Beatport, a leading site for djs, has opened up their Beatport Mixes program to all djs on Beatport. Previously selling only mixes from a select few such as Diplo and Paul Van Dyk, Beatport Mixes will begin selling mixes from any registered dj using music purchased from Beatport or original content
Beatport Mixes opened up this week so that djs can create and sell legal mixes via Beatport. The primary restriction:
"You can sell your mix on Beatport if it contains tracks you have purchased from Beatport or your own productions."
Restrictions are explained in more detail in their terms of service. This is a pretty smart approach to addressing the problem of creating legal mixtapes by limiting the sources of mixes to music that's already been cleared by Beatport. Though Thefuture.fm has developed a solution for clearing music across the board, they seem to be the only ones applying it to legal mixes.
This distinction and history is mangled a bit by TechCrunch's Josh Constine but his youthful enthusiasm does point to the fact that legal issues around mixes have been an ongoing concern to the point that djs have been faced with working in grey areas for years. Beatport Mixes restricts music used in a way that is conceivably annoying to creative djs but it does provide a legal way to create mixes and profit from them.
Here's a bit more on clearing music from what appears to be a press release:
"To alleviate the complexities of licensing for the DJ, BEATPORT has deals in place with tens of thousands of independent labels it currently works with to cover the use of their songs on Beatport Mixes. BEATPORT is negotiating similar rights with its major label partners as well. As a result, with each mix sale, BEATPORT compensates all parties involved in the mix as if those tracks were downloaded individually, so long as the mix was created using tracks acquired through the Beatport Music store."
"BEATPORT also offers a non-downloadable, full-length preview option which does not require tracks to be acquired through BEATPORT. Any mix can also now be embedded for playback on websites and blogs, as well as shared to a user’s Facebook timeline."
So some limits and the potential to spend a lot of money to make a creative, legal mix but definitely a positive development from Beatport.
Hypebot Senior Contributor Clyde Smith (Twitter/App.net) blogs about music crowdfunding at Crowdfunding For Musicians (@CrowdfundingM). To suggest topics for Hypebot, contact: clyde(at)fluxresearch(dot)com.
