Recordings of Illegitimate/Indeterminate Origin are the topic of much of the discussion that goes on, on the 'net, and so it seemed wise to make some comments about them...

"Why use the term 'RoIO'?" There are various reasons for this, but the foremost is that, even if your mail is secure, when you post to a mailing list or newsgroup, your words are being broadcast all over the world, to places that are potentially far from secure. Mail involving certain illegitimate items could get you and the recipient of your message into a fair amount of trouble. Also, using the "b" (footwear) word on the various 'net forums (Echoes or the newsgroups) could attract unwanted attention to them, to the detriment of everyone. Also, it is important to use "RoIO" on echoes because it is run out of an independent company. Using the more common term could present liability problems for meddle.org that they would rather avoid; using "RoIO" allows both the company and bear to legally cover themselves.

"Where can I get RoIOs?" Local stores are a good place to try first. Avoid the larger chains, such as Tower, Music Plus, Wherehouse, Sam Goody, etc. Instead shop around at the smaller, independent shops. Stores in large cities and college towns are good places to look, as that's where much of the demand is. Try also asking for "rare" or "concert" recordings, "imports," and that sort of thing. The other main method of acquiring RoIOs is through tape trades. You'll find many people willing to trade tapes with you -- just ask people to send you their lists. And, for those beginning collections, some nice folks will even take blank tapes in payment, if you have nothing to trade. For a set of guidelines to tape trading put together by Echoes members, send the commands send trading.guidelines echoes quit to the address "echoserv@fawnya.meddle.org" *NOTE: While we're on the subject, please do not post lists of RoIO dealers and their locations to the 'net. This is a very easy way to make them ex-RoIO dealers -- they are, in general, uncomfortable with a lot of attention. Plus, posting their location could attract the wrong sort of attention (it's rare, but it happens more than you might think). Likewise, if you want to mail a response to someone asking for RoIO dealer locations, a certain amount of circumspection is in order.*

"What are some good RoIOs?" While the Echoes database is good for checking out particular RoIOs, it's cumbersome to use to find a general list of good- quality recordings. With this in mind, Herwig Henseler has put together a nice guide to some of the better RoIOs, for those starting collections or looking for recordings from a certain tour. You can get this guide by mailing the following to "echoserv@fawnya.meddle.org" mail roio_guide.062795 roio quit Or, using a WWW browser, you can access it in full hypertext format at http://www.pf-roio.de You can contact Herwig at "Herwig.Henseler@Informatik.Uni-Oldenburg.DE"

"Where can I find lists of RoIOs?" Check the ROIO database at http://www.pf-roio.de

"What are these 'Trance Remix' albums?" They're RoIOs -- but rather than offering live or unreleased "Pink Floyd" music, they feature Floyd songs remixed to sound more "ambient." Such music is difficult to describe -- think of the child of a "Saucerful of Secrets" and "Another Brick in the Wall, pt.2" union... Trance remix versions are available of many Pink Floyd albums: Meddle, OBC, DSotM, WYWH, Animals, The Wall, and AMLoR; as well as remixes that mix and match Floyd albums, such as Welcome to the Remix. NOTE: Some of these albums are rumored to have been done by such groups as The Orb, The KLF, and Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor. About the only evidence for such claims I know of is that some trance remix albums feature samples from songs done by these groups. And, as some people have pointed out, the quality of these albums isn't altogether what one would expect from the people mentioned.

