Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Grooveshark Shuts Down

grooveshark.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

231–240 of 283 posts

Re: Grooveshark Shuts Down

#231

Post by eropple »

pikachu_is_cool wrote: post #195
cotix wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can, infact, make a living with playing video games. I wonder how you would feel if I said developing is a big hobby of mine, a leisure activity, and a very rewarding one actually. You should not make money from that, get a real job, and practice your development hobby for its own sake.

I hold the opinion you should not be paid to make software, in most cases, in this era. It tends to be an instrument for control and manipulation. (ads)

So what's your economically sensical alternative?

Re: Grooveshark Shuts Down

#232

Post by jelubu »

Oh no! I'm so sorry to see you go! :( But I think it's awful not to have at least one days or a few hours notice. I've been a loyal follower for years and have so many amazing playlists I've carefully cultivated on there. I know it was perhaps foolish to do so on this site alone, but my God, I'm heartbroken. Is there no way of recovering just the lists of song names? Pleeeease?

Re: Grooveshark Shuts Down

#233

Post by icebraining »

acdha wrote: post #225
icebraining wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The content is not illegal. Illegal content would be stuff like child pornography.

Trying to redefine the question will not make your earlier wrong answer correct. At no point has anyone questioned the legality of the actual music – the discussion has always been about whether it was legal for them to share copies.

I wasn't answering, I was nitpicking :)

Re: Grooveshark Shuts Down

#234

Post by 91bananas »

SuperCynical wrote: post #124

I was listening to music (on Grooveshark touch) while driving down the highway. The page refreshed and this came up, it was a very weird feeling. This was the best music product I've ever used, and it was buggy as fuck sometimes. I used it so much I learned weird ways to get around the menu rendering issues on the html5/touch version of grooveshark. Even with its bugs it was my main music platform. Thank you for your…

Mobile web client was seriously the buggiest piece of shit ever. Every week it introduced new little things that you had to find ways around. But I still battled it every time I got in my car so I could listen to exactly wtf I wanted to listen to. That will be missed greatly.

Re: Grooveshark Shuts Down

#235

Post by 6stringmerc »

Dear Grooveshark,

From the first day I saw your service, I had doubts about the legitimacy of what you were doing. After watching YouTube grow into a massive company - building on infringement then turning a corner through appeasement to the legacy media interests - I knew doing a pivot was possible. Every time I saw your name mentioned, it looked like you were refusing to play ball.

Part of me applauds anything that really pisses off the RIAA, and there's another part of me that has rational fear of what the RIAA is capable of doing through legal channels. Your service had a big bullseye painted on it, so I stayed far, far away. I never even bothered to check if my music ended up there...I was too busy focusing on channels I know to at least try to be in-line with artist payment methods (iTunes, Spotify, Amazon, Google, etc). I fully comprehend the notion of Safe Harbors, and also comprehend that there was no way - ever - that you could lawyer up enough to defeat RIAA.

Music is an industry that truly does need to evolve, as the current disruptions are helpful, but still lacking the genius innovation to best connect listeners and content producers in an equitable relationship. Will it ever happen? I'm optimistic. However, this day was inevitable, and as much as I'd like to compliment you on trying, I'm held back by the fact Grooveshark was, for lack of a better term, a white-washed piracy site. Good luck on your next endeavors, and I truly hope you learned from this experience.

- An Independent Musician

Re: Grooveshark Shuts Down

#236

Post by ctb_mg »

Yet another anecdote here... for me, Grooveshark was the genesis of music discovery. Napster, limewire, etc. helped with artists I knew about already. mp3.com helped me with genres but did not expand my library too much. Early Last.fm/audioscrobbler was interesting to see what my friends were listening to, but it was not effortless to discover similar/new music there. Winamp shoutcast stations helped me to broaden my music portfolio, but there was no mechanism to save favorite songs/artists that I had heard, and re-listen to them. GS took the best of all those things and added more.

So I listened to GS for years. I owe GS a lot. Now I wonder if I, or if we had supported them more, would they have not met their demise?

Re: Grooveshark Shuts Down

#237

Post by throwawaykf05 »

chimeracoder wrote: post #113
zzalpha wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quite frankly - yes, they are the beneficiaries. Independent artists absolutely do not benefit from copyright law at all. Wow... I just... I don't even know how to argue against that. It's demonstrably false and patently absurd. You honestly believe no indie musician has benefited from copyright law? Seriously? Do you understand how compulsory licensing works? Do you really believe no indie artist has ever collected…

> Do you understand how compulsory licensing works? Do you really believe no indie artist has ever collected royalties on their music? Yes, I do understand how licensing works. The RIAA collects royalties on all music, whether or not the artist is signed to one of their labels[0]. Then, the artist has to register with the RIAA (technically, SoundExchange) to get paid, and if the RIAA is in a good mood, they may decid…

> The RIAA collects royalties on all music, whether or not the artist is signed to one of their labels[0].

Whenever there's an inflammatory post like this on the Internet that implies obvious injustice, it behooves us to do a little more research. As with most such articles posted around here, there's always another side of the story. A collection of comments from Slashdot, of all places, that explains this:

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/1530851/#C...

Re: Grooveshark Shuts Down

#238

Post by mikeash »

morganvachon wrote: post #222
mikeash wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pandora doesn't provide the same service. They purely do "radio" and don't let you make playlists or play specific songs. I can't explain Slacker's omission though.

I thought Pandora offered playlists in their paid tier? I've never paid for it so I don't know the details of their full service.

Their paid service just removes ads, and adds some minor enhancements like allowing more skips.

Re: Grooveshark Shuts Down

#239

Post by neon_electro »

gibsonje wrote: post #226
shock-value wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I definitely think you're in the minority. I don't remember the last time I bought an album or song, but I use streaming music services all the time. Same goes for anyone I know. Admittedly anecdotal but then again so is your assertion.

How do you buy an album or song without it being DRM-chained to a particular service? That's my problem with music. I've settled on Spotify for this reason, but I was extremely disappointed to read that I'm probably not contributing in any meaningful way to the less-than-popular artists I listen to.

Beatport is a great source of DRM-free (320kbps MP3 or WAV) music: https://www.beatport.com/

Re: Grooveshark Shuts Down

#240

Post by cryptophreak »

zzalpha wrote: post #78
bmat wrote: post #74

As a native of Gainesville, FL (where Grooveshark is based), this is really sad news. Certainly they made mistakes, but what few see is how much they contributed to the tech community here. Their CTO has personally mentored many companies in the area, and they have a presence at pretty much every tech-related event. I can't think of any other company within a 100-mile radius that can fill that role now that they're g…

Well, the flipside is, let's face it, their business was pretty darn shady... not much a role model for other up-and-coming entrepreneurs. I absolutely grant you their technology was pretty cool, and the community features they built are still unreplicated anywhere. But I'd rather laud businesses who manage to combine cool technology with an ethical, sustainable business model.

Sharing is the most ethical thing there is.
Post reply on HN