@txels I make a music player app – @Radiccio – and I thought it might be interesting if people could browse, follow, and listen to Faircamp artists they like directly in the app. Similar to what Fairplayer does, only in a native Mac app instead of a web app.

I can see that Faircamp sites have RSS feeds, but it doesn’t look like they contain enough information to enumerate albums and songs, find stream URLs to play, etc. So I was curious how Fairplayer is doing this.

@dmd @fairplayer

My short answer is, I don't think we will be putting effort into such a "music consumption API" in the near future, because we have more important problems to solve first, the main one around creator consent.

@dmd @fairplayer

The longer answer is, the kinds of APIs or protocols I think we should be focusing on solving are those around content federation - among tools that share a vision of a decentralized platform, built as a digital commons (libre or freedom-enhancing software). Parties that set up explicit federation agreements, where they recognise each other as peers, and have the explicit consent of creators - they establish a bond of mutual trust.

@dmd @fairplayer

This may include explicit licensing or compensation agreements that are acceptable to all parties (not just the platform admins but the content creators as well).

@dmd @fairplayer

fairplayer.band (the instance) will play music that the #faircamp site owners have explicitly entrusted us to play (they have done this by signing up and providing a proof of website/faircamp ownership). We can make no implicit assumption about what other things we can do with their music, so we won't, until we can formalise some sort of consent mechanism.

@dmd @fairplayer

Although not yet formalised as such, for me fairplayer.band the instance is co-owned by all contributors (those who contribute to the tool, those that bring in the content, those that do community building and communication, whoever pays the hosting bills, etc...). We share the work, we should share the decision making as well.

@dmd @fairplayer

Building trust is really hard and losing it can be very easy. In our case we have gained the trust of early participants by having direct conversations (in person, via videoconference or email) and explaining more of our vision going forward. These early participants help spread the word and let others trust us, with fewer context.