To Title or Not

Kidsonic · 27th May 2003, 00:47

I have noticed that when I list the titles I get listeners on my small 56k oldies station. But if I remove the titles I seem to attract little interest. Now it could be said that this is just due to the lack of a title and that since no one knows what im playing the interest is low. On the other hand straight streaming with no titles makes ripping undesirable which is the reason that I do it in the first place.

Aside from the occasional honest listener and those who run mega bandwidth stations are we just kidding ourselves into thinking that we as amature stations are attracting listeners or are we the new Napster?

I know what some of you may say, Well Duh! But I hope that we are offering something more to the internet community than just an opportunity to rip music.

Anyone care to chime in?

FesterHead · 27th May 2003, 02:51

What are your goals?

DJHotIce · 27th May 2003, 03:02

I don't think you need to worry. Shoutcast handles the people who stream ripp and ect.

FesterHead · 27th May 2003, 03:15

You do know the user agent tag can be altered, right?

Many stream-rippers do this to mask their activity.

Kidsonic · 27th May 2003, 04:06

I think I should have called this thread something else because it really is not about sending song titles, its about the clientel that browses Shoutcast.

I do not have definite goal yet; However I do have a few ideas about what type of programming I would like to broadcast and it has nothing to do with music. The controversy over the legal rights of music has given me other ideas for Internet broadcasting that avoid the legal wranglings of the media industry.

This is why it is important for me to establish a good sense of what is really happening within this community. If the majority of browsers are here to rip streams and true listeners are few then I could not justify any sort of investment towards this Internet Broadcasting arena.

DJHotIce · 27th May 2003, 04:15

no stream ripping is not allowed in shoutcast. Shoutcast has made sure that stream ripping is kept to a minimum! And they try hard too!

Also you'd know if somebody tried to stream rip!

in short. The majority of listeners just wanna listen! 98% are here to listen!

DJHotIce · 27th May 2003, 04:16

It is the same example with FM. Majority of people listen to it. Yet there is a few who wish to record the station. WHY??? many reasons though!

NO matter what area you go in FM or Internet. There is gonna be those listners that wanna listen and those that wish to ripp or record. Streams!

Kidsonic · 27th May 2003, 04:33

Ok well i am looking forward to the next few months as i get more into this. Either way i am having fun with this technology.

FesterHead · 27th May 2003, 04:44

Goal #1: Have fun.

Goal #1 met.

matt2kjones · 27th May 2003, 15:29

does it matter if they rip the stream, i mean its them that is doing the illegal activity, not you, so i wouldn't worry about it

but if you do know of people ripping your stream, advise them not to as it is illegal

rgATL · 27th May 2003, 15:50

Quote:

Originally posted by Kidsonic
If the majority of browsers are here to rip streams and true listeners are few then I could not justify any sort of investment towards this Internet Broadcasting arena.

Do you really believe this is the case?

Btw, how can we tell if people are ripping? I have people who connect for hours on end; I figured that they just connect, listen, then forget about it.

rg.

DJHotIce · 27th May 2003, 15:52

I believe there is an error on the the shoutcast server that will show up. Stream ripping. or something like that.

Notice a shoutcast search may yeild more results

matt2kjones · 27th May 2003, 15:53

well someone was connected to my stream for over 25 hours yesterday, now im guessing he/she was ripping because of the time. 25 hours is a long listen to internet radio

UNLESS, they went out somewhere, and left winamp open and playing by accident, or, they went to bed and forgot about it

or some other reason could be that the music was so crap he fell asleep listening to them (i hope thats not the case

)

DJHotIce · 27th May 2003, 15:57

those are all logical. Maybe to keep possible stream ripping down to a minimum. I don't wanna discuss it because its not allowed. But its real simple to do. THATS ALL I'M SAYING ON THAT. I dont' stream ripp!so what you do is on the config setting's on the server is.

