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Audiogalaxy has a Gold program. This program lets you download an unlimited number of songs from fast servers at a cheap fee per month. If you choose the cheapest (per month) option, the charge ($2.95) is automatically billed to your credit card each month until you decide to cancel.

This sounds promising. If the Linux community chooses this model, the software can remain free as in beer/speech, but downloading from the server would be charged, either per (insert period of time), or (insert each piece of software), or (insert how many megabytes downloaded). Hopefully the connections would be faster than the norm to make the additional charge worth the cost.

Just .02 from a Computer/Business person.

Audiogalaxy has a Gold program. This program lets you download an unlimited number of songs from fast servers at a cheap fee per month. If you choose the cheapest (per month) option, the charge ($2.95) is automatically billed to your credit card each month until you decide to cancel.

This sounds promising. If the Linux community chooses this model, the software can remain free as in beer/speech, but downloading from the server would be charged, either per (insert period of time), or (insert each piece of software), or (insert how many megabytes downloaded). Hopefully the connections would be faster than the norm to make the additional charge worth the cost.

Just .02 from a Computer/Business person.

I have a computer attached to my stereo system, so that's what what I'm using for a source. The stereo is Klipsch KG4 main speakers, Klipsch KSW-10 Subwoofer, all controlled by a high performance Marantz receiver. Yea, I can tell the difference between MP3 and uncompressed. At 128Kbs, mp3 is pretty ugly. 160Kbps, it's pretty good, but not perfect, and sometimes I can't tell the difference. Anything above that and I generally can't tell. It's more obvious on very subtle music like classical violin. When it's at decent volume, you'll hear a sort of bubbling/gurgling sound that comes with the compression.

You may not like 128Kbps, but I'm wondering how many people would want files at 192Kbps.

I don't care what other people want. I'm talking about what I want. When I poke around on places like AudioGalaxy, it's obvious that most people are happy enough with 128Kbps. And most are probably listening through $20 computer speakers, so it's probably fine. I'm not. If that makes me an audiophile snob, then so be it.

You've suggested lossless. That's basically .wav - have you seen the size of those files? 40mb a track, typically.

There are lossless compressors. One such is FLAC. There are others. Compression rates are generally about 50%. I'd like to be able to download the song lossless and then do what I want to do with it (such as compressing using lame in VBR mode). You can be that the record companies won't be aiming for the the best quality sound they can get.

-S

If Katz had posted the original email it would have lent a little more credibility to this story. I agree that certain statements sound a little fishy to me. However, I do believe that Internet use actually has increased in Afghanistan since the rousting of the Taliban began. About this same time of day two weeks ago,
I checked the number of users from Afghanistan who were using Audiogalaxy. There were TWO. Today (as of this moment) there are ONE HUNDRED TWENTY THREE. Allow for some errors here. They may not all truly be from Afghanistan but I'd bet that a good portion of them are. It certainly sounds like an increase.

I doubt that Golden State is cdopy-protected, why should I allready found it in the net?

I love Audiogalaxy!

Audiogalaxy has some sort of free hosting for musicians, described here.

I'm not sure it's quite as robust as what you're looking for, but I thought I'd mention it. Also, Audiogalaxy seems to be on the record companies' radars lately, but I'm hoping that their musician hosting might help keep them afloat.

Audiogalaxy has some sort of free hosting for musicians, described here.

I'm not sure it's quite as robust as what you're looking for, but I thought I'd mention it. Also, Audiogalaxy seems to be on the record companies' radars lately, but I'm hoping that their musician hosting might help keep them afloat.

I think it was yo la tengo

(Note: Audiogalaxy installs some nasty spyware, but nothing a little registry editing can't fix.)

Okay.. i just read your post..

You *DO* realize you just described audiogalaxy EXACTLY, right? Like, to the letter, more or less.

Not only will many artists still be making sure they're not on napster, but napster will fail once again due to the fact while it'll be a paid only music software, while software such as audiogalaxy and software that allows downloads of files and videos and all that, such as morpheus are now reigning all popular.

However, now that the recording companies are able to make a profit out of napster, perhaps they'll pursue morpheus, audiogalaxy and all these other companies to make sure that napster is unrivaled.

Besides the already mentioned availability at AudioGalaxy it's also available in a number of MP3 channels on various IRC servers (Dalnet, EFnet, etc). If you look, it's rather easy to find.

The song is already on AudioGalaxy and available for download. They just can't win. Copy protection doesn't work!

AudioGalaxy for Linux does not force you to install any spyware (I don't think there is something like that for Linux), and it's a really great MP3 sharing network.
All hail AudioGalaxy!