"How do I know if a RoIO is any good?" Thanks to the efforts of the folks on the Echoes mailing list and others around the net, there has been compiled a database of many of the more popular RoIOs. For each item listed, information is (usually) given regarding tracks, playing time, relative quality, and anything else appropriate. The database can be accessed in two main ways: via the World Wide Web and via the mail-based "echoserv" database. To use the WWW database, you need the appropriate software, such as Mosaic, Netscape or Lynx. The address of the database is: http://www.pf-roio.de For those without WWW access, the echoserv RoIO database functions via e-mail. For a list of all the RoIOs available in the database, send the following commands to "echoserv@fawnya.meddle.org" filelist roio quit (commands should be lowercase and left-justified) This will send you back a list of files, with each file describing a particular RoIO. To retrieve information on that RoIO, use the "send" command, followed by the filename, and then the word "roio" You can ask for as many files as you like at a time, one "send" request per line. The last command should be "quit" send roio send roio ... quit The mail-based list processor at the heart of echoserv will then mail you information on the RoIOs you requested. If have a RoIO that is not in the database, please obtain the "blank" file from the database, which is a blank form. Fill out the form and send it to roio-maint@fawnya.meddle.org or roio@fawnya.meddle.org If you have additional comments you'd like make about a RoIO already in the database, use the same address.

A word about CD-R RoIOs With the advance of technique, the CD-R RoIO becomes more and more popular. Everything that holds for RoIOs holds especially for CD-R RoIOs as well. Listen before you buy, never trust any information on the RoIO any further than you can throw it, and do not pay any more for the RoIO than you think is worth it. Especially since you can most likely obtain the same music through trading (see the next 2 questions) NOTE: Naturally, none of this should be taken as condoning the actual purchase of this sort of thing where it is deemed illegal -- simply consider all this as just a further collection of Floyd trivia.

02 : A Word about trading Some words about tape CD-R trading The best, cheapest and most enjoyable way of expanding your collection (or even starting your collection) of Pink Floyd and Solo live material is through tape/CD-R trading. Brian Davis created the Tape Trader's bible, which explains this all much better than we could ever hope to do. The Tape Traders bible can be found at http://www.jasongeo.com/gerhard/tradebible.html

"What are CD-R/tape trees?" A tape tree is a fast way to spread a show to a large group of people. A (long) document explaining this in more detail is available through echoserv, as tape tree.long And can be found online at the Essential tape tree home page (http://www.jasongeo.com/gerhard, click on the Essential ROIO tree icon)

"What is a tape/CD-R weed?" A weed is an alternative method of spreading a recording fast through a large number of people, without having the overhead of making a tree structure. Basically the person starting the weed ships a copy of the recording to N people (for free, there is no trade involved) those N people promise to do the same. So they announce on Echoes that they are weeding, and will ship a free copy to the first N people who respond. Those N people in turn will offer free copies to the first N people and so on and so on.

03 : A Word about CDRs CD-R How-To The Echoes FAQ is *NOT* the place to look for technical information about CD-Rs. The best and most accurate information about CD-Rs can be found at http://www.fadden.com/cdr_faq. Please look there before asking any CD-R related questions on Echoes.

"Disk at once/Track at once" Before you start trading CD-Rs, make sure you can burn music CDs with DAO. If you do not know what DAO means, see the above mentioned URL for details.

"Converting tapes/MD/DAT/LP to CD-R" Yes, you can convert tapes, MDs, DATs, LPs, reel to reel tapes, etc, to CDR. You do need to have the right hardware and software, and a lo of time to learn how to do it properly. At the risk of repeating myself, the Echoes FAQ is not the place to look for this kind of information, see the above mentioned URL for full details.

04 : A Word about various other topics A Word about various topics This subsection talks a bit about things that are relevant to Floyd fans on the Internet, but are not Floyd related.

A Word about trust Echoesians in general are nice, kind and friendly people, and being nice and friendly people they will happily trade, sell or buy with/from you. However since the Internet is largely a faceless medium, it's hard to get any guarantees that the other person will hold up his side of the bargain. Therefore, if you trade with someone you don't know, either get references from people you do know and trust, or make sure you're not trading more than you're willing to lose. Having said that, I've easily made more than a hundred trades with Echoesians over the years, and have never ever been ripped, though I did loose a couple of packages in the mail.

