Elbows Music Blog Community

i think that would be a wonderful idea to have a set of standards that bloggers follow and the white-list idea would really work. that way, responsible bloggers are protected. i should know because a) i don't post tracks at my blog unless a record label releases them or the release in question is already out and i own it or b) it was sent to me by someone and they asked me to post it up. those are the only two reasons why i would post tracks in the first plae.

so yes, i think it's a wonderful idea for the white-list and the standards. (and i would agree to them as well if i was asked. i do anything to support friends and soon-to-be friends of the blogasphere.)

just throwing in my two cents. :)

Funnily enough .. me too Coxon ...

If you are after finding people to post your stuff I'm sure you will find lots of willing bloggers who are happy to build a 'relationship' with you just for the promise of free pre-release stuff and the kudos of posting things early.

I'm not one of them! Sorry! ... but good luck.

Terms like 'responsible blogging' and 'white listed blogs' scream NOOOOOOO to me!

Adam, this sounds like a good, yet strategically worded idea. I think before a lot of people come on-board, there will need to be a bit of clarification re:

what if we...were to codify things a bit more and develop a set of standards that you could follow and, in exchange, we would white-list your blog and you'd be free to post what we make available on our sites or directly to you.

Personally, I'm not too concerned with "exclusives" (although the vast majority of those present here are), but I do think it's great that there is, at least in theory, a big label group wiling to take a progressive approach to music blogging. Once, er, you let us know what exactly that means from your perspective.

My biggest worry about music blogging is the continuation and codification of pretty much what's already happened to it: the trend toward exclusivity and promotion and away from uniqueness of perspective and, yeah, uniqueness of perspective, which is pretty much what you mentioned here:

we quite obviously agree there is a lot of value in what you guys do for us in terms of building buzz, getting music out, shaping opinions, etc....

It'd be great to debate pros and cons...once you give a clearer idea of what you're talking about.

codify things a bit more and develop a set of standards that you could follow and, in exchange, we would white-list your blog and you'd be free to post what we make available on our sites or directly to you.

How is that different than what already happens. When you put up tracks on a public website I assume they are available and free to post on a blog.

Don't understand the word codify in this context. Also white-list is a very scary term and don't get that one either.

yeah, the nice thing about blogging is there are no real rules. The medium is a wide open canvas and you can apply whatever brush strokes you want to it.
If we start having too many rules to abide by that will be the time I abide to give it up.
And saying a white-list implies there is a black-list. That won't create much of a cooperative spirit for sure.
I personally think bloggers provide excellent PR and open up huge channels and exposure for the labels (especially the smaller ones).. A ton of small labels would have to struggle for exposure but now due to bloggers they don't have to struggle hard to get noticed.

I understand that you aren't begging for contacts. I was just being englishly provicative ... it's in my nature ;)

Responsible blogging is such a wooly term and one that I personally hate being used like this ... it's the whole 'us and them' thing all over again ... if by it you mean bloggers that clear music before they post it then that's fine ... that should just be called 'blogging within the law' rather than 'responsible'.

White listed blogs ... well ... this surely can only mean mouthpieces for the record company who will post whatever they are given ... you might as well just post the stuff directly on your site and be done with it .. and then just chase anyone who posts something that you haven't put up yourselves?

Surely for a big company like BB that would be the best thing to do? Just post the tracks you are happy to see being distributed freely on your site and whoever wants to review and link to them can? I believe that already happens and by posting them yourself nobody would need to ask for permission.

I personally believe that larger record companies and artists really don't need the blogging community. Shouldn't this discussion really be 'what value does the blogging community have for a large label like BB who already has many other perfectly functional promotion methods'?

... and sorry in advance if I don't reply to this rant as I'm off out now!

You all know I'm just being a devil anyway ! :)

That's a pretty vast and binary oversimplification, Bill. I impose a ton of parameters on myself and my blog, but it has to do with personal taste instead of the desires of the RIAA or the Web Sheriff. I also post a lot of free and legal stuff, too. I don't think anyone, "legal" or not, wants anyone to "tell them how to run their blog."

If I can enter my 2¢ here, Adam is one of the most innovative label people I know...especially in terms of trying to create a community between bands and their fans.

Well, what I think I was trying to get at is that whenever these types of topics come up, whether it's blogging standards, relationships with labels, ad space, legally cleared music, etc, the counter argument always seems to be, "You can't tell me what to do."

I do realize that most people fit somewhere in between.

i wish we could quote on this board! but i'm loving all the feedback....seriously.

merzmarz: "How is that different than what already happens. When you put up tracks on a public website I assume they are available and free to post on a blog."

no, this is actually a violation of copyright or it sucks our bandwidth (depending on if you put it on your servers or if you deeplink). we post mp3s to build community around our web sites and encourage people to visit so that they also check out other stuff we want them to know about.

amy SYF: "Don't coorperate and we'll sic the RIAA on you."

ummm....the RIAA reps the major labels. we have nothing to do with them.

"Most of the people on this board are pretty responsible about pre-releases and stuff like full-album downloads and understand your concern. But proposing some sort of written or unwritten contract is kinda offensive. It could be construed as a bribe. And assumes we want to participate in your promotion efforts. Perhaps that's what Tim and Eric are suggesting."