something like this. 0= never, and then its specified in mins
;autodumpusers=0
fill it out remove the ; and then restart the server. Then now when somebody listnes I'll dump them after X amount of time. I mean if somebody sits and listenes for 6 hours you prby know there ripping.

matt2kjones · 27th May 2003, 16:01

i wouldn't dump someone after 6 hours or so because many of times have i been working all day at home, and been tuned in

and when i look at my winamp i have been connected for 14 hours, (15 hours 36 mins is my record

)

but what u do is up to u, as its ur station

im not really bother to be honist, if i know someone is ripping i will chuck them off. if i only think someone is ripping, then i will leave them connected, as they may not be ripping the stream, just a keen listener

rgATL · 27th May 2003, 16:03

Hmm, I don't think I'm going to autodump listeners, even if they are asleep or if there's a possibility that they're ripping. I've had people connected for 40 hours before.

I just broadcast the radio, and I can't do anything about people who intend to rip the stream.

rg.

FesterHead · 27th May 2003, 16:05

Lookup their ip.
Get a nice, sturdy bat.
Take a road trip.

matt2kjones · 27th May 2003, 16:42

Quote:

Originally posted by festerhead
Lookup their ip.
Get a nice, sturdy bat.
Take a road trip.

LOL

if your thinking what im thinking then u would probably go to jail for that

Jay · 27th May 2003, 17:28

I think there is too much emphasis put on shoutcast's ability to stop streamripping. This is impossible, it is also impossible for you to determine the behaviors of a streamripper. I see no reason for you to believe that the longevity of their connection would have anything to do with them streamripping. I have a 6 hour list of songs and have people connected for days. Some of the advice I have seen here sort of borderlines paranoia in my opinion.

The easiest way to curtail streamripping is to make the finished rip imperfect in some fashion. There are many ways to do this.

Lower your bitrate, or crossfade and/or mix promos into the song.

At this point it shouldn't matter because it would make keeping the song undesirable, especially if they can just find it somewhere else. The only thing I concern myself with is if I see someone just blatenly and boldly advertising the fact that they are streamripping.

rgATL · 27th May 2003, 22:23

Quote:

Originally posted by KXRM
The only thing I concern myself with is if I see someone just blatenly and boldly advertising the fact that they are streamripping.

What do you mean? How?

thanks,
rg.

DJHotIce · 27th May 2003, 22:39

I allready explained I don't stream rip!

Jay · 28th May 2003, 01:16

Quote:

Originally posted by rgATL
What do you mean? How?

thanks,
rg.

ususally if I see that a known streamripper is connected via the XML interface in the user-agent field I get 'em.

Kidsonic · 28th May 2003, 02:41

Thank you for all your posts, this is very educational.

My station is up at http://68.8.193.94:8000/listen.pls. Have a listen and tell me what you think, any construtive criticizm by you veterans is graciously accepted.

FesterHead · 28th May 2003, 03:17

Your stream is skipping so much it makes listening a painful experience.

Do you have enough processing power to run the encoder?

Is your DNAS and Winamp/DSP combo on the remote machine.

Kidsonic · 28th May 2003, 03:23

Um i was messing with the pluggins, try one more time, if the issue is not resolved i will make adjustments. The server is on my home pc at the moment.

rgATL · 28th May 2003, 03:32

I got: "Invalid resource"

rg.

Kidsonic · 28th May 2003, 05:31

[dest: 217.237.31.153] starting stream (UID: 2)[L: 1]{A: Nullsoft Winamp3 version 3.0d build 488}(P: 0)

[dest: 217.237.31.153] starting stream (UID: 3)[L: 2]{A: FreeAmp/2.x}(P: 1)

When I finally got my stream to steady up someone connects with Winamp3 (first entry). Oh boy its working again and I got a listener!

Moments later the same IP connects with FreeAmp/2.x (second entry)

My son tells me that this is the default masquerade for a Winamp3 stream ripper pluggin (Hmmm how does he know that?). So I kick the bugger, he reconnect, so I ban his IP, he makes numerous reconnect attempts which scroll my monitoring screen off the charts.