A Word about gullibility "If something sounds too good to be true, it usually is." If you keep this in mind, you won't be too surprised when things turn out a bit different than you'd expected. For example, if you get an e-mail from Roger Waters, saying that he liked your posts to Echoes so much, he's going to give you backstage passes for his show, but you need to send him $50 to get them, then most likely the person on the other end of the e-mail conversation is not Roger Waters.

A Word about April Fool's Day There is a bit of tradition on Echoes, involving April Fool's Day, the first day of April. AFD is the day where people either release a humorous posting -- usually one that took quite some time and effort making -- or partake in an elaborate bit of leg pulling. Please be aware of the following: * Any posts involving/preparing the leg-pull should be posted after Mar 17 and before April 2 (in other words, the 2 weeks leading up to AFD and AFD itself). * On April 2nd the perpetrators of the leg pulling should come out in the open and 'fess up their tricks. * The leg-pulling and humorous writing should be done in good fun -- and should be interpreted as being done in good fun. Don't abuse AFD as an excuse to start an all-out flame war or hatemongering campaign. If you're wondering what this is all about, either check some digests from the AFD periods, or sit back and watch what happens around AFD next year -- and remember to take everything that's posted between Mar 17 and April 1 with the necessary grains of salt.

A Word about language English is the Lingua Franca on the Internet, and on Echoes. This means that all postings to Echoes should be in English. However since for many Echoesians English is a second (or third or...) language we can not expect every posting to be in perfect English, nor can we expect every poster to immediately understand the finer nuances of the many (near) synonyms the English language has to offer. Don't feel insulted when your postings are not fully and/or correctly understood, and don't be afraid to ask for further clarification if a posting is not clear to you.

A Word about culture As above, so below. Since Echoesians come from almost all corners of the world, take into consideration that some things that you take for granted are not taken for granted by all Echoesians. As an extreme example, Echoes is [or was] apparently also read in Iraq, a country where listening to Pink Floyd could be a subversive activity.

Another word about language While this should go without saying (and is mentioned in the posting guidelines as well) foul language, racist language, etc, etc, should be kept to the necessary minimum.

A Word about racism The following poem has been erroneously attributed to Gandhi, Mandela, M. L. King and Bertold Brecht. It's meaning and implications don't need any further explanation. bear wrote: first, i also found this (in a brecht forum) The poem is by German theologian Martin Niemöller, and the German original goes as follows: "Als die Nazis die Kommunisten holten, habe ich geschwiegen; ich war ja kein Kommunist. Als sie die Sozialdemokraten einsperrten, habe ich geschwiegen; ich war ja kein Sozialdemokrat. Als sie die Gewerkschafter holten, habe ich geschwiegen; ich war ja kein Gewerkschafter. Als sie mich holten, gab es keinen mehr, der protestieren konnte." http://remember.org/witness/links.let.niem.html has an English translation They came for the Communists, and I didn't object - For I wasn't a Communist; They came for the Socialists, and I didn't object - For I wasn't a Socialist; They came for the labor leaders, and I didn't object - For I wasn't a labor leader; They came for the Jews, and I didn't object - For I wasn't a Jew; Then they came for me - And there was no one left to object. Martin Niemöller, German Protestant Pastor, 1892-1984

05 : A Word about fawnya Why Fawnya ? Fawnya In the words of bear hi all. in the middle of the recovery from the most recent server fiasco, somebody ask about why "fawnya.meddle.org" and sometimes just "meddle.org" ? i don't recall answering, and cannot find orig mail. and as it is a faq, here we go... in a prior incarnation "fawnya" was the machine on my desk and having the name made the mail routing a bit faster. the setup is different now, but i still recommend it as i might just change back at some point. fawnya is also the name of our oldest daughter and, as i was sysadmin in the copious spare time :-/ allowed by my engineering tasks, i got to dictate the systems naming policy: name machines after our kids became the rule. so there you have [basically] the whole story. ttfn, bear.

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