. In other cases Clear Channel is able to simply outbid local competitors and increase ticket prices for the consumers. In other instances in which local promoters are able to successfully outbid Clear Channel Entertainment for concerts, Clear Channel has refused to run advertisements for the shows or has aired them during undesirable time slots. This argument that Clear Channel is illegally tying its concert promotion business to its monopoly position in popular music radio underlies the Sherman Act proceeding currently underway in the District of Colorado, Nobody in Particular Presents v. Clear Channel Communications.
---
In economics, a monopoly (from the Greek monos, one + polein, to sell) is defined as a market situation where there is only one provider of a product or service
Monopolies are characterized by a lack of economic competition for the good or service that they provide (and a lack of viable substitute goods), as well as high barriers to entry for potential competitors in the market.
Re:Why hasn't this done before? (Score:3, Interesting)
And honestly, people have been doing it legally for years as well at venues that allow such things. Hell, concerts by less main stream groups like the Grateful Dead, Rusted Root, Phish, and such from that genre have vocally encouraged people to record their shows and then trade them with other fans, all legal, and all with the band's consent.
I have even been t
Re:No need for prior art (Score:4, Insightful)
I reckon if this is the sort of standard of patent we're seeing now, every patent issued by the US patent office in the last twenty years ought to be declared invalid because obviously we can't trust any of them to actually be sensible!
Re:Not Obvious...? (Score:2)
to some one skilled in the art.
Yes but in practice the art is that of being a patent lawyer, and the skill is that of being deliberately obtuse.