Cool...maybe it's my bad that i used the word exclusives. That's your perogative and I hope that you would post more than just our shit and keep this world of music interesting. That's what this is all about.... i just meant getting you guys music as early as we get it to SPIN, NY Times, etc. We hold off getting you guys the full albums because of a fear (not my opinion, but an opinion in the majority over here) that you'll act irresponsibly and post the whole album or a majority of it.

Again, I totally see the good in all this.

"I personally believe that larger record companies and artists really don't need the blogging community. Shouldn't this discussion really be 'what value does the blogging community have for a large label like BB who already has many other perfectly functional promotion methods'?"

This is super interesting....so are blogs the new 'zines? i've heard this notion bantied about a bunch. ARE YOU GUYS?

Doesn't Beggars have to HIRE Web Sheriff and Media Defender though? I could be waaaay off on this one.

and the best blogs, IMO, are very similar to the hand stapled zines of yore. the worst ones are the photocopied press release of today.

..or people who don't post anything but the MP3 for Hype.

my last comment was an adendum to Eric Marathonpacks, btw.

THIS FORUM IS TRULY MOVING AT THE SPEED OF LIFE

noooooooooooo ;-)

seriously squashed, I love ya, but don't fuck this one up.

well, adam, none of the people who post here support full-album posters, let alone link to them. but i understand the example, and that does really blow when you put it in quantifiable terms.

for instance, when The National was getting a ton of "Best of 2005" press for Alligator this past January, some loser posted the full album up on yousendit and linked it from his blog. It was downloaded 9,000 times before we caught it. the album had only 'scanned 10,000 at that point. this was only one case.

what if that blogger wouldn't have done that and other bloggers wouldn't have linked to it.

a fantastic, hard-working band who has been at it a long time might have sold more records.

Yeah, this is a pretty common mistake--grouping the full-album posters in with those here. It helps to just regard those guys as p2p with different clothes on. They're not doing what those of us here are doing.

And yeah, I wasn't inferring that anyone was telling anyone how to run anyone's blog, or do I think Bill was. Actually, I think that's a pretty silly statement that's probably never been uttered or typed. "Hey, try running your blog like this."

And if these are your "guidelines":

- don't post a full album (and more than a certain % of total album tracks)
- links to pre-order or buy album

Then, well, I think EVERYONE on this board already does that.

yeah, I listened to that interview and was bummed they cut that out.

(I finally met Matt in person at Pitchfork last weekend at the CSS show...wish I got more of a chance to talk to him).

I'm still not sure on this...did Beggars hire Web Sheriff? Can they be reasoned with? Or are they VIGILANTE SOLDIERS

And I still don't understand what it would take to become a "white-listed" blog. I mean, it won't stop other people from starting another soulseek junior.

Is the issue mainly with posting music before the album is released? I'm not too bothered by that.

To me a tricky area is when the label says "this is the track you can post" and I think "meh to that one, but *this* one is awesome!" I believe this has been discussed here before. I want to be writing about the music that really inspires me, and that may not always be what the label thinks is the single or whatever.

The problem, though, is for a popular album, you end up with half or all of it posted to different blogs, and then Elbows and Hype Machine make it easy to find it all, so I see the labels' side of this as well.

Random blurbs:

1. The blog scene is very young. The most established blogs are only a year or two old. (What to post, how to post it, when, how long, what format...are all still being develop) This compared to established "Radio or trade magazine". We can handle a lot of exotic materials in all sort of format and length that no other channel can.

2. Believe it or not, even with Hype machine, a blog does not automatically equal "global and permanent exposure". mp3 blog has distinct set of audiance. Stop freaking out when a blog post a track for 3-4 weeks. It does not end an artist carreer.

3. A blog has a relatively stable audiance. (It's quite amazing really)

4. My biggest wishlist for record company. Be more open. (open a blog yourself maybe?) Make available Announcements, schedule, outakes, live recordings, interview recordings, etc... Relationship with blogs as a whole isn't that hard. There aren't that many stable mp3 blogs around. at the most it's less than 2000. The era of press release and media saturation is over. (Something new is coming, tho nobody not knows what yet) We need those informations.

5. ... as you obviously notice, You don't know jack about making a webpage that people want to visit everyday. It's a lot of work. The blog scene can do this part. We know our audiance, you don't.

6. Your old business model of --- selling CD - publisher - MTV/Radio are obviously not working anymore. And you also should notice odd spike on certain indie artists that couldn't possibly happen before. Trust us, we notice that too. (And Sony can go to hell)

7. Back catalog! ( You guys at the labels are way to focus on this week release. ) Work with us here...

8. DO NOT even THINK about trying to attack anybody's computing resource. You do that sort of hostile attack, yer toast. Most bloggers are satisfied with simple communications, (okay maybe ... extended argument.) But most of the time we just think what you do is odd and doesn't make sense, even taking into account "making money and profit"

9. We like music, you like music. what's the problem? there are more than one way to make artist and audiance happy. everything is open for talk.

10. don't even think about doing a job on HM and elbo.ws.

Hype and elbo.ws, as I've said before, have been more of a detriment than a bonus to music blogs as a whole.

Thanks, marathonpacks, just clarifying. I don't have much to say about that, since I'm not getting advance stuff anyway.