Project: "The Internet as a platform for musicians"

During my last semesters at university I started to work on the relation between music and technology. To be more specific I focused on how new technological innovation have shaped (and still shaping) the music world.

The thesis Internet As A Platform For Musicians can be found here: https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B_f1ULrY_RHLNDA1ZTA3YmQtYjYwZC00YzExLWIwNGEtY2RkMWQxZmYyMGEw

The project is divided in 4 sections:

1) The Invisible Good analyzes the social uses of music and how it has become "untouchable and immaterial"

2) The Ab-use Of Music focuses topics like illegal downloading, online piracy, peer-to-peer application, i-Tunes, etc. and it also discusses how music has come (and still coming) into our homes, our pc and mobile devices (this part contains a short "history of portable devices", from the walkman to the iPhone

3) Social Networks And The Internet As A Virtual Stage discusses how these technologies has changed the music business. This section talks about websites, MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Newsletters, Forums and Blogs.

4) Conclusions: Best Practices is the final part of the project that talks about how to use these new communication and promotion channels in an effective way.

What made this thesis something unique is how it has been made. Not only I read books, magazines and similar sources to obtain some of this work's information, but I also interviewed musicians! Members of the music business, small independent "troubadours", soundtrack composers, radio show hosts and producers are some of the main characters that helped me putting together this innovate insight on the relationship between music and technology. The complete interviews can be found at the end of the thesis as attachments.

This is the complete list of the interviewees (last names in alphabetical order):

• Marcel "Jimi" Aeby (More Experience vocalist & guitarist)
  
• Roy Bennett (singer & bassist)
  
• Judy Carmichael (singer, pianist, radio host and producer)
  
• Daniele Dreier (guitarist of Denis Angelucci and Lucilla Sky)
  
• Nick Fyffe (former Jamiroquai bassist and currently playing in Thenewno2)
• Luis Landrini (singer-songwriter and guitarist)
• Jan Laurenz (guitarist, "stick" player and active independent musician)
• Xavier Longchamp (drummer of reggae band ZonaSun and funk group Brainless)
• Janis Moisejs (Latvian jazz singer and songwriter)
• Xra Nov (independent musician and multi instrumentalist)
• Nicki Parrott (jazz bassist and singer-songwriter)
• Christian "Zodiac" Schwarz (performer and producer under pseudonyms such as Zodiac Project and Tracelements, as well as soundtrack scores)
• Matthew Shilling (jazz and brass band saxophonist)
• Sam Totty (drummer of indie rock band Mata León, previously known as Overview)
• David Werlen (multi instrumentalist)

NOTE: the permission to add the names into the thesis has been given directly from the artists.