As a proud owner of a ADSL line and a 10MBit Ethernet connection (at a diffrent location), I have no problem downloading MP3 music from the net.

Ofcourse you need to back up and save your music if you want to keep it, eiter by using CDs or other temporary backup measures. The problem with purchasing music online (by contrast to, say, pirating it is that you are limited by arbitrary restrictions. See the e-book junk for example.

you heard me. get the whole series in mp3 format from audiogalaxy. just search for it, it's all there. linux client available.

Also... programs such as AudioGalaxy's satilite proggy will try to install gator by default. Gator is a crackwhore to remove too...

Try http://www.audiogalaxy.com/. It works very cool, pretty much just like you're saying. Only the GUI is their web page so its super accessable from any computer, yet any music you want still gets downloading to where you're running the "satellite" program.

That's it. Napster is now a non-entity. I bailed when they started making it harder to use, locking out Napigator (or trying!) and removing all the songs I wanted to grab. I've moved on to AudioGalaxy, and I'll move on to something else when that bites the dust.

I don't really think there need to be any more Napster stories now. Because the plain and simple facts are, Napster no longer offers what people originally wanted to use Napster for. And it looks like it will be offering less and less in the future. I think it's finished.

--

I think we can look to Napster to learn about how the business model for music distribution works when you're working with the music industry. Napster was an important force because of it's user base when it emerged, the music industry wanted it both ways. They wanted to be part of a popular site, and they wanted the retarded level of control with their imaginary "secure" music distribution systems that they guaranteed Napster became so assy that the reason they bought it was removed.

The only model that made sense for Napster was the one that was initially discussed. The music industry allows a subscription based service which is "all you can download." Now we're stuck with some SDMI still born .NAP file scheme and bertlesmann has succeeded in creating the user bases necessary for 5 other programs to be viable.

In any case, here's some links to what I use these days:

The best Gnutella client: LimeWire
eDonkey
Audio Galaxy

Top mp3 searches

no you dont... audio galaxy yes just another temp. solution but it works..

Napster? Is that like AudioGalaxy or something?

The majority of napster users have already left due to filtering.
If microsoft and napster setup an agreement, only more people will leave for alternatives such as bearshare and audiogalaxy.
Trying to kill mp3 trading by an agreement with napster is like trying to kill linux by buying corel, in my mind.

(I'm not sure what the situation with Corel was, its just to illustrate that people will move to alternatives.)

"// this is the most hacked, evil, bastardized thing I've ever seen. kjb"

10+ gigs on AG and running...

It's better than Napster is, was, or ever could be.

--------

I recently submitted an article about how I found a piece of spyware that is installed by a number of music sharing systems including AudioGalaxy and iMesh on my machine. Of course, Slashdot rejected it. Since it is ontopic for this discussion here it is:

The SpyWare Invasion

While writing a proxy server for a class I noticed that for each URL I clicked, a number of POST requests were being sent to d2.webhancer.com and d3.webhancer.com. Wondering what was up I decided to go to the Web Hancer website where I found out that WebHancer is a company that claims to have an installed base of millions of WebHancer agents that report web browsing statistics to their corporate headquarters.

WebHancer currently charges businesses $12,000 a month to access these usage statistics. I found the webHancer agent on my Windows machine (after a quick 'ps -W | grep gent')in "C:\Program Files\webHancer\Programs\whAgent.exe" and deleted it. What I am wondering is how the Web Hancer agent got on my machine since I don't recall being asked whether I wanted to install any spyware. Also exactly how many of their millions of anonymous usage statistics are being generated by unsuspecting users?

Which program did I install that decided to place this Trojan on my machine and is there a blacklist of such programs? AudioGalaxy

Finally, while searching for info on Web Hancer I found Ad-Aware which claims to locate and uninstall such spyware.

• Alpine - Adaptive Large-scale Peer2peer Information NEtworking
• ANAP -- Anonymous Napster
• AudioGalaxy Satellite
• Bearshare -- Powerful Gnutella client
• Blocks -- open source distributed sharing client with encryption
• Carracho -- MacOS file sharing program
• CuteMX
• Direct Connect
• DFSI -- Distributed File Sharing over IRC
• Espra
• FileSwap
• Filetopia
• FreeNet
• Gnutmeg -- peered file sharing system
• gnutella -- distributed P2P file sharing tool
• Hotline
• IMesh
• Jungle Monkey -- open source
• KaZaA - Windows Media Desktop
• Konspire -- open source distributed client in java
• OFSI -- Open File Sharing Initiative
• ProjectELF -- anonymoys distributed sharing system
• SongSpy
• Spin Frenzy
• Splooge -- P2P file sharing by file extension
• Swapoo -- Napster like service for sharing video game ROMs
• Swaptor -- Online File Sharing Community
• VNN - secure file sharing app

-------------

_ _ _
I was working on a flat tax proposal and I accidentally proved there's no god.

