[Gregory Dowling]

Chris Childers has put in a plea on an adjoining thread for someone to send him the first five episodes of BBC7's Paradise Lost. I've sent him a PM offering to do so but being technologically challenged I only know such primitive methods as attaching files to e-mails and my server won't let me send such a massive attachment. I was intrigued by his suggestion that someone might "upload them to a location whence I could download them". Now I know that my sons do this sort of thing continually (and I don't know, and guess I'd prefer not to know, whether legally or not); it's a long time since they've ever bought a music CD. What I'm really asking is whether it would be possible for people on this site to do the same thing with poetry recordings - or even if we can just pool information on where free or reasonably priced poetry recordings can be found. I can start by offering this address: http://librivox.org/ . It's a website that offerings free audiobooks of works in the public domain; the recordings are done by volunteers and the quality is obviously very variable. However, for those interested, there is a very good reading of the first canto of Don Juan, by someone who understands meter and (very important in Don Juan) rhymes.

Gregory

[Chris Childers]

Hi Gregory, I'll respond publicly since you made a public thread here. With that comment about uploading and downloading what I was actually thinking of was a website I remembered hearing about but whose name I had forgotten, www.yousendit.com , which allows you to email large files by uploading them onto the site, where they wait a few days on the yousendit server to allow for download. If you would be willing to use this site to get me the Milton files, or if Christopher has a better idea, I would be very appreciative. I'll pm you my email address.

I can't access the link you give, probably because of safety measures connected to the school network I use; maybe when I go home for Christmas I'll be able to download the Don Juan. In general though I am very interested in getting ahold of as many sound files of people reading poems as possible -- my iPod (which I lost) had thousands of poems that I had laboriously read into it, including most of Paradise Lost. If I get another iPod, it would be nice not to have to read so much on my own & tear up my vocal cords, but to have them from various sources, not least to relieve me of the sound of my own voice. All of which goes to say, if anyone knows good ways to get ahold of reading files, please share! Thanks,

Chris

[Henry Quince]

Gregory, I don’t know what the BBC format is, but if you have an audio editing program (there’s a good one for Windows, GoldWave, which I got free off a magazine CD) you could probably use it to reduce the file sizes greatly by saving out in a different format and at a lower sampling rate. Also, if the files are in stereo, save out in mono — it doesn’t really need to be stereo for a voice reading a poem.

For example, I recently downloaded an audio file in .au format. Around 5Mb for about ten minutes of audio. Saved in 16-bit mono .mp3 it’s about 1.1Mb.

If the resulting files are still too big for email attachment, can you break them into shorter chunks? Again an audio editor can do that.

The other idea — put them online for others to download — is a good one. Your account with your Internet service provider (which gives you your connection) probably includes some web space, somewhere to put your own pages. Even if you’re not creating a site as such, you can still use that space to store files. Depending on how much space is provided, you might be able to upload a few audio files, then give someone the URL. Ideally, link to the individual files in an email: then the recipient (at least if using Windows) can right-click on each link and choose Save Target As.

An example (small file): quack.mp3

Re free poetry recordings online, there’s this from the American Academy of Poets: http://www.poets.org/page.php/prmID/361

And there’s this: http://www.poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/home.do
which Andrew Motion has a hand in.

And there’s this (lots of links): http://laurable.com/

Best,
Henry

[Roger Slater]

A couple of suggestions.

First, check out Pando, probably pando.com, for a software solution.

Second, check out x-drive, where you can open up a free storage account and let people share.

[Gregory Dowling]

Thanks for all this advice, everyone.

Chris, I did as you suggested and uploaded the files to sendit.com, where they will apparently be kept for you in storage for a week - as you presumably know.

Henry, thanks for all the suggestions. Some of it sounds pretty challenging to me, but maybe with the help of my sons I'll work out how to fragment or slim down my files. Thanks too for all those links. They look very promising. Oh, and a special thanks for the quack.mp3. I hope everyone else has tried it out.

Roger, I'll check those addresses out as well. Thanks.

So who's going to start the Eratosphere audio-pool for everyone to draw on?

[Greg Krawczyk]

Hi everyone.

I've been listening to the BBC7's Paradise Lost since the Sunday Omnibus with the episodes from 16-20 and I find it wonderful. Unfortunately, I haven't had the occasion to hear the first 15 episodes; thus, I'd be very grateful if someone could send them to me either via e-mail or a file-sharing site, eg. http://rapidshare.com/

Thank you.

[David Anthony]

I had this problem a couple of years ago when I was trying to send my publisher the sound recording of my new book, both of us being technologically-challenged.
My daughter pointed out that if you join the free Hotmail service you can send huge files, so I did and he did and the sound file was sent and received with no bother at all.
Best regards,
David

[Roger Slater]

Let me mention x-drive again. http://xdrive.com

You can have a free account there and they give you 5 gigs, no charge, no credit card, no hassle.

You can store anything you want in folders just like the ones on your computer. Files of any size (up to your 5 gig quota).

But here's what makes it great for the purposes being discussed in this thread. You can set up a file or folder and "share" it with anyone else. So let's say that I set up a folder and I put in it a bunch of recordings of poets reading their work. All I need to do is email you an invitation and you can enter that folder and use it like your own. (You don't even have to join x-drive to access the folder a few times, but I think you need to join -- easy enough -- for permanent access).

[Gregory Dowling]

Roger, that is exactly the kind of thing I was thinking of. Thanks. I'm going away for a week but when I get back I'll set up an account there and put in what recordings I have. Can you give us any legal advice on the question of copright infringement with this system?

Greg, I'll put in my Paradise Lost recordings 1-16, if you like. Welcome to the Sphere, by the way.

David, would you care to set up an account with your own recording? It would be great if all Sphere poets did it - unless they feel they'll be depriving themselves of millions of dollars from CD sales.

Gregory

[Roger Slater]

No, not a legal opinion, but an impression. Assuming you came by the audio file legally, I see no reason you cannot let other people listen to it. If you have a legal file on your computer at home, and a friend stops by, you can certainly let that person listen to it on your computer. If instead of a local hard drive, you use an online hard drive, like xdrive, it seems to me you should be able to let your friend listen to it, as well. I may be oversimplifying, and if we were dealing with a for-profit widespread distribution of copyrighted content I'm sure we would hear a differnt analysis from the copyright owners, but for our limited, small-time purposes, I think that friends letting each other listen to each other's legally acquired sound files is probably safe. Again, not a legal opinion, just an off-the-cuff impression. Of course, if anyone protests that they don't want us sharing their own file that way, I would probably back off -- even if not legally required to do so.