This is not really about webcasting, but is it legal to put an mp3 mix up on my website (of a mix made mostly from purchased beatport.com tracks) or would this be classed as file sharing?! Thanks!

Technically it is illegal under the terms of the license that the music was sold to you.

However "dj promo mixes" tend to have a blind eye turned to them and particularly if you are mixing tunes from smaller labels and ensuring that they are properly credited then they can be seen as a good promotional tool.

I've got a lot of downloadable mixes on my website, and many of the labels I've used are aware and a label DJ from one of them (Ketuh Records) even gave me a mix of his own for the site.

I would think that the majority of the type of labels on Beatport will take a similar view.

OK thanks. If its just streaming rather than downloading (is this classed as webcasting?), is that better?!

I'm guessing there are complicated licensing issues to negotiate to become 100% "legal" especially if you made the stream "on demand".

The problem is you've downloaded the tracks from Beatport so they aren't likely to be on major labels who are the ones that benefit from blanket licensing deals...smaller labels often can't afford to join the collection agencies and will never see a penny of any royalties you pay...so legal is one thing, moral is another and unless you are planning to use your streaming mix as the cornerstone of a huge successful business that it would be worth purusing I personally would ignore the legality issue.

edit: I really ought to add a disclaimer to that last sentence...the views expressed are my own based on the laws in my country of residence and in no way are Mixmeister and/or Beatmixing.com suggesting that laws should simply be ignored on moral grounds.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Monkey Do,

OK, thanks Monkey Dan. My original thought to setting up the site was to post my own tracks, but I thought it might also be cool to add the 6 or so MM mixes I've done. By the way, you're site looks good and I will be exploring more later! Where can I learn more about webcasting?

The RAIN newsletter is a fairly good source of background information (http://www.kurthanson.com/) on webcasting.

For UK licensing the protection racket is administered by PPL (http://www.ppluk.com/).

For technical info try asking here I guess

rendez2k,

I confess that I know almost nothing about music licensing in the UK. I can tell you in the US that the major collections agencies (ASCAP, BMI, SESAC, and SoundExchange) do support independent labels.

Before launching your stream, I encourage you to do you homework on what is and is not permitted where you live. In the US, there is a big legal difference between streaming and downloading. I also encourage you to consider how important it is to you to set a good example for your listeners or clients.

Please let us know what you find.

Aaron is correct of course...a good place to start for legally broadcasting what will essentially be classified as an online radio station you might want to consider looking at http://www.swcast.net/ which is a service that handles royalties etc. for you and provides you with streaming bandwidth.

I know that http://www.spiderpower.net/ uses SWCast which is a UK based station that started very much from your perspective of just streaming from a personal website for the station manager to listen to their tunes while at work.

OK, thanks guys. I've set up an example site with a streaming mix and I'll investigate further now, starting with the beatport guys. To be honest, I was hoping it would be simpler to set up!