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Now, the world really is a stage.

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Articles

Creative Director Stefan Sojka is one of Australia’s most published freelance writers and commentators on Web business and Internet culture.  He has been a regular monthly columnist for the award-winning NETT magazine for the past three years.  Previous roles included 7 years writing for internet.au magazine and the Australian Net Directory. He continues to contribute to a number of blogs and publications.

World Wide Jam

Monday, August 19, 2002

By Stefan Sojka

If everyone at any one time who was doing something musical on the net was gathered together in one geographical location, it would be the biggest, and loudest music festival in history. Next to sex and possibly IT or stockbroking, music would have to be one of the most enormously popular activities on the Internet. The publicity surrounding Napster has made MP3 a household name and boosted the entire MP3 industry to make it THE phenomenon of the early 2000s.

Music and Computers have been close allies for quite some time, but now that musicians and music lovers can hook up through their computers around the world, the global music community has really arrived. What this means to the average muso, whether pro, semi pro, amateur or adoring fan is that the possibilities have just been expanded a billion fold. Collaboration, accessing information, buying and selling equipment, learning songs, being influenced by music you’d otherwise never hear, legal advice, work opportunities, even political aspirations of a musical nature can all be achieved with a bit of patience and a lot of mouse clicking.

It has all happened so quickly, and so organically that no one has really been able to get a handle on just what is out there. Not too long ago, (say 5 years), there were a few big sites like the Ultimate Band List www.ubl.com that gave all bands an audience, a large number of MIDI file archives, a small number of music e-zines, fan sites, newsgroups etc.. but now that net­working technology has evolved - thanks to the commercialization of the web - and the average connection speed has increased dramatically - along with the various audio and video formats - the quality, quantity and sheer diversity of musical information is nothing short of mind-numbing.

Somewhere in this melting pot of creativity, business, technology and human involvement each one of us has to try to find what we really need, and where we fit in, otherwise we risk wasting our entire lives away mindlessly surfing from one amazing music portal to another. There is a world of possibility, but only if we stop long enough to grab some of it, and make it our own.

Here is a small sampling of the variety of offerings available. Places where you can begin finding your way to where you really belong in this musical melting pot. To determine the appropriate places to hang out, consider that each site needs to offer either some great ideas, resources and music or a chance to become active and express yourself, or at least network with others, within their virtual space. These days most sites provide many options, so you can definitely have a good time probing around and finding kindred spirits with which to share your own musical world.

There are some great local on-line resources for songwriters and musicians. Local organization, Songsalive! www.songsalive.org has amassed a large collection of links on their site that open up a lot of music industry doors, as well as the organization themselves actively supporting local songwriters with workshos and showcases. Collectives like Clan Analogue www.clananalogue.org realise that there is power in association and create opportunities to nurture talent and promote live performance as well as provide plenty of Internet exposure to the acts that get on board.

songcritique.com is a place where active song-writing members of MP3.com or IUMA.com (both excellent starting points for any musician looking for exposure) can get together, workshop-style, and constructively critique each others work. All genres are allowed. www.lyricist.com is a massive list of extremely helpful links to anything from publishers to musicians unions to law resources and “how to write a hit song” sites. Bookmark this and spend some time following the links – you can only benefit from the experience.

Internet radio is a booming phenomenon, and although many stations might get very few listeners, it is a place to make contact with the various radio broadcasters to maybe air your stuff, listen to music you otherwise would never hear, and tune into the trends, styles and cultures that are rapidly evolving all around us. www.radiospy.com and www.live365.com as well as Nullsoft’s www.shoutcast.com open the streaming floodgates.

E-Zines provide genre-centric zones where adherents to a particular style of music can gather. They often are populated with non-musicians with plenty of opinions, but so longs as everyone is in agreement that we all love Acid Jazz or Hip Hop, the general consensus will be that we’re all kind of happy hanging out together. www.fly.co.uk gets into the dope beats and reviewing the dance music, www.jazzlife.com opens up the world of the Jazz idiom. www.360hiphop.com is a commercial, but involving portal for all the “Yo, whassup bro” phreeqE hip hop grooverZ.

MP3 Download sites not only give you thousands if not hundreds of thousands of new tunes to check out, they usually provide areas for discussion, chat and the creation of your own little section where you can harness the technology they have set up in order to promote your own sonic masterpieces. www.mp3.com allows income earning potential as well as promotional tools, as does www.ampcast.com with countless genres covered. Others, like www.changemusic.com offer discounts and tools to budding artists. Radio Raw - www.digitalone.com.au/raw is recruiting unsigned Aussie acts for Digital Radio stardom.

