A few years ago, if you wanted high-quality digital music, the place to go was Oink’s Pink Palace. A torrent index and forum, it didn’t host any music files itself, but it provided a clearing-house for any and all to share their own files.
It was, hands down, the best online music site ever to have existed on the web. You could find new releases or old favourites. You could find rarities that you had never seen before. And, better than Napster ever was, the emphasis was on quality, quality, quality. The site had strict rules on what could be shared, with a priority on high bitrates and full albums.
It was music nirvana — even musicians thought so, with an endorsement from Trent Reznor, himself a member.
Then it was shut down in a police raid in October 2007.
The court case has dragged on ever since, with terse updates about court dates posted by webmaster Alan Ellis on Oink.cd.
On Friday, he was declared, unanimously, not guilty of copyright infringement.
I think this dovetails with my post, below, about charging for news content. I have my own theories on the future of entertainment, and I think we’re moving more and more towards a performance model, wherein recordings will be seen as promotional loss leaders for the real money, which is in touring and merchandise.
Grant Hamilton
4 Responses to “Oink creator found not guilty!”
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If only oink could come back as good as before! Much loved and much missed!
I remember when oink went down and the hp simply linked to google showing links to download sites – if oink was breaking the law showing links then so was google!
Man, I’m with ya. I wonder if Mr. Ellis feels like starting it up again.
If you’re looking for alternatives, I think what.cd is the closest thing. I had a membership at waffles.fm, but I’m not even sure if its up anymore. I find myself gravitating towards singles and mp3 blogs rather than whole albums and torrents anymore.
But also, I suspect the demise of Oink had something to do with pushing me away from albums.
I have been thinking about yet another model. This is when a popular musical act records a new album, and then announces a subscription drive. Until the target is reached, the album remains unreleased. When the target is reached, voila.
There are several problems, such as artists lying, and holding albums even after reaching the target. Or, artists overestimating their appeal, and never reaching target.
Another problem with that model, as intriguing as it sounds, is that it wouldn’t help artists whose albums get unintentionally leaked — someone in the production crew ripping a master, say.
The really interesting thing about the current entertainment industry is that there’s no need for a one-size-fits-all model. Some people might do really well with a subscription model, others with a pledge model. Still others might find that touring suits them better, or they could rely on merchandise. There’s also a real possibility that you could sell an album as a piece-d’art — for big bucks, but worth it — and have mp3s floating around for free or cheap. This would be like prints-vs-originals that some painters offer.