May, 1996
Computer Shopper May 1996 v16 n5 pC4(4)
Live on the Internet: the interactive music scene
(California Edition) (Internet)
By Linda Dailey Paulson
- Abstract
-
The Internet is increasingly used as a medium for delivering live rock
concerts, particularly in the San Francisco Bay area. The real-time video
programs CUSee-Me and MBONE allow multilayered multimedia broadcasts of
events as they take place; interviews with bands are available in text,
RealAudio and other formats. The Rolling Stones performed one of the first
'Netcasts' using MBONE in 1994. Early live-video technology was shaky, but
Web video has been refined enough to give those with fast PCs and modems and
the latest Web browsers and helper applications a high-quality concert
experience. Another Web broadcast, called Grateful Web and involving the
surviving members of the Grateful Dead as well as their fans, encouraged
users to view many Web sites and contribute to a 'live' site from the
Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco. A unique live event called the Future
of Hope conference linked Jimmy Carter, Nelson Mandela, Shimon Peres and
Elie Wiesel with Internet users.
Time was when music fans would simply grab a ticket, go to a concert, buy a
T-shirt, and save the ticket stub to remember the experience. If you
couldn't go, you could tune in to similar performances by the same artist on
the King Biscuit Flower Hour; Don Kirschner's Rock Concert; or, more
recently, pay-per-view TV, BET, MTV, or VH-1. That is, of course, if you
were lucky enough to catch the broadcast performance or willing to pay for it.
Now you can access the best of today's concerts instantly without leaving
your home--courtesy of the Internet.
California, long the vanguard of the music and multimedia communities, is
now home to several organizations--including concert-promotion firm Bill
Graham Presents and club chain The House of Blues--that produce real-time
broadcasts of live music events via the Internet. These events offer all the
benefits of live music in a nightclub setting, without the smoke. Plus, you
don't have to buy a ticket or link up through a cable operator to see a
performance.
Using a host of technologies, including the real-time video programs
CUSee-Me and MBONE, these broadcasts are multilayered multimedia
experiences, broadcast as they happen. Interviews with bands are available
in several formats, including text-based files. These can be accessed during
or after the performance, along with text, stills, RealAudio files, and
other information. A Web site built on the fly to coincide with the event
contains hot links to the artist(s), record label, venue, and other sites of
interest. And after the event, the information remains on the Web.
Why all the interest in using the Internet as TV? More than simply another
means to put across a performance, netcasting is a way to make the
experience of a concert accessible to the world in an interactive format.
"The goal is to create compelling content," says Cory Smith, president of
MediaSynergy, one of the companies that combined to form MediaCast, a San
Francisco-based netcasting group that records about one broadcast a month.
"The most compelling medium now is the Net. You can describe a band's music
in an article, but now you can get it on the Net. Our goal is to capture
content in as high a manner as possible."
That includes not only using high-end video and digital photography, but
also recording to digital audio tape. "When we started doing this," says Jon
Luini, one of the principal members of MediaCast, "the quality was whatever
we could get. Just the fact that it was happening was amazing. Now we have a
crew with the best beta tools, the best photos...The key is definitely
connecting to people. As the bandwidth increases, we can reach more people."
The Birth of the Netcast
Back in 1993, a handful of artists emerged in San Francisco, driven to
create the first netcast musical events. Severe Tire Damage, whose band
members included members of the Xerox PARC technical staff, made the initial
MBONE netcast in June of that year. (MBONE was developed at Xerox PARC.)
Luini and the rest of the MediaCast staff were among the pioneers of the
nascent technology, producing concerts with Deth Specula and Sky Cries Mary
in August and November 1994.
The Rolling Stones were reportedly goaded into making their Voodoo Lounge
tour part of a 1994 MBONE broadcast by the prospect of Aerosmith beating
them to the claim of being the first mainstream rock band to netcast. The
Stones already held the honor of being the first rock band to have a
commercially sponsored tour. At the November 18, 1994 event, in a 30-minute
promotion for a pay-per-view show of the tour, Severe Tire Damage "opened"
for the Stones in cyberspace by netcasting their performance shortly before
the Stones were scheduled to netcast from the Cotton Bowl in Dallas. This
bit of technological legerdemain obviously made the crew producing the
Stones netcast none too happy--on the official Stones Web page, the Xerox
PARC band is referred to as "Sexually Transmitted Diseases."
A Shaky Start
In the beginning, the technology was shaky. Even Mick Jagger commented
during the Rolling Stones' MBONE broadcast that he hoped the Internet feed
wouldn't be lost. Today, the improved technology, coupled with increased
bandwidth availability and a convergence of allied technologies, makes
netcasting the latest frontier for innovation on the Internet and in
entertainment distribution.
