Damien Mulley

But someone else did.

BBC Radio Show: Meet the bloggers.

Blurb:

Introducing some of the new voices on the internet – people who have made their mark by writing a blog or online journal. Mark Savage meets the men and women who’ve attracted attention in cyberspace by recording their thoughts and impressions on anything and everything.

Bernie kind of does this already for Ireland on Podcasting.ie

Johnny Beirne very softly launched Downloadmusic.ie recently. It’s a download service allowing you to download the music of unsigned Irish artists.

Johnny and the other folks behind the site are a group of 3 people with various backgrounds, primarily in e-business and music. Johnny puts it nicely:

If we were on a road trip, there would be a driver (me, the guy answering these questions), a mechanic (the guy who makes sure things work) and a guy that keeps changing the radio station (the music guy).

To download the music you click on the song, listen to a sample if you want and then add it to your basket. When you go to the checkout, the process is nice and simple. If you haven’t registered it will make you do it there and then but it’s quick and it remembers what you want to purchase. Payment is using paypal for now. Fine for net users but paypal takes a fairly percentage from the seller for small transactions. Once that’s all done you are directed to a download page. You have 24 hours to download the files you’ve purchased and you are allowed to download them up to three times.

Johnny believes the main difference between what you hear on the radio and what you don’t is “money not talent”. It’s been a dream of his for years to have an Irish “Irish Top 30” Music Chart and he believes the Internet has made this possible.

By speaking to the artists and surfing the web Johnny researched the market. He initially sees fans and friends of chart artists as the core customers, but as word spreads, all music lovers. On how Downloadmusic.ie will distinguish itself from the rest of the sites out there, Johnny said:

Firstly, the site is for Independent Irish Artists. Secondly, the chart aspect, with sales figures published, introduces healthy competition and also provides direct feedback to the artists on their marketing efforts.

The mp3s are DRM-free allowing them to be played and moved to and from any mp3 player. Something which many techs would probably agree is a good thing.

we try to provide a mechanism for artist to get their music heard. If easy movement helps this then so be it. Artists already give a certain amount of their material away for free in return for exposure.

From the beginning says Johnny, the artists have been promoting the idea, telling their friends, recruiting other artists etc. He also noted there are also quite a number of activists who are doing great work for the independent music scene in Ireland and abroad, and they have also been promoting the site.

It’s a great idea and it deserves some support since it’s a local operation. Have a look at DownloadMusic.ie yourself.

Very useful guide on how to register to vote by Simon McGarr.

Author William Gibson describes the eyes of Molly, one of his best characters.

Ze Frank talks about the Jon Benet brand. Scary. The guy is a genius at observation.

Piracy blamed for company being shit at business. Terrorism funded by piracy mentioned too. Not by super rich dictators in Oil economy countries. Oh no.

Snakes on a radio! Anthony was on the Beeb about Snakes on a flying thing.

Speaking of reptiles. Snakebite, a new BitTorrent server. Seems very easy to use.

I think this may be from Poland. Very amateur gore action video. It’s hilarious and at times makes you hurt. Here’s Bagman:

Paige doesn’t think she’s worthy to be a blogger and wants to stop. In her words:

I hope that you will excuse my discontinuing as a blogger. I genuinely don’t feel worthy of the description owing to my lack of original talent and the selfish (childish) reason that I started blogging. I will continue to check out your brilliant posts and wish you all continued success.

Paige , if you’ve never read her, is a wonderfully talented writer despite her saying she isn’t. It’d be a real shame if she were to go. Too many greats are leaving. Where’s Fiona these days? Daddy Gavin is gone too. (Despite him being younger than me he was like one of the wise fathers of Irish blogging when I started and so many started due to his encouragement too.) If you’ve read Paige or even if not, how about popping over to her blog and signing the comments and ask her to stay if you think she should but at least wish her well. We’re losing too many talented people these days.

If you wanted to go that little bit extra you could blog about her on your blog and explain why you like her writing (if you do) so that at least she gets a proper send off. Gavin, you going to have a going away party too?

The Hill is a new Washington D.C. documentary. Looks promising enough. It will never get over to this side of the Atlantic. I’d appreciate if someone could Tivo it. Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease.

The DCMNR/ComReg event on September 21st:

0845 Mr Noel Dempsey TD opens the event.
0910 Prof Peter Cochrane Co-Founder and Chief Technologist of Concept Labs
0940 David Jesse, MD of eBay Ireland
1000 Martin Cronin, Forfas
1020 Coffee

1040 Podcasting – Increasing access to 3rd level education. Sligo IT
1100 Infotainment Technology, Dylan Collins, CEO DemonWare
1130 Halo Room, Paul Bradley, HP
1200 Gerry Fahy, TIF, “Ensuring Broadband Ireland”
1220 Summary/Discussion/Bunfight
1250 Closing Address. Ms Isolde Goggin, ComReg
1300 Lunch

Facilitator: Miriam O’Callaghan

Update to update: Date set to September 30th. Sorry to everyone who can’t make it but 30th suits more.

Update: Seems a few of those that want to go are unavailable for the 23rd. Would the 30th suit? It’s the usual case though that one date will never suit everyone. Can people leave a comment below?

Barcamp Ireland will be held in Webworks Cork on Sept 23rd. Myself, Conor O’Neill and Walter Higgins will be organising it from the Cork side. Pleae stay tuned to the BarCamp Ireland Wiki.

another is returning home. Branedy is off to Dublin for his new job. But at least we have some kind of balance as another Cork son is returning soon. Best of luck in Dublin Branedy. Will we only see you blog on weekends now? You got the passport, the Munster Jersey, the Cork GAA top, the Barry’s tea and the Peoples Republic of Cork T-Shirt?

New blogs on the block or at least new to me.

First up is Gillian Morrison’s blog. Gillian is a film producer living in Cork. It’s a nice blog and it even talks about the movie industry here in Cork. Yes, it exists.

Then we have Mise’s blog. Mise lives between Cork and the United Arab Emirates. Go read the blog for more details.

John McWilliam’s photo blog. You may have seen it before but have another gander. Photo bloggers in Ireland are gifted.

Lastly today is Davy McDonald’s blog. Davy is a graphic designer based up North. Check out his blog for rants and odes to the world of graphic design and look up his past work. Brilliant posters. Davy can design the poster for the next blog awards in February. 🙂 Maybe I should ask first?