At the height of Slashdot's reporting on Napster (twice or thrice a week) I couldn't understand what relevance it had with regards to being "News for Nersa" or "Stuff that Matters", some service that is primarily used to pirate songs was getting sued, big deal.

Now that Napster has been rendered useless as a file sharing service by the RIAA and a court of law, why is Napster still news? Everyone I know has moved on from Napster and now uses a service that surpasses Napster's poorly designed service in one way or the other. For simply sharing and obtaining music there are iMesh, Audiogalaxy, Music City, Ohaha, Gnutella and a host of others. For uses of P2P beyond simply grabbing MP3s we have Mojo Nation, Freenet and Publius.

Why doesn't slashdot start reporting on these systems instead of beating the dead Napster horse?

Has anyone tried Audiogalaxy its way better than napster and it auto-resume the songs.

We shouldn't have to pay for 1's and 0's.

Why is it that hotline never gets mentioned???

Because Hotline is a pain. Yes, it's simple enough to use and has potential, but the reality is pretty unpleasant to use. You find that someone has something you're interested in. You have to see what particular hoops you have to jump through to get access "...go to this web site and sign up for this spam-bait..." To hell with that. I share over AudioGalaxy and Napster and the BearShare Gnutella client because I like to share, not to try to make a nickle from people.

Surely more bytes have been transfered over Hotline servers than ANY other file (not just mp3) sharing peer to peer system!!!

Probably, but if you're interested in MP3s, and are not looking for movies or warez, everything else is less of a pain.

Gnutella is neat, but for a reliable MP3-only service, check out Audiogalaxy.

At first I was put off by the web interface, but:

1) It remembers everything you request in a queue and will get it when available. (A must for dial-up users)

2) Auto-resume using temp files.

3) A small app in your system tray/console only sends/receive when you have it running.

The greatest advantage is that ZDnet/CNet/MSNBC and other DON'T mention audiogalaxy in their "quest for Napster clone" articles, so the quality of users, and therefore the music, is excellent.

Unfortunately, it is a centralized system, but so far, it seems the mainstream media/RIAA have ignored it.

Go to AudioGalaxy. Once you do, trust me, you'll just laugh that Napster is goin' down. I've converted many of my friends, all who say it's much better than Crapster.

Ok, so there is all this hullabaloo over Napster shutting down? Why should this even affect anything. I've always been curious over the far reaches of the American judicial system. Like sure they can state what is legal and illegal in the states but what is to stop someone from doing something offshore (ala: the internet gambling casinos etc.) But even aside from that all this focus is on Napster, so Napster dies big deal, they can't stop a movement of this size anymore .. you can equate it with the war on drugs, something that will go nowhere, sure they can bust Noriega or Napster but with that stem the flow? I don't think so. Hell there are still places out there like Audiogalaxy which have been around longer than Napster and also search a much broader base of files. If anything all Napster did was bring mass markey appeal of mp3's to the forfront. No one cared until mp3's became a commodity on Nasdaq. Oh well my 2 cents and thats probably over pricing it.

gnapster and opennap is all I need.

And should gnapster and opennap ever fail you, I have only but 3 words to say... Audiogalaxy dot com

Not quite Napster, but any bets on how long it takes the record industry to get after them?

I'd say once they hit 1/3 of the Napster bandwidth......

The RIA is just to stupid to understand that they no longer have control, and they are dieing a slow death. We dont need them to charge us money so they can conrol what music they think we want. The Net will just route around that shit before the relize what hit them.
I for one dont even use Napster that much because its not very Reliable.
BWTF I like Audio Galaxy better anyway just not as much music.

Was your AOL-Time Warner-Bertelsmann
reference part of the joke?

But if you look at www.aol.co.uk scroll down to the bottom of the page where the copyright disclaimer is and you can see that they're already partners in europe :)

As for 3 subscribers, you've gotta be joking- hmm then again. There's a lot of (better) free alternatives out there :)

Now I've just gotta get out of the shock of a non goatse first post :)

Napster is a relatively simple protocol, with a simple (though now very well-tuned) server backend. It's fast, but it doesn't do anything particularly clever. This is why OpenNap turned up so quickly, and why we don't need to pay for Napster.

