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I know eMusic always has free trial offers for like 50 or 75 free songs. & After your trial songs are still reasonable. I don't think they are 99 cents...

Amazon.com has a ton of free tracks, pick through it and you'll find a few gems. Also, subscribe to their MP3 newsletter. Every week they have deals with $5 albums and free songs etc... If you just glean the free stuff off Amazon, you'll build up a decent sized collection. Of course, you won't get all the songs you absolutely want, but I've discovered some cool music that way.

Oh, and get the weekly free MP3 from Starbucks. Gotta drop by the store and pick up the card.

but why pay?

Perhaps because we're honest and don't like to steal?

I haven't used limewire for years now. If you want songs there are thousands of blogs that host music for free. I type in the song name on google and the word "blogspot" and it will almost certainly bring up your tracks on blogs with various download links rapidshare, megaupload, 4shared etc.

If you also want your music in the best mp3 quality you will want to include in the search term the word "320kbs" that is the highest quality mp3 encoding.

NOT legal. (except for the occasional indie band that distributes their music this way)

The 'music industry' pulled out numbers for illegal download sales lost from their behind when asked by the FCC to reproduce those numbers. Singers/musicians/actors are overpaid. Doctors are underpaid. Anyway, sales are not 'catastrophically' low as you mentioned. The 'battle' here is on the limitation of rights to someone who has purchased music. If I buy an album from iTunes, am I allowed to share it with my friends? Technically I should be able to since I did purchase the rights to the music. However, the 'music industry' (since I'm not sure who I'm referring to) wants only the original purchaser to have the content. Aka they do not want you to be able to share it with others. It's absolutely ridiculous on what they're asking. In analogy, as you said, it's like buying a cheesecake for desert and not being able to share it with your significant other over dinner ;)

ABSOLUTELY WRONG! Can you duplicate that cheesecake endlessly and give it away while still enjoying it yourself? The phrase "can't have your cake and eat it too" is very appropriate here. Now, if you want to buy that song and give it to a single individual and remove it from your collection, that would be an appropriate comparison. But your example is idiotic at best.
 
Torrents themselves are not illegal... maybe you should brush up on the legality issues.

I understand that torrents themselves arent legal so no i shouldnt brush up on my legality issues. When you are torrenting copyrighted material it is.

Anybody used Music Folia?
 
Nope. Thanks for the tip.

It does charge you, but not per song. Its plenty legal.

Be careful, there are sites that charge, but aren't legal because they don't pay the fees back to the recording companies. Have you checked them out?
 
It has a disclaimer that it asks you, though it is brief. Ive been using it for many years. There isnt a "legal" FREE download site. Limewire is as close as it gets and its been around a LONG time. So has iMesh but i dont like it.
Limewire actually has a "pro" version where you do pay, but why pay?

There isn't a legal free download site??? You're kidding...right?
 
Just buy your music like most people.

eMusic is NOT free. You can get a few songs free, then they charge per month/downloads.
 
So I think we've beaten the horse: like lunch, there is no free music, for the most part. If you want it CHEAP, buy used CDs from Amazon, Half.com, and Ebay. You can find a lot of the more popular, but slightly older titles, at ridiculously cheap prices, usually far cheaper than most mp3 prices. Just don't focus on new releases and you'll find decent prices. If you're into older music, you'll find a lot of bargains, and especially if you're not picky about the condition the discs and artwork are in - we're talking 50 cents a disc here, plus $2.50-3 shipping. And it's all legal.
 
It has a disclaimer that it asks you, though it is brief. Ive been using it for many years. There isnt a "legal" FREE download site. Limewire is as close as it gets and its been around a LONG time. So has iMesh but i dont like it.
Limewire actually has a "pro" version where you do pay, but why pay?

Especially when you can download limewire "pro" from limewire "basic"
 
I consider $1 a song to be cheap and am happy to pay it. Amazon's MP3s are cheaper, but also lower quality. Your other options are subscription services or just doing without as many, but don't pretend that a buck is some outrageous price.
 
Torrents themselves are not illegal... maybe you should brush up on the legality issues.

Just think... epeen sizes!

There are some good compliation albums ( the Hati album iTunes has/had is one) with a decent mix of good songs from various artists - that helps bring the cost per song down.