Technophiles will love the Drum Machine Museum @ www.drummachine.com and the Synth Museum - www.synthmuseum.com delving deep into the inner workings of every piece of cool gear imaginable, as well as providing active communication with fellow aficionados and links to other suitably happening sites.

When it comes to hooking up with others, the power of e-groups, now Yahoo! Groups - groups.yahoo.com is unarguably effective . The Music section contains about 20,000 groups, with the chance for you to set up your own. The tools provided are extremely useful, including full mailing list facilities, data base, file exchange, chat, messaging etc etc.. It has revolutionised the newsgroup concept and brought it up to today’s Web-based interactive standard.

Likewise, the popular little chat client IQC – www.icq.com has enabled the creation of interest groups and people-finding facilities that open up great possibilities of net­working with like-minded individuals – or for that matter having huge arguments with opposite-minded people.

www.rocketnetwork.com is a leader in professional on-line recording collaboration, after partnering with many of the major players in the audio software and hardware industry. About 10,000 studios are connected through the amazing facilities provided.

Almost every major artist over the last 40 or fifty years has some kind of web presence. Whether they are building their own sites in their spare time, the record company has thrown something together, or some adoring fan has built a shrine, these sites can often lead you to make personal contact with the artists themselves, or at least getting more of a glimpse into their reality than record covers in days of old would offer. The aforementioned www.ubl.com is the portal through which you can access official and unofficial sites as well as lyrics, guitar tabs etc.. Rubbing shoulders with those you respect and admire in your chosen field has got to be a positive influence.

While we are spending so much time surfing, we must never forget that music has to be played, written, recorded, sung, programmed – and that means getting off the net, plugging in your instruments and getting creative. Bang that drum, strum that guitar, tweak those synth knobs, belt out that vocal – but do it in the full knowledge that when you are done, there are billions of people out there willing to add you to their bookmarks, discussion groups and portable MP3 players.

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Real Estate

Monday, August 05, 2002

By Stefan Sojka

Name of Site: OzEco
URL: www.eco.com.au
Load Time: Scorching
Ease of Navigation: Signposted
Plug Ins Required: None
Review: While most of the building and housing industry seems content to stick to 19th century bricks, concrete and tiles design principals, OzEco is waking up to new millennium reality and realising how important eco-friendly housing is. Energy saving, waste minimisation and improved human comfort are all achievable with current technologies and all new houses by rights ought to be adhering to some standards of sustainable development, whilst older houses can be retrofitted to keep in step with the times. Essentially a real estate agency, OzEco goes much further by providing links to architects, developers, networks and publications on how to stay green and save money. Some of the homes here may not be the epitome of environmentally friendly, but they certainly have taken steps in the right direction, whilst others have gone all the way. - SS

Name of Site: Real Estate
URL: www.realestate.com.au
Load Time: Medium
Ease of Navigation: Signposted
Plug Ins Required: Flash
Review: Though you may not be in the market for the same kind of house Lachlan Murdoch might purchase, you may well appreciate his company's interactive real estate offering. In a simple tab, map and menu-based navigation system, you can browse homes for sale, sell, rent, share, invest, borrow, calculate mortgages and customise your session to save possible choices for more thorough investigation. Detailed search criteria makes producing positive results more likely, besides the fact that there are thousands of listings to start with. Much more is on offer too, with sponsored resources, reports, suburb profiles and a huge range of tools and tips to make the traumatic process of spending hundreds of thousands of dollars in one hit as painless as possible. - SS

Name of Site: Owner.com.au
URL: www.owner.com.au
Load Time: Scorching
Ease of Navigation: Walk in the Park
Plug Ins Required: None
Review: It's time to cut out the middle man, and what better enabler than the Internet to do just that. A relatively straightforward database-driven site allows sellers to post ads and upload images of their private property and buyers to browse and search the locale of their choosing for the right home in the right price bracket. Amazingly it is all free at the time of review, allowing the concept and the site's popularity to grow, until we all realize how easy it is to do things this way. The site will then provide paid premium listings to enhance your chances. There are for sale signs for sale and handbooks on how best to handle the whole house marketing process, with sellers logging in to manage their listing and allowing buyers to contact them directly. Its all too easy, too helpful and way too cheap, it will have the agents and big commercial sites running for cover in no time. - SS

Name of Site: Rent
URL: www.rent.com.au
Load Time: Medium
Ease of Navigation: Walk in the Park
Plug Ins Required: None
Review: If you are setting up a rental Website, you'd have to be pretty happy with this domain name, but you would f eel the pressure of doing it justice. It seems they are well on their way, with a nation-wide listing service, easy navigation good pricing and plenty of on-hand assistance in both using the site and actually moving in to the rental, share rental, or holiday property. Members, both private and commercial, manage their listings and pay online. It all looks great - the only crucial element for a site like this is getting those listings so the searches reap rewards. That could be the trickiest part of the whole exercise, with agents set in their traditional ways of doing business. With a bit of marketing and word-of-mouth this could well be the place to visit when your eviction notice is served. - SS

