Program tests file-sharing potential

By Andrea Alarcon
Alligator Contributing Writer

November 9, 2006

For those whose music-downloading bills are almost as high as their rent payments, a group of UF students and alumni may have an idea for some relief.

"We are basically building an online music-sharing community where users get credit for sharing their music," said Samuel Tarantino, an economics sophomore at UF and the founder and chief executive officer of Escape Media Group.

Tarantino's company created Grooveshark, a legal peer-to-peer program whose users will get credit for the music they share. Grooveshark is expected to be ready by Fall 2007.

"We go one step beyond just being a music store," said Andres Barreto, chief operations officer and a decision information sciences sophomore.

What makes Grooveshark different from other music-downloading applications is that its users will acquire music legally. Record labels and artists will be compensated each time their music is downloaded, eliminating the legal risks of copyright infringement.

The idea surfaced in early February, when Tarantino met economics senior Seung Jin Lee through UF's Entrepreneurship and Technology Club.

"When Sam told me about his business plan, I knew he was serious," Lee said. "After that, wonderful stuff happened."

Later that semester, Lee introduced Tarantino to Barreto and Josh Greenberg, two of the three founders of Campus Open Course, a Web site for students to share items like class notes and textbooks.

They soon set up headquarters in a small office in downtown Gainesville and recently had to move into a newer, bigger office at 602 S. Main St.

Since then the team has grown to 18, most of whom are UF students.

The music-sharing program is based on three primary ideas: sharing, community and discovery. According to Tarantino, the credit awarding will be the factor that determines whether Grooveshark is more attractive to users than other music-buying programs such as iTunes.

Credit awarding will be based on the level of activity each user displays on the Web site; those who share music significantly and contribute to the Web site's community will get more credit than those who are less active.

The concept relies on the notion that the more you share, the cheaper the music you buy becomes.

Under the community feature, Grooveshark will offer user-created groups, a profile system, a chat feature and message boards.

As for discovery, users will be allowed to tag songs under various categories so they will appear after searching for criteria such as "chilling," "groovy" and "rocking" instead of only the clear-cut music genres, and with Grooveshark's bite feature, users will be able to see other music recommendations based on similar artists, genres and user ratings.

One of the Grooveshark's top priorities is to help new artists promote music. Independent artists would simply have to acquire a Creative Commons copyright license in order upload songs onto the Web site. They can allow users to download their songs for a very low price or even for free to expand their pool of listeners.

The University's Office of Technology Licensing, part of the University of Florida Research Foundation, is helping the Escape Media Group acquire the intellectual property rights for Grooveshark.

To receive updates on new Grooveshark developments visit www.grooveshark.com and sign up for their notification list. Those who register will be notified of launching events and the registration for Grooveshark's private beta version, expected to be ready by February 2007.