Also, there are free songs every week from iTunes.

If you want a very Conservative expense in expanding your music collection you gotta shop around.
 
I consider $1 a song to be cheap and am happy to pay it. Amazon's MP3s are cheaper, but also lower quality. Your other options are subscription services or just doing without as many, but don't pretend that a buck is some outrageous price.

Huh? That's wrong...Amazon MP3s are higher quality, always have been.
 
Just buy your music like most people.

eMusic is NOT free. You can get a few songs free, then they charge per month/downloads.
I know eMusic isnt free.
I consider $1 a song to be cheap and am happy to pay it. Amazon's MP3s are cheaper, but also lower quality. Your other options are subscription services or just doing without as many, but don't pretend that a buck is some outrageous price.
Uhmmmm, a dollar a song isnt cheap especially if youre going to have 100 songs bought. Thats 100 dollars.

I guess i wont use Music Folia. I guess im stuck with eMusic which is far better than iTunes.

Plus eMusic now has 45 free songs. Thats not bad, so im fine unless theres somewhere that has music cheaper than .50-.36 per song.

Is anybody using eMusic? I read the cnet reviews and it was terrible.
 
I know eMusic isnt free.

Uhmmmm, a dollar a song isnt cheap especially if youre going to have 100 songs bought. Thats 100 dollars.

Really? How much would those same 100 songs cost you if you bought them on CD? A hell of a lot more...that's how much. $1 isn't bad at all.
 
I did the emusic thing looking for an alternative. They suck, period. The overall price seems like a deal. But the selection is old and very limited. After you pay your monthly fee, you can't roll over the credits you paid for. What the crap is that? I went back to iTunes and gladly.
 
I did the emusic thing looking for an alternative. They suck, period. The overall price seems like a deal. But the selection is old and very limited. After you pay your monthly fee, you can't roll over the credits you paid for. What the crap is that? I went back to iTunes and gladly.

Ok, well then i guess thats not an option.
 
Here in the UK iTunes songs are 79p which is $1.20, think yourself lucky eh?

Also being in the music industry I really strongly advise against downloading illegally :)
 
Huh? That's wrong...Amazon MP3s are higher quality, always have been.

Before iTunes Plus Apple only offered 128k MP3s. Apple's current AAC format is higher quality than a Amazon's MP3. So you are correct that originally Amazon's files were better, but that was a long time ago.

There are a lot of articles on the web on AAC vs MP3.Here is one.
 
Before iTunes Plus Apple only offered 128k MP3s. Apple's current AAC format is higher quality than a Amazon's MP3. So you are correct that originally Amazon's files were better, but that was a long time ago.

There are a lot of articles on the web on AAC vs MP3.Here is one.

1) that article is from 2002
2) There are plenty of other articles that say they are statistically no different at the same bitrate (but some say AAC is VERY slightly better at the same bit rate)
3) These comparisons are true if comparing the iTunes encoder...BUT it's generally accepted that an iTunes encoded AAC = LAME encoded MP3 at the same bitrate
4) I concede that I was mistaken about one thing...I thought the default download from iTunes was 192 Kbps AAC, but after some research it seems that it's 256 Kbps AAC now.

However, I'll take a more versatile 256 Kbps MP3 from Amazon over the much less versatile 192 Kbps AAC from iTunes.
 
1) that article is from 2002
2) There are plenty of other articles that say they are statistically no different at the same bitrate (but some say AAC is VERY slightly better at the same bit rate)
3) These comparisons are true if comparing the iTunes encoder...BUT it's generally accepted that an iTunes encoded AAC = LAME encoded MP3 at the same bitrate
4) I concede that I was mistaken about one thing...I thought the default download from iTunes was 192 Kbps AAC, but after some research it seems that it's 256 Kbps AAC now.

However, I'll take a more versatile 256 Kbps MP3 from Amazon over the much less versatile 192 Kbps AAC from iTunes.

Yep, I'm sure you can find articles that slant both sides of the argument. I'll take the higher res iTunes files because when I've played them over club sound systems I do notice a difference. To my ears over loud club systems AAC maintains the extreme treble and bass better.
 
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