Indaba Music

Infobox Dotcom company
company_name = Indaba Media, LLC
company_
company_type = Private
foundation = New York, New York, USA (February 2, 2007)
location = New York, New York, USA
key_people = Dan Zaccagnino, Co-Founder and CEO
Matt Siegel, Co-Founder and CEO
Mantis Evar, Co-Founder and EVP
num_employees = 10
url = [http://www.indabamusic.com/ indabamusic.com]
website_type = Music Community
registration = Free
launch_date = February 2007
current_status = Active

Indaba Music is a social networking website for musiciansinterested in collaborating on music projects online. The site wasfounded by Dan Zaccagnino and Matthew Siegel, who also founded
Veritas Records while undergraduates at Harvard. Indaba Musicprovides tools that allow musicians to connect and collaborate onmusic projects with users around the world. Registration and use ofthe site is free and available anywhere the internet is accessible.The site is similar to other music collaboration sites like Jamglue, Splice, WeMix, eJamming, Mix2r, NinJam and YourSpins.

[ [http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/commentary/listeningpost/2007/04/listeningpost_0430 Finally, the On-Demand, Online Garage Band Gets Real ] ] According to the company, "Indaba is a Zulu word that invokes the spirit of collaboration and community. It refers to a gathering or a forum for sharing ideas, and it embodies concepts that are central to the mission of Indaba Music." [ [http://www.indabamusic.com/corporate/about About - Indaba Music ] ] The site is part of a trend in digital music to provide artists with creative services beyond promotion and distribution. [ [http://emusician.com/tutorials/musicians_online_collaboration/ Electronic Musician looks at online collaborative-music sites | Interview with Thomas Dolby on remote collaboration | Dolby, Electronic Musician, music collaboration online, n... ] ] [ [http://images.businessweek.com/ss/07/07/0727_mozes/index_01.htm Free Tools for Bands ] ] According to ABC News, "Anyone can upload a track — whether it's a beat, or a melody or a full-fledged song — and can solicit other musicians to record new or different parts. Similarly, musicians looking to add or build on other people's songs can search for these open "sessions," which are tagged by genre and instrument. They can ask to be invited to play and can send audition tracks." [ [http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/TenWays/Story?id=3750858&page=1 ABC News: Unmaking the Band, Facebook for Music ] ]

In August and September 2008 Indaba Music hosted the Mariah Carey remix contest for her song "I'll Be Lovin' U Long Time" in conjunction with Island Def Jam and Live Nation. It was one of the largest remix contests ever held with over 1,200 submissions. [ [http://www.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUSN1126228020080712 Reuters: Mariah Carey single at center of online contest] ]

Profiles

Members of Indaba Music create profile pages, similar to profiles on
Facebook or Myspace, where users can post examples of theirmusic, leave comments, and reach out to new members throughconnections they have made. Members can also blog, post photos, and rate each other's music. Artists use Indaba profiles to represent themselves within the Indaba Music community.

Sessions

Sessions are online recording projects involving groups of Indabamembers. They can be public and open for auditions or they can beprivate and visible only to invited members. Artists can talk with collaborators, exchange audio files, createmixes, and create agreements regarding payment and/or legal rights.

Indaba also keeps a detailed record of events that occur in sessions which can be subscribed to via RSS feed.

Session Console

The session console is an online digital mixer that Indaba members use to mixand edit audio in the web browser on any computer. The sessionconsole features a user interface that is similar to that of a
Digital Audio Workstation. The session console can be used to mixdown separate audio files made by other members into one mix to be saved as a single file.

Features of the Session Console include track-level panning, volume, volume automation, mute, solo, cropping, and looping. Users must use their own recording software to produce digital audio which they then upload to Indaba for collaboration and editing. It is similar to the online mixers of sites including Jamglue and Splice.

Notes

References

* [http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/newmedia/la-ca-webscout19aug19,1,5973343.story?coll=la-entnews-newmedia&ctrack=3&cset=true LA Times]
* [http://images.businessweek.com/ss/07/07/0727_mozes/index_01.htm Businessweek]
* [http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/commentary/listeningpost/2007/04/listeningpost_0430 Wired]
* [http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121183763054920739.html Wall Street Journal]

Further reading

* [http://www.crunchbase.com/company/indabamusic|CrunchBase Entry]
* Frank Gruber, [http://www.somewhatfrank.com/2007/06/indaba-music-ja.html|Indaba Music: Jam With A Virtual Band] ,June 21, 2007
* Cameron Parkins, [http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/8099|Creative Commons Indaba Music article] ,March 4th, 2008
* [http://www.nextnyers.com/home/2008/2/25/115-indaba-music.html|NextNYers Video Interview] ,February 25, 2008
* Mashable, [http://mashable.com/2007/07/06/online-music/|90+ Essential Music & Audio Sites] , July 6, 2007