I guess I caught one!

FesterHead · 28th May 2003, 05:42

Stream down.

Kidsonic · 28th May 2003, 05:57

Quote:

Originally posted by festerhead
Stream down.

Yes it is, it seems I cannot use my computer and stream at the same time without disrupting the stream. It appears that I will require some kind of seperate server.

FesterHead · 28th May 2003, 06:00

Responded via PM re: separate server.

Jay · 28th May 2003, 06:04

Yea dupes I would look at suspiciously as well as anything with the following user agents:

FreeAmp/2.x
Streamripper (of course)
Winamp (w/o version identification)
sr-Posix (any version entry)

or missing User-Agent tags. Most applications report a user-agent as part of the spec.

rgATL · 28th May 2003, 15:44

Yeah, I just noticed two of these Winamp/FreeAmp combos today. Like:

<05/28/03@08:11:11> [dest: 80.141.82.8] starting stream (UID: 7804)[L: 6]{A: WinampMPEG/2.8}(P: 0)
<05/28/03@08:11:14> [dest: 80.141.82.8] starting stream (UID: 7805)[L: 7]{A: FreeAmp/2.x}(P: 4)

So, it that someone ripping my stream?

Should we always be suspicious of FreeAmp? But isn't it a legitimate player for Linux?

thanks,
rg.

Tom · 28th May 2003, 17:51

WinampMPEG/2.8
That's a valid Winamp user-agent.

Tom

[edit]Don't mind me I thought you were questioning the user-agents, at first glance I failed to see the same IP[/edit]

DJHotIce · 28th May 2003, 17:54

allways a possiblility... Could shoutcast ban free amp players? Prob wouldn't be wise though.

Why would anyone wanna listen to your stream with free amp and winamp at the same time. Just a thought.

rgATL · 28th May 2003, 23:30

I think winamp and freeamp both from the same IP within 3 seconds of each other is a stream ripper.

Quote:

Why would anyone wanna listen to your stream with free amp and winamp at the same time. Just a thought.

Again, I think FreeAmp is a legitimate player for Linux. Can any Linux users confirm this?

thanks,
rg.

rgATL · 28th May 2003, 23:34

By the way, a couple of questions:

(1) When someone is banned, what happens when they try to connect? Do they get a ban message in the winamp window?

(2) Is there a way for me to send some sort message to this IP about the ban? like one of those popup messages that people send to non-firewalled computers (if you have any idea what I'm talking about)...

thanks,
rg.

FesterHead · 28th May 2003, 23:40

1.
Good question. I don't know. Try banning your ip

2.
Try a proxy front end (e.g. peppert's php auth proxy) to do the ip lookup and either send the stream, a custom message, or a combination of the two.

Jay · 29th May 2003, 01:53

when someone is banned they see
ICY 401 Forbidden in their winamp player.

Freeamp is a notorious stream ripping application nowadays XMMS is the choice for nix users,

matt2kjones · 29th May 2003, 19:12

yea but just cos xmms is the choice for linux users, dont block everyone who uses it

its the next best thing to winamp for linux

DJHotIce · 29th May 2003, 19:14

tell those users to use winamp or face consequences. Maybe somebody should send an email to the company to not allow stream ripping as a feature!

27th May 2003, 03:02	#3
DJHotIce Forum Loser (Forum King) Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: That place I can't remember the name. Posts: 4,617	I don't think you need to worry. Shoutcast handles the people who stream ripp and ect. -DJHotIce Bounce Multimedia - Professional Web Design

27th May 2003, 04:15	#6
DJHotIce Forum Loser (Forum King) Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: That place I can't remember the name. Posts: 4,617	no stream ripping is not allowed in shoutcast. Shoutcast has made sure that stream ripping is kept to a minimum! And they try hard too! Also you'd know if somebody tried to stream rip! in short. The majority of listeners just wanna listen! 98% are here to listen! -DJHotIce Bounce Multimedia - Professional Web Design