"The fact that we could allow people to access live shows and events through
their home computers was the initial attraction," says Marc Schiller, vice
president for The House of Blues New Media, the technology division of The
House of Blues. "Some people were playing around with MBONE for government
uses and...we thought if [entertainment broadcasting via the Internet is]
going to happen, we want to do it. By the time the ink dried on my contract,
the Internet exploded."
According to Schiller, it was important to do more than a simple concert
broadcast for the first House of Blues foray on the Internet [produced by
Luini and other MediaCast founders] in January
1995. A celebration commemorating Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday was
planned. Five Blind Boys from Alabama, a gospel group, headlined the event,
which brought 1,500 fans to the club and attracted the attention of the
traditional broadcast media around the world. The celebration also included
speeches, performances from artists such as the new Blues Brothers Band and
Charlie Musselwhite, and an unexpected guest: Stevie Wonder.
A Los Angeles area DJ, impressed with the power and potential of the
Internet broadcast, had been moved to call Wonder, who was on his way out of
town. Wonder not only changed his plans and turned back at the airport, he
also mobilized other musicians to join him at The House of Blues, Los Angeles.
"Wonder got on stage and spoke for 40 minutes," Schiller recalls. "It was
the most unbelievable speech. Then he sang 20 minutes with the band and
ended with 'Happy Birthday.' It was just absolutely electrifying."
Lovester Law, vice president of marketing for Bill Graham Presents, agrees
the technology has enlivened the job of providing entertainment. The
concert-promotion firm joined forces with Apple to produce an Internet
broadcast of San Francisco's New Year's Eve party.
"I think this is a perfect example of technology and entertainment coming
together in a way that people can touch, feel, and enjoy," he says. "What
makes this so special is that we are taking an entertainment experience and
sharing it globally."
That's one of the reasons Grateful Web came together. The event, held to
mark the 30th anniversary of the Grateful Dead's performance at the historic
Fillmore, was planned for a rainy December night, just days after the band
announced it would not go on without Jerry Garcia. On the afternoon of
December 10, 1995, fans began congregating outside the door at 4 p.m. Inside
the spacious auditorium, the oversized screens of Silicon Graphics
workstations glowed as technicians threaded cables and tested equipment.
Once the doors opened, attendees could grab an apple from a zinc tub in the
lobby, as was the custom in the venue's early days, and enter the
auditorium. A giant projection screen and a row of computer terminals
occupied the area where the stage was supposed to be. Fans were not only
encouraged to sit and surf the Web as the music of the Grateful Dead played
and light projections soared through the prisms of the purple-lit
chandeliers, they were able to become a part of the event. At a table set up
in the historic "poster room," MediaCast's crew gathered material for a
living Web site; they took photos with a digital camera and transcribed
memories of fans' years listening to and even working and performing with
the Grateful Dead.
Later that night, as the group's two newly released CDs played, fans around
the world were able to chat with the Grateful Dead's Phil Lesh (Mickey Hart
attended by telephone) while hearing the music and watching clips of the
band interspersed with real-time footage from the Fillmore. The event was a
success from the fans' point of view and marked a uniquely triumphant
convergence of technology companies pioneering this medium, including ISP
Networks, Silicon Graphics, Xing Technologies, and a host of others.
The Right Place and Time
San Francisco was a natural place for Internet broadcasting to evolve.
"There is a level of acceptance San Francisco lends to people," Law says.
"You've got a lot of people allowed to be creative, and their talents are
allowed to flourish--be [they] technology, entertainment, or multimedia."
MediaCast's Luini agrees. "It's really about creating community and allowing
people all over the world to connect," he says. "It's the cafe mentality
rather than the strip-mall mentality."
Netcasting isn't solely a West Coast phenomenon, however. More and more
individuals and commercial operations all over the country are using one or
more of these technologies.
Live @nd in Concert, a netcast concert featuring Deborah Harry of Blondie
fame and Joey Ramone of The Ramones, plus Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, put
a New York City event on the Internet in January.
Martin Belk, partner/sales and marketing director for SenseNet, the New York
Web organization responsible for the netcast, says it was also the largest
such event to date. "RealAudio confirmed that 2,472 users came in at the
beginning of the broadcast and were able to hear it start to finish," he
says. "We had some 300,000 hits between 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. Eastern Standard
Time on the fourth [of January]."
The reason for the number of hits can be attributed to the wider
availability of the technology and the sheer desire to check out the content
of the broadcast. "I think it was a combination of both," Belk says. "The
comments we received ranged from [those of] techheads who really wanted to
see the concert to [those of] people who were signing in, 'We love you,
Debbie.' So it was mix of both scenarios--demonstrating the technology and
having some fun also."