Audiogalaxy Satellite, on the other hand, has nearly all its cleverness on the server side. It keeps note of the songs you want and starts downloading them for you when you're around, automatically. It chooses the nearest peer to you automatically. It understands the difference between artists and titles, so you can browse by artist. You can leave the client running on DSL/cable at home while you use the web interface at work to send stuff to it. And loads of other features.

It's very, very cool, and it'll be much harder to clone for the Open Source world. I'd pay for it.

I quite like the audiogalaxy software. Basically you download their piece of software called the "satellite" and you then use a web based interfact to select what songs you want to download, then without hassle it downloads the songs without further interaction. As it's web based you can do it all remotely so if you're at work you can remotely log into the website and set more songs downloading on your cable connection at home. It resumes partial downloads and is available for both Linux and Windows (closed source tho at the moment).

I quite like the audiogalaxy software. Basically you download their piece of software called the "satellite" and you then use a web based interfact to select what songs you want to download, then without hassle it downloads the songs without further interaction. As it's web based you can do it all remotely so if you're at work you can remotely log into the website and set more songs downloading on your cable connection at home. It resumes partial downloads and is available for both Linux and Windows (closed source tho at the moment).

I second the recommendation of AudioGalaxy... it's far too easy to find good music, so much so that I keep wondering if it's some kind of "honey pot" sting operation!

Join up - the more the merrier. I have about 2GB of weird stuff shared out right now.

Vorbis sounds absolutely excellent compared to the same bitrate MP3. I'm encoding all of my CD's into Vorbis format. I wish Napster or Audiogalaxy(has linux support) would support the Vorbis format. I've emailed Audio galaxy about it but haven't heard back. If programs like these supported the format, it would catch on much faster.

A few people I know are living a happy existance as a member of fairly average unsigned club bands bouncing around New York trying to get heard, and a few of them, after finally getting a demo-quality CD cut asked me to rip the tracks and share them over 'that Napster thing'. I'd like to do what I can, but because of the way Napster works, it's easy to find the song you know, by the band you know (oh, say, Metallica) but next to impossible to just share a song that no one has ever heard of and get any good hits. mp3.com is a site that does a much better job of this than Napster claims to do.

A lot of this discussion of Napster focuses on searching, but very little on it's best feature: it's instant messaging. Everyone I know who uses Napster regularly goes through several stages. First, they search for songs they know and like. Once they have their current collection duplicated, they search for stuff they remember, but never owned. Eventually thay have all the stuff they can think of. Then, they start looking for stuff that will appeal to their tastes. That's when they start noticing who they've downloaded stuff from, who has tastes similar to their own and message them. Eventually they develop friendships with people they trust with reliable taste.

Of course just having a song on Napster won't do anything for someone. But having a song in the collection of an active fan of a particular genre of music, someone happy to talk to people who share their tastes, is wonderfully effective.

I have a fairly small MP3 collection on Napster (560 files), but my wife has 8600 songs. She is constantly chatting with people all over the world, discovering artists that she could have otherwise never heard, and introducing people to new music constantly. I'll look over at her computer and she'll have four chat windows open, conversing with various folks. She's bought albums and CDs of artists she's discovered via Napster, and people are constantly telling her that they're on a web site ordering something that she's introduced them to, or heard on her Shoutcast stream.

Knee-jerk pro-napster moderators can mark this as flamebait if they really want to, but realize that unless Napster gets a decent overhaul allowing an mp3.com style system of self-advertising, their claims in the article are fairly self-serving in their defense against RIAA. However, the potential is there. I'd LOVE to see them actually do it.

Maybe it might make the job of marketing easier, but in this respect Napster is not broken. MP3.com works fine, and Napster works fine. Leave both to do the job each does well. The last thing Napster needs in a bunch of self-serving verbige accompanying each listing. There are file sharing programs that allow links and comments (see Audiogalaxy) but the "viral marketing" of enthusiastic fans chatting about their favorite music is (IMO) more effective in the long run.

G-Force, by Andy O'Meara, kicks ass over that POS proprietary app Ryan Geiss wrote anyday!

check out G-Force

Plugin for winamp and standalone app. Its basicly the technology behind geiss with the ability to program the visuals (Or well, you write mathematical functions, but it works really well!) And more or less its open source. Maybe one day with enough of our support he'll GPL it.

from a functionality standpoint, at least. Audio Galaxy Satellite is very well done, it'll be easy for them to shut down when they get around to it though.

I bet after you use their service for a while, you'll wonder why Napster was so backwards =)

Try Audiogalaxy. It's a lot sweeter than Napster and still evolving. Better yet, it has a Linux client and some GPL'd source code!
Ryan Earl
Software Engineer