27th May 2003, 04:16	#7
DJHotIce Forum Loser (Forum King) Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: That place I can't remember the name. Posts: 4,617	It is the same example with FM. Majority of people listen to it. Yet there is a few who wish to record the station. WHY??? many reasons though! NO matter what area you go in FM or Internet. There is gonna be those listners that wanna listen and those that wish to ripp or record. Streams! -DJHotIce Bounce Multimedia - Professional Web Design

27th May 2003, 15:29	#10
matt2kjones Major Dude Join Date: May 2002 Location: UK Posts: 929	does it matter if they rip the stream, i mean its them that is doing the illegal activity, not you, so i wouldn't worry about it but if you do know of people ripping your stream, advise them not to as it is illegal TDD House & Trance Radio: [ 64k Stream \| Visit Site ]

27th May 2003, 15:52	#12
DJHotIce Forum Loser (Forum King) Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: That place I can't remember the name. Posts: 4,617	I believe there is an error on the the shoutcast server that will show up. Stream ripping. or something like that. Notice a shoutcast search may yeild more results -DJHotIce Bounce Multimedia - Professional Web Design

27th May 2003, 00:47	#1
Kidsonic Junior Member Join Date: May 2003 Posts: 25	To Title or Not I have noticed that when I list the titles I get listeners on my small 56k oldies station. But if I remove the titles I seem to attract little interest. Now it could be said that this is just due to the lack of a title and that since no one knows what im playing the interest is low. On the other hand straight streaming with no titles makes ripping undesirable which is the reason that I do it in the first place. Aside from the occasional honest listener and those who run mega bandwidth stations are we just kidding ourselves into thinking that we as amature stations are attracting listeners or are we the new Napster? I know what some of you may say, Well Duh! But I hope that we are offering something more to the internet community than just an opportunity to rip music. Anyone care to chime in?

27th May 2003, 02:51	#2
FesterHead Alumni Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Maui, Hawaii Posts: 14,109	What are your goals?

27th May 2003, 03:15	#4
FesterHead Alumni Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Maui, Hawaii Posts: 14,109	You do know the user agent tag can be altered, right? Many stream-rippers do this to mask their activity.

27th May 2003, 04:06	#5
Kidsonic Junior Member Join Date: May 2003 Posts: 25	I think I should have called this thread something else because it really is not about sending song titles, its about the clientel that browses Shoutcast. I do not have definite goal yet; However I do have a few ideas about what type of programming I would like to broadcast and it has nothing to do with music. The controversy over the legal rights of music has given me other ideas for Internet broadcasting that avoid the legal wranglings of the media industry. This is why it is important for me to establish a good sense of what is really happening within this community. If the majority of browsers are here to rip streams and true listeners are few then I could not justify any sort of investment towards this Internet Broadcasting arena.

27th May 2003, 04:33	#8
Kidsonic Junior Member Join Date: May 2003 Posts: 25	Ok well i am looking forward to the next few months as i get more into this. Either way i am having fun with this technology.

27th May 2003, 04:44	#9
FesterHead Alumni Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Maui, Hawaii Posts: 14,109	Goal #1: Have fun. Goal #1 met.

27th May 2003, 15:53	#13
matt2kjones Major Dude Join Date: May 2002 Location: UK Posts: 929	well someone was connected to my stream for over 25 hours yesterday, now im guessing he/she was ripping because of the time. 25 hours is a long listen to internet radio UNLESS, they went out somewhere, and left winamp open and playing by accident, or, they went to bed and forgot about it or some other reason could be that the music was so crap he fell asleep listening to them (i hope thats not the case ) TDD House & Trance Radio: [ 64k Stream \| Visit Site ]

27th May 2003, 15:57	#14
DJHotIce Forum Loser (Forum King) Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: That place I can't remember the name. Posts: 4,617	those are all logical. Maybe to keep possible stream ripping down to a minimum. I don't wanna discuss it because its not allowed. But its real simple to do. THATS ALL I'M SAYING ON THAT. I dont' stream ripp!so what you do is on the config setting's on the server is. something like this. 0= never, and then its specified in mins ;autodumpusers=0 fill it out remove the ; and then restart the server. Then now when somebody listnes I'll dump them after X amount of time. I mean if somebody sits and listenes for 6 hours you prby know there ripping. -DJHotIce Bounce Multimedia - Professional Web Design

