Beeps rule in alarm clocks. They’re annoying sounding, but they work.
Jars of Clay, Handle’s Messiah, Jack Johnson, and Norah Jones have all graced our CD alarm clock for a time, and all to a tragic result: the sound of any of that music – at any time of day – instantly annoys me.
I like to keep my computer lean, and I personally don’t care for applications that burn CDs, I often find them to be a pain in the neck. My easy alternative is to then use Media Player which comes stock on any Windows machine.
Every now and then this presents a problem; not all of the audio files I’ll want to add to my mix are in a format that will burn onto an Audio CD. This happened today as I prepared to make my June mix (a little later than usual). I have a copy of Spoon’s “I turn my Camera on” in mp4 format. Now I could go upstairs and get the physical CD that I own, or I can use my wonderous computer to change the format.
Sadly my open source audio program Audacity doesn’t have the liscence to convert an mp4 for legal reasons. I stubbornly don’t really want to download a converter as I recently took a bunch of little apps I never use off of my computer. This is where Media Convert comes in.
Media Convert is a neat conversion site I just came upon. Though it’s a little ad heavy it was able to convert my file into an mp3. My only critiques could be 1) it doesn’t allow bitrates about 256kbps, 2) it doesn’t encode ID3 tags (which burning will lose anyways) and 3) there isn’t an option for batch conversion.
If you’re stuck with a track or two that needs converting Media Convert is a perfect tool to get that mix where you want it. I should mention they also seem to do conversions for movies, text (including PDF), images, vector and more; but this is a music blog so enough of that.
I don’t usually get all activisty on things, but there is a new Copyright law that got proposed on the 12th of June that is just insane enough to get me off my chair. If it passes the very concept of mixtapes is punishable by serious fine of $500 for any song downloaded. Bill C61 is so strict that it would be illegal to rip a CD you actually own onto your laptop or ipod. This is insane. I just emailed some folks, maybe you want to to.
Even if you’re not Canadian you can get involved. If this bill passes I will stop mixtaping. This hurts non-Canadian with copyrightten materials. Take a Stand!
More information:
Defective by Design Bill overview – http://www.defectivebydesign.org/fight-the-canadian-dmca
Copyright for Canada – get the email addresses of your MP and a letter format http://www.copyrightforcanadians.ca/
If Applicable Email your MP and: ‘Prentice.J@parl.gc.ca’; ‘Minister.Industry@ic.gc.ca’; ‘Verner.J@parl.gc.ca’; ‘pm@pm.gc.ca’
The Bill C-61 – http://www2.parl.gc.ca/HousePublications/Publication.aspx?DocId=3570473&Mode=1&Language=E
Facebook group http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6315846683
This is the templated letter I emailed:
Title: Please Stand Against the New Copyright Bill
These recipients will be CC’d on your email:
The Honourable Jim Prentice P.C, M.P.
5th floor, West Tower
C.D. Howe Building
235 Queen St.
Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0H5
The Honourable Josée Verner, P.C., M.P.
Minister of Canadian Heritage
25 Eddy Street
Gatineau, Quebec K1A 0M5
I’m a constituent who has been following recent developments in Canadian copyright law. I’m concerned that the Copyright bill presented by the government on June 12th goes too far in outlawing the lawful use of copyrighted material, and does not take into account the needs of consumers and Canada’s creative community who are exploiting the potential of digital technology. I’m disappointed that this bill adopts an American approach to digital copyright laws, instead of crafting a Canadian approach.
Canada’s copyright laws need to advance Canada’s interests. This means copyright laws that respect ordinary consumer practices, such as unlocking cell phones and copying the contents of purchased DVDs for use in video iPods. The current bill outlaws these practices. This means copyright that facilitates the work of Canadian creators, such as documentary filmmakers, who instead find that this bill outlaws the use DVDs as source materials for their films. This means we find made-in-Canada solutions to the challenges of file-sharing, such as consideration of the P2P proposal of the Songwriters Association of Canada. Instead, this bill paves the road to importing the consumer file-sharing lawsuit strategy that has failed so spectacularly in the United States. Canada deserves better.
Please ensure that this bill really is made for Canadians by allowing all Canadian stakeholders a say in its final contents. That means meaningful consultation in the coming months, and opening up Canada’s copyright policy to more than just the special interests that lobbied behind the scenes for this law. As my MP, I urge you to represent my interests in the copyright debate.
I love sharing resources for listening to new music online. Ordinarily these outlets allow you to chose music by genre, band name, popularity etc, but I’ve never seen a site that allows you to chose by mood.
http://musicovery.com allows you to pick how you’re feeling on a scale from “dark” to “positive” while choosing an energy level between “calm” and “energetic”. It is very intuitive and seems to work pretty well.
In addition to this you can check valid genres and eras. I have been playing with this for a little while and it seems to make some very decent choices.
It’s a great resource for mixtaping too as sometimes it’s hard to find that balance between songs of varrying mood.
DI-700-SLI: Intel 700-class SLI workstation
- Case: 17 Inch Apevia X-Discovery case – black
- Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E6700 Conroe 2.67GHz x 2 Dual Core 1066MHz FSB 4MB cache
- ASUS P5N-T Deluxe 780I SLI LGA775 ATX DDR2 3PCI-E16 2PCI-E1 1PCI GBLAN
- DDR2 Memory: 4GB Dual-channel: 2 x 2GB DDR2 800MHz PC6400
- Hard Drive with Serial ATA interface: 150 GB SATA 10000 rpm Extreme Performance 16MB cache
- Hard Drive #2 with Serial ATA interface: 250GB 16MB cache 7200RPM SATA2 hard drive
- Hard Drive #3 with Serial ATA interface: 250GB 16MB cache 7200RPM SATA2 hard drive
- Serial ATA RAID: RAID Level 1 (mirroring)
- Optical Drive : 18x SATA Dual-Layer DVD±RW w/ Software
- Optical Drive : 18x SATA Dual-Layer DVD±RW with Software + Lightscribe
- Video Card (PCI Express x16): 2 x 7950GT 512MB in SLI
- Removable Storage Device(s): 7-IN-1 Floppy Drive and Flash Card Reader
- Sound Card: Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Elite Pro w/ External I/O hub (not actually Vista compatible, I guess I’ll change this out for the mobo sound card)
- Network Card: Integrated LAN with 10/100/1000 Fast Ethernet Controller
- 2x Additional Case Fan: Extra case fan
- Power Supply: 700 Watt Crossfire/Quad-SLI ATX power supply with 120mm fan
- CPU Cooling: Level 3 upgrade: Aftermarket Heatsink with a 120mm fan
- Operating Systems (OS): Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium Edition
- Surge Bar: Surge Bar 7-Outlet and Phone Line Surge Suppressor
- Warranty: 2-Year Limited Warranty
- Service: Assembling and Testing