"We have a population that is just saturated with the same type of
presentation," Law agrees. "What technology and entertainment are doing is
fresh, making it novel again. I think it gives people a lift."
The technology is being used for other intriguing purposes as well. "The
entertainment applications are high-profile and a lot of fun, and certainly
help to drive the user base," says Howard Gordon, president of California's
Xing Technologies, whose StreamWorks software assists with the transmission
of real-time video and audio. "But entertainment is only one of a lot of
different applications of content distribution."
MediaCast envisions roundtable discussions, fashion shows, art shows, and
just about any event lending itself to being captured with video and audio
as a candidate for netcasting. For example, on December 6, 1995, The Future
of Hope teleconference linked former president Jimmy Carter, South African
president Nelson Mandela, Israeli Prime Minster Shimon Peres, and writer
Elie Wiesel with others on the Internet as part of a three-day conference
held in Hiroshima, involving 50 world leaders. The key, Luini says, is
continuing to offer unique events--should the medium become clogged with
information nobody cares about, then netcasting "becomes TV."
Internet radio is also growing more common as the tools become readily
available. Radio stations such as KPLX, a Dallas country station, and WBBR,
an AM business news station in New York's tri-state area, have begun
broadcasting their signal in cyberspace using Xing Technologies' tools.
"The one thing that is absolutely charming about this is that if you are in
Antarctica or in Taiwan, you can hear the Lincoln Tunnel traffic reports,"
says George Mahlberg, Webmaster for Bloomberg Online, a department of
Bloomberg Development, the entity that put WBBR on the Net. "To hear that
from a place halfway around the world is a wonderful piece of technology."
Improving the Bandwidth
The most important issue now is speed. Not every home computer is linked to
the Internet through an ISDN or T-1 line, and it is difficult to enjoy video
and music through a slower modem connection. Luini says his company and
other small companies like his have a vested interest in making bandwidth
faster.
"We can be there to assist in any way to help that process," Luini explains.
"It's evolutionary at this point," Xing's Gordon says of the new technology.
"The stuff that's in place now is crude. We have a long way to go. It's a
question of creating tools and the capabilities we need to manage a mass
audience- there are some interesting technical issues that must be resolved
before the existing network broadcast can reach a lot of people."
Those include determining royalties for artists, tracking
participants/viewers, and even developing pay-on-demand-type schemes to make
the new distribution lucrative for those involved. Gordon says that
currently, "there just aren't enough Internet-connected people to reach the
number of people that something like the Super Bowl reaches."
However, Schiller is optimistic about the venue's financial future. "The
royalties will come directly from an artist's performance using new
technologies," he predicts. "Play a gig; collect at the door. With the
Internet, that is a bigger door. If the transaction models start to come
through, an artist would have to play Wembley Stadium to equal the door on
the Internet."
Netcasting is still a long way from becoming mainstream. A few more widely
known artists need to make the jump to the Internet for that to take place,
Law says. "I think it's a technology that everybody can embrace," he
comments. "To give it stature and acceptance, you probably need some big
things to happen."
But Schiller contends the purveyors of these events need to be particular
about content. Give viewers Madonna, and they might not appreciate the
quality; introduce them to a band with a cult following, such as Poi Dog
Pondering, and they might continue to tune in.
"I don't want to just distribute concerts," Schiller says. "I want these to
be interactive experiences with live music over the Internet.
It is not about a new broadcast medium. It's about communication."
Web Sites of Interest
Broadcast Sponsors
Bloomberg Online http://www.bloomberg.com
Bloomberg Online, sponsored by Bloomberg L.P., offers a variety of
business-related information on its site; it also offers WBBR Live,
real-time broadcasts from NYC's WBBR radio station using Xing Technology's
Streamworks software.
MediaCast http://www.mediacast.com
MediaCast's Web site is the place to be if you want to find out about past
MediaCast events--including the Eighth Annual Digital Be-In and the Free
Speech in Cyberstate Rally--and participate in future events. Links to sites
where you can access the software needed to participate are included.
SenseNet http://www.sensenet.com
SenseNet is an online service offering businesses access to the Internet.
They sponsered last January's Live @and in Concert netcast of Deborah Harry
and other stars (which can be found at http://inconcert.com.)
Software Sources
These sites also feature links to a variety of online events.
Cornell Information Technologies
http://cu-seeme.cornell.edu
CU-SeeMe video conferencing software
Progressive Networks
http://www.realaudio.com
RealAudio real-time audio software
VocalTec
http://www.vocaltec.com/iwave.htm
Internet Wave real-time audio software
Xing Technology Corp.
http://www.xingtech.com
StreamWorks real-time video and audio software