27th May 2003, 16:01	#15
matt2kjones Major Dude Join Date: May 2002 Location: UK Posts: 929	i wouldn't dump someone after 6 hours or so because many of times have i been working all day at home, and been tuned in and when i look at my winamp i have been connected for 14 hours, (15 hours 36 mins is my record ) but what u do is up to u, as its ur station im not really bother to be honist, if i know someone is ripping i will chuck them off. if i only think someone is ripping, then i will leave them connected, as they may not be ripping the stream, just a keen listener TDD House & Trance Radio: [ 64k Stream \| Visit Site ]

27th May 2003, 16:03	#16
rgATL Major Dude Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: ATL, of course. Posts: 724	Hmm, I don't think I'm going to autodump listeners, even if they are asleep or if there's a possibility that they're ripping. I've had people connected for 40 hours before. I just broadcast the radio, and I can't do anything about people who intend to rip the stream. rg.

27th May 2003, 16:05	#17
FesterHead Alumni Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Maui, Hawaii Posts: 14,109	Lookup their ip. Get a nice, sturdy bat. Take a road trip.

27th May 2003, 17:28	#19
Jay Moderator Alumni Join Date: May 2000 Location: Next Door Posts: 8,888	I think there is too much emphasis put on shoutcast's ability to stop streamripping. This is impossible, it is also impossible for you to determine the behaviors of a streamripper. I see no reason for you to believe that the longevity of their connection would have anything to do with them streamripping. I have a 6 hour list of songs and have people connected for days. Some of the advice I have seen here sort of borderlines paranoia in my opinion. The easiest way to curtail streamripping is to make the finished rip imperfect in some fashion. There are many ways to do this. Lower your bitrate, or crossfade and/or mix promos into the song. At this point it shouldn't matter because it would make keeping the song undesirable, especially if they can just find it somewhere else. The only thing I concern myself with is if I see someone just blatenly and boldly advertising the fact that they are streamripping. -Jay \| Radio Toolbox.com

27th May 2003, 22:39	#21
DJHotIce Forum Loser (Forum King) Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: That place I can't remember the name. Posts: 4,617	I allready explained I don't stream rip! -DJHotIce Bounce Multimedia - Professional Web Design

28th May 2003, 02:41	#23
Kidsonic Junior Member Join Date: May 2003 Posts: 25	Thank you for all your posts, this is very educational. My station is up at http://68.8.193.94:8000/listen.pls. Have a listen and tell me what you think, any construtive criticizm by you veterans is graciously accepted.

28th May 2003, 03:17	#24
FesterHead Alumni Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Maui, Hawaii Posts: 14,109	Your stream is skipping so much it makes listening a painful experience. Do you have enough processing power to run the encoder? Is your DNAS and Winamp/DSP combo on the remote machine.

28th May 2003, 03:23	#25
Kidsonic Junior Member Join Date: May 2003 Posts: 25	Um i was messing with the pluggins, try one more time, if the issue is not resolved i will make adjustments. The server is on my home pc at the moment.

28th May 2003, 03:32	#26
rgATL Major Dude Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: ATL, of course. Posts: 724	I got: "Invalid resource" rg.

28th May 2003, 05:31	#27
Kidsonic Junior Member Join Date: May 2003 Posts: 25	[dest: 217.237.31.153] starting stream (UID: 2)[L: 1]{A: Nullsoft Winamp3 version 3.0d build 488}(P: 0) [dest: 217.237.31.153] starting stream (UID: 3)[L: 2]{A: FreeAmp/2.x}(P: 1) When I finally got my stream to steady up someone connects with Winamp3 (first entry). Oh boy its working again and I got a listener! Moments later the same IP connects with FreeAmp/2.x (second entry) My son tells me that this is the default masquerade for a Winamp3 stream ripper pluggin (Hmmm how does he know that?). So I kick the bugger, he reconnect, so I ban his IP, he makes numerous reconnect attempts which scroll my monitoring screen off the charts. I guess I caught one!