Name of Site: Domain
URL: www.domain.com.au
Load Time: Medium
Ease of Navigation: Signposted
Plug Ins Required: Flash, Real Media, Windows Media
Review: Economy of scale works just as effectively on the Internet. When you own a massive real-world publication with all the advertisers, staff and resources that go with it, chances are your on-line presence is going to benefit greatly. Domain plugs into thousands of listings, auction results, articles, sponsors, statistics - the list, and the listings, go on and on. At every stage, there are value-added features, such as short listings, agent contact forms, conveyancing info, email to a friend, printable brochures, alert services, tips - need I say more? This is THE domain for finding your own domain. - SS

Name of Site: Property.com.au
URL: www.property.com.au
Load Time: Medium
Ease of Navigation: Signposted
Plug Ins Required: None
Review: The very tech savvy RPData have put their heads together and come up with an efficient, attractive and very useable property Website, with a respectable level of listings that keep it alive against the competition of the big print publications' online offerings. The obligatory zooming map and search criteria take you to anywhere in Australia and the categories are well thought out, ranging from rural, commercial and investment properties to businesses for sale, new homes and auctions. The cute little "bug me" feature allows you to tell the site what you are looking for and to stay posted on anything that comes along within your parameters. There are a few under construction areas, but they seem to be rapidly filling in as the site grows in popularity. Meanwhile there is plenty of useful info here alongside the property listings themselves. - SS

Name of Site: Australian Property Investor Magazine
URL: www.apimagazine.com.au
Load Time: Medium
Ease of Navigation: Signposted
Plug Ins Required: None
Review: It seems these days you can make more money sitting on your backside just watching your house go up in price than you can going out and working for a living. In this climate of insanely escalating property prices, perhaps we should all be investigating this phenomenon further. If we all do it, will the whole economy collapse like a house of cards exposing the entire business as a great illusion? Or is property really the rock solid investment it seems to have always been? Perhaps it's time to consult the experts and subscribe to this little publication. Unfortunately, like most print publications the Website is just a taste of what you might get if you get each issue stuffed in your mailbox each month, but there is enough here to tease and titillate you into knowing that you really ought to investigate the secrets behind successful property investing. It certainly seems to work for all the landlords I've ever rented from! - SS

Name of Site: Toll Transitions
URL: www.tolltransitions.com.au
Load Time: Medium
Ease of Navigation: Signposted
Plug Ins Required: None
Review: When all the wheeling and dealing is said and done, it's time to face the reality of realty and pack up your stuff and shift. Moving house is said to be one of the most stressful times in one's life, so the more help you can get the better. These folks are relocation experts who service businesses and individuals and take care of everything, way beyond shoving your stuff into a truck and dropping it off somewhere. With guides, forms and third party service providers, even including nannies, moving house becomes more like checking in and out of a five star hotel. They consult, brief, supply info pack, arrange utility connection, orient you to your new surroundings and even help throw a housewarming party. They make moving into your dream home a dream in itself. - SS

Name of Site: FSBO Private Sale System
URL: www.fsbo.com.au
Load Time: Medium
Ease of Navigation: Signposted
Plug Ins Required: Windows Media
Review: The Real Estate agent snubbing continues with a total system designed for people to take the matter into their own hands. FSBO provides fixed price house-selling kits, including signage, flyers, advert templates, property fact sheets, Website listing, step-by-step guide, fee-free loan applications and discounted insurance. Optional extras include video, extra signs, spotlights and flags. This is a true alternative movement in the industry and is taking off everywhere. Well thought out, well organised and well presented, it is a system well worth considering when you weigh up the relative costs and benefits of going private or through an agent. So long as you have a good solicitor, there shouldn't be too many drawbacks. - SS

Name of Site: Tsui Design and Research Inc.
URL: www.tdrinc.com
Load Time: Medium
Ease of Navigation: Signposted
Plug Ins Required: None
Review: While most of the world is content living is square boxes lined with bricks, fibro, tiles or corrugated iron, there are some who are beginning to realise that houses need to be much more in tune with nature, both from an efficiency and comfort perspective. Enter organic architecture. Houses that twist and turn like shells, or spread like the wings of a bird, open like eyes, or embrace like wombs. Amazingly these designs are often cheaper than ordinary houses, because they use recycled material and can be hand made or built by collectives of like-minded people. Marvel at the shapes, the colours the cool living spaces, and wonder why the world over idiots in councils are still approving block after block of ugly, inefficient, depressing boxes. This is the new millennium, let's start acting like it and build more freaky houses! - SS

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