"ACSR Weekly" Debuts

[DanQ]

The March 7th, 2004 edition of Apolyton Civilization Site Radio`s "ACSR Weekly" is now available for broadcasting live on-demand. Encoded in RealAudio format, total length is 22m:21s. This is the premiere episode of the new series on ACSR, precipitated as an outcome of a popular opinion vote put to ACS` registered forum users earlier this year [related story].

With publishing every Sunday, each edition of "ACSR Weekly" constitutes the previous seven days of news intermixed with music breaks. These breaks are built on one half-dozen clips from mainstream pop, rock and alternative songs. Speaking of tunes, the show`s theme is also completely new over those previously heard on ACSR: it is a clip from `Civilization` by the band Electric Funstuff. Finally, note that the broadcasting stream has been updated from 16.2kbps to 20kbps. The reason for this change is two-fold: a recognition of increased Internet access speed capacities generally across the world and, following from that, to provide better quality broadcasts to listeners.

Comments/questions on the show are welcome in this thread.

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Dan; Apolyton CS

[Frozzy]

C'est fantastique. Trés bien

[Locutus]

Very nice indeed

Some issues though:

1) I really like the idea of music breaks, and your choice of music is quite nice, but why 30 second (or however long they are) clips? As it stands, the music breaks feels rather chaotic and disorienting to me, I'd prefer single full songs (or at least 'proper' radio edits) over several short clips, even if that makes the show last a few minutes longer. But maybe I'm just an old fart

2) It might be me, but the music breaks are a lot louder than your news sections, forcing me to turn the volume up/down every time the trasition is made. Personally, I'd prefer it if the volume of the music would be toned down a tad (or the volume of your own contributions turned up).

3) I love the new intro theme, a great choice (I was wondering if we'd ever hear that song again ) But what, no end tune?

Overall great stuff though

[Bloody Monk]

Yep, getting a bumper for the end would be good.

Very interesting overall, but, very amusing to hear you speak so often of screenshots on the radio.

Monk

[DanQ]

Frozzy: thank you for the kind words.

Locutus: I quote below from your comments above.

Some issues[...]

1) I really like the idea of music breaks, and your choice of music is quite nice, but why 30 second (or however long they are) clips? As it stands, the music breaks feels rather chaotic and disorienting to me, I'd prefer single full songs (or at least 'proper' radio edits) over several short clips, even if that makes the show last a few minutes longer. But maybe I'm just an old fart

2) It might be me, but the music breaks are a lot louder than your news sections, forcing me to turn the volume up/down every time the trasition is made. Personally, I'd prefer it if the volume of the music would be toned down a tad (or the volume of your own contributions turned up).

3) I love the new intro theme, a great choice (I was wondering if we'd ever hear that song again ) But what, no end tune?

re: #1 -- The reasoning for this is primarily legal and, flowing from that, secondarily social.

Under United States copyright law fair-use provisions, [u]p to 10% of a copyrighted musical composition, but no more than 30 seconds can be used for non-commercial purposes [ reference: http://www.dpi.state.nc.us/copyright1.html ]. While the Internet is a global communication medium, and neither owners of the site are American citizens or live in the United States (a) U.S. copyright law is among that most developed in the world, (b) U.S. copyright law is the or one of the most referenced copyright laws inside and outside that country and, in turn, the or among the most recognized forms of the law in the world and (c) Apolyton's server is located in the U.S.

It is true that (a) Apolyton does not strictly fall under fair-use provisions and (b) [f]air use ends when the multimedia creator loses control of his product's use, such as when it is accessed by others over the Internet. Nevertheless, we wish to recognize and respect these legislated rights as much as possible.

re: #2 -- I'll have to continue to play with the volume levels of my microphone input. Your patience is appreciated.

re: #3 (and echoed by Bloody Monk) -- hmmmm, well, I'll see if I can find something appropriate that has either been used in other ACSR series or is new in this context altogether. I will entertain suggestions.

Bloody Monk:

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Dan; Apolyton CS

[Locutus]

Ah yes, I guess I should have known (re: #1). I realize this probably means even more work for you (which it may not be worth, especially not if I'm the only one who has a problem with it ), but maybe it would work better if the songs faded out in the last few seconds? The clips end very abruptly now, which I personally find very chaotic and annoying, as I pointed out.

#2: no problem, I'm not going anywhere

#3: (a different part of) the same song as the intro theme seems like a good idea to me, but I guess that might be a legal problem as well.

[MattH]

Stop that constant pencil tapping or whatever! Tap tap tap tap tap tap...

Anyways, fantastic!

[Tuberski]

It never seems to work for me......

ACK!

[MattH]

Originally posted by Tuberski
It never seems to work for me......

ACK!

It does take a long time to load, it that's what you're talking about. Other wise, try upgrading your real player.

[DanQ]

Originally posted by MattH
Anyways, fantastic!

Thanks!

Originally posted by MattH
Stop that constant pencil tapping or whatever! Tap tap tap tap tap tap...

Tapping? Hmmm I'm missing this... is anyone else hearing a similar sound?

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Dan; Apolyton CS