28th May 2003, 05:42	#28
FesterHead Alumni Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Maui, Hawaii Posts: 14,109	Stream down.

28th May 2003, 06:00	#30
FesterHead Alumni Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Maui, Hawaii Posts: 14,109	Responded via PM re: separate server.

28th May 2003, 06:04	#31
Jay Moderator Alumni Join Date: May 2000 Location: Next Door Posts: 8,888	Yea dupes I would look at suspiciously as well as anything with the following user agents: FreeAmp/2.x Streamripper (of course) Winamp (w/o version identification) sr-Posix (any version entry) or missing User-Agent tags. Most applications report a user-agent as part of the spec. -Jay \| Radio Toolbox.com

28th May 2003, 15:44	#32
rgATL Major Dude Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: ATL, of course. Posts: 724	Yeah, I just noticed two of these Winamp/FreeAmp combos today. Like: <05/28/03@08:11:11> [dest: 80.141.82.8] starting stream (UID: 7804)[L: 6]{A: WinampMPEG/2.8}(P: 0) <05/28/03@08:11:14> [dest: 80.141.82.8] starting stream (UID: 7805)[L: 7]{A: FreeAmp/2.x}(P: 4) So, it that someone ripping my stream? Should we always be suspicious of FreeAmp? But isn't it a legitimate player for Linux? thanks, rg.

28th May 2003, 17:51	#33
Tom Moderator Join Date: Apr 2000 Posts: 4,485	WinampMPEG/2.8 That's a valid Winamp user-agent. Tom [edit]Don't mind me I thought you were questioning the user-agents, at first glance I failed to see the same IP[/edit]

28th May 2003, 17:54	#34
DJHotIce Forum Loser (Forum King) Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: That place I can't remember the name. Posts: 4,617	allways a possiblility... Could shoutcast ban free amp players? Prob wouldn't be wise though. Why would anyone wanna listen to your stream with free amp and winamp at the same time. Just a thought. -DJHotIce Bounce Multimedia - Professional Web Design

28th May 2003, 23:34	#36
rgATL Major Dude Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: ATL, of course. Posts: 724	By the way, a couple of questions: (1) When someone is banned, what happens when they try to connect? Do they get a ban message in the winamp window? (2) Is there a way for me to send some sort message to this IP about the ban? like one of those popup messages that people send to non-firewalled computers (if you have any idea what I'm talking about)... thanks, rg.

28th May 2003, 23:40	#37
FesterHead Alumni Join Date: Sep 2001 Location: Maui, Hawaii Posts: 14,109	1. Good question. I don't know. Try banning your ip 2. Try a proxy front end (e.g. peppert's php auth proxy) to do the ip lookup and either send the stream, a custom message, or a combination of the two.

29th May 2003, 01:53	#38
Jay Moderator Alumni Join Date: May 2000 Location: Next Door Posts: 8,888	when someone is banned they see ICY 401 Forbidden in their winamp player. Freeamp is a notorious stream ripping application nowadays XMMS is the choice for nix users, -Jay \| Radio Toolbox.com

29th May 2003, 19:12	#39
matt2kjones Major Dude Join Date: May 2002 Location: UK Posts: 929	yea but just cos xmms is the choice for linux users, dont block everyone who uses it its the next best thing to winamp for linux TDD House & Trance Radio: [ 64k Stream \| Visit Site ]

29th May 2003, 19:14	#40
DJHotIce Forum Loser (Forum King) Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: That place I can't remember the name. Posts: 4,617	tell those users to use winamp or face consequences. Maybe somebody should send an email to the company to not allow stream ripping as a feature! -DJHotIce Bounce Multimedia - Professional Web Design

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