I'm a big fan of BoingBoing, and a big fan of TAL. In fact, I used to work there. I was their intern.

Now, being a BoingBoing reader and generally techy kind of guy, I hate DRM and extortionist content practices and all the rest of it. And, in fact, when I moved to Chicago last summer to work for the show, I spent much of the 20 hour drive listening to TAL episodes I AudioHijacked off of my real player.

That being said, while lame, the way TAL deals with its downloads isn't greedy, and it's not their fault. Don't forget that they are primarily a radio show, one that is broadcast nationwide. As an additional service, they let you stream the show from their website for absolutely free. Which is nice, right? So why can't you take it with you?

You have to understand that This American Life is produced differently than just about any other show on the radio. They get big names on there. They pay well. They score the whole show with great music. All of these things make it difficult to give away programs for free. Because all the different people who contribute to each show are entitled to a part of the CD sales, its in their contracts. As I understand it, there's some difference between streamed recordings and downloaded recordings that makes the lawyers go crazy. (Cory?) Also, there's some royalty thing with all the music used in the show.

Could contracts be changed to make this work differently? Maybe. But it would probably take a lot of time, and there's not a lot of people over there. Don't be fooled by that polished sound -- when I was there, there were eleven of us, and that includes me, a guy that runs the books, and a guy who makes CDs. Everybody's pretty busy making radio shows.

In any case, Ira's not trying to cheat you. He is, in fact, a very nice guy. Like, for instance, if he were going out to get lunch, he'd ask you if you wanted anything, and then he'd bring it back, and he wouldn't make you pay for it. And, say, if you were going out to get lunch, and you asked him if he wanted anything, he'd tell you and give you money to go get it, and sometimes he'd let you borrow his car. He's a nice guy.

So my advice to BoingBoingers is not to worry about it. Stop complaining, and hack things the old fashioned way. It's not difficult to just hijack it, or listen at your desk.

p.s. I don't know if people know about TAL's move to TV and New York, but here's a link to a story I wrote about it for New York Magazine: Link.

I've been reading the TAL thread and thought this article I wrote last year might be interesting. I exercise fair use and use my Radio Shark to capture radio shows, then transform them into something I can hear on the iPod and is accessible as a podcast. Link.

Reader comment: Christopher says,

In response to a comment made by Tom Collins regarding the ongoing saga of TAL and podcasts, I would like to point out that whether or not it is ethical or moral to do so, the ability to essentially make a hyperlink to existing content without actually reproducing said content is a fundamental freedom associated with the Internet. Even if this hyperlinking is done via an RSS feed rather than a <a > tag in HTML, the concept is exactly the same. Thus, while I agree with most of Mr. Collins' comment, I must take issue with the assertion that we do not have the intrinsic right to make such a podcast. Not being a lawyer in any way, I don't know if he's right or not, but everything I've learnedabout American law leads me to believe he is incorrect on this point. I do not mean this comment, however, to be an endorsement of behavior antithetical to the wishes of the content's creators. Rather, simply because we have the right to do something doesn't make it right.

posted by Xeni Jardin at 07:28:32 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments