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Well there's Emusic.com which has vanilla MP3s, but like other sites without DRM the selection is very limited.

Wow, that's news to me. Who knew?

RealNetworks Music Store and Rhapsody are two DIFFERENT services offered by the same company. They run on two different pieces of software.

Rhapsody is an on-demand streaming service that will let you burn songs to a CD for 79 cents a song. Currently, Rhapsody does NOT allow you to download a file that you could put on an mp3 player.

The Real Music Store is a service, much like Napster, BuyMusic.com or iTunes. They sell DRMed music files for 99 cents each. They use a unique format called RAX, which is actually AAC, the same format sold at iTunes, but with a different DRM system. Supposedly, those files can be played on an ipod using Real's "Harmony" technology, but Apple has broken that compatibility with firmware updates in the past.

Personally I think the Rhapsody service is very elegant, and the fact that you can't purchase DRMed files is actually a good thing. In a few years, any store selling DRMed files is going to have a rude awakening as its customers find out that the only way to play all these files that they "bought" is to keep their old computer.

Until the major labels start selling MP3s, indie music is the only music worth buying. Emusic.com sells a lot of good music on MP3 for as little as 22 cents a song. They also offer a different track in their library as a a free download each day.

For the major label stuff that I refuse to buy with DRM, Rhapsody is a good service for on-demand listening.

Try also EMusic.com. Mp3 files but NO DRM and a decent selection - no britney either

Really. Then how come eMusic is selling away MP3s without DRM?

That sounds like the exact format I want my portable music to be in, so I may be opening an account. Thanks for the tip!

My mp3 player has no DRM. Files are stored on a standard MMC card. I can pop the card into any flash reader and transfer files. You apple fan boys seem to think DRM is ok. Because of growing support of iTunes, and the general acceptance of DRM and DRM friendly products(iPods). We will see DRM propagate. There are alternatives like Emusic who sell non DRM mp3s from artist like Ray Charles to Creedence Clearwater Revival. But since the general public has shown that they will accept DRM into their lives, record industry won't be licensing music to distributers that don't provide DRM. Thanks again for screwing over our consumer rights.

I'd like to plug, for instance, eMusic, a subscription service for non-DRM mp3s ($10 fer 40 downloads per month). Their catalog isn't too bad, although it is heavy on the stuff that, um, doesn't sell well otherwise. But if you like Jazz, or bands like Big Star or Yo La Tengo, it's fantastic.

Most of the stuff comes from small labels, of course.

Now if I could just play it on a decent non-DRM HD based player, with a great user interface, that's also a portable data drive, Earth would be the best planet ever. Hey! That's like something Sony would've made, in the old days...

you might like Emusic. DRM free mp3s and a pretty good industrial selection. They have a free 50 song trial, I never signed up for the full service though because you had to do a contract. That was a while ago, I don't know the current terms.

The recording industry will not allow Apple, Napster, or anyone else to sell unrescricted, unencumbered digital music, so your argument is really moot.

So how does eMusic get away with selling songs with no DRM?

I have not and will not buy from any of the DRM encumbered stores.

I buy songs from eMusic.com for my iPod. eMusic sells unencumbered MP3 tracks.

The other online music stores could also be 100% compatible with the iPod, by selling unencumbered MP3 tracks.

eMusic is an online music store compatible with the iPod. So there.

I've been using eMusic lately. They don't have a lot of "Top 40" or whatever, but there's a lot of good music. It's also helped me to expand my music tastes.

eMusic

They have a free 50-MP3 trial, and there's no DRM. Their subscription programs range $0.22-$0.25 per song. They use VBR encoding averaging 192kbps (using LAME version 3.92). They also have Linux, Mac, and Windows versions of their download manager software (but you don't have to have the download manager to download songs).

They also compensate artists, and are completely legal!

I'm paying about $.22 per download at http://emusic.com/ for quality non-DRM mp3's and I'm liking it a LOT. If you're not already familiar with eMusic, be sure to check it out - but please keep in mind that it's independant artists and labels only. You won't find Linkin Park there.

Nope. eMusic basic membership, $10 per month for 40 downloads. I misremembered, Genius Loves Company only cost me $3. The selection at eMusic isn't that great, but I haven't failed to find 40 tracks a month that are worth a quarter each. Particularly if you like older jazz and older music in general.

...what I always post to these stories: EMusic, DRM-free, high quality VBR MP3s from a range of labels. Subscription works out at under 25c/track. Definitely a fan.

What about emusic? Of course, selling only independent music, they have little to fear from RIAA pressure...

eMusic is a legal non-DRM site. Lots of really cool music, mostly indie/underground/non-"top-of-the-pops" type stuff. IMHO, the best digital music store around. I discovered some of my favorite bands there. So, it goes without saying I guess that it's not for the Britney Spears crowd, but for those of you who don't mind expanding your horizons and searching for new tastes in music, this will be right up your alley. And it's cheaper than iTunes.

I've yet to find a online music store that will let me use my mp3 player.

Off the top of my head:
eMusic
MP3Tunes

There are also a number of individual artists and labels that sell ordinary MP3s you can use with your player, as well as a number of places offering free sample tracks.

Well, Emusic does have a live music section, but I think they're counted as any other part of the subscription. You do get 30sec sample of any song before you buy, for what it's worth. Anyway, I'm not really in to live music, so I haven't checked it out much. I think there may be other services out there more like what you're thinking.

Actually, when you use the Napster service you also have the option to purchase "most" tracks (don't know what that really means) for an additional $0.99 per track. So it really depends on whether you find that $15 a month for essentially an unlimited free trial (until you quit the service) of all the music a value added.

But as another poster pointed out, the music you "purchase" in iTMS or Napster is still not really yours, because you're still restricted by their DRM from doing a lot of things (protected by fair use) with the music you payed for. You're still tied to certian supported platforms and players, restricted in what computers you can move it to, and forbidden from reselling. Personally, I chose Emusic, because I actually own the music I pay for (well, in the sense you own the music on a CD anyway) and can do what I want with it (within the confines of law). There are other services like this out there too. Of course, many major labels/bands won't allow anyone to actually sell their music in a digital format not encumbered by DRM.

There already is a service that offers DRM-free mp3 music... and it has a pretty extensive catalog... it's emusic. No freakin' Britney Spears on this service. Although you might not find it up to snuff unless you're heavily into indie and obscure music or if you've got a sense of adventure.

Because we all know there are no drm free music services around that offer legitimate and legal in America music downloads.

It's not as though emusic.com didn't already do this...

This is not a new concept. It's already alive and well over at emusic.com. The selection is not great, but you get 50 to 80 high-quality MP3's with NO DRM for a flat monthly fee.

Hmm... I've never considered emusic before. But I clicked your link and saw a zappa album on the front page. Being a zappa fan I know its been rough finding legal downloads online. Lo and behold, emusic has 55 Zappa albums Wow!

You left emusic off your list. But they have been around before the dot com boom and made it through the bust. Hmmm.... Looks like they have Frank Zappa's catalog. Pretty impressive for an also ran.

You left emusic off your list. But they have been around before the dot com boom and made it through the bust. Hmmm.... Looks like they have Frank Zappa's catalog. Pretty impressive for an also ran.

eMusic is mp3 only and works great with my ipod.

as iPod is limited to iTunes when it comes to purchasing music online

No legitimate music site is allowed to sell songs in any of those formats. So other music sites cannot inter-operate with the iPod, unless they break their license agreement with the RIAA.

AllofMP3
eMusic
Magnatune
Warp Records Bleep Store
Audio Lunchbox
I don't speak German so I don't know about this one
Creative Commons has plenty about DRM-free open music sources

This place has worse selection than even http://www.emusic.com/.

They list some other artists there and none of them are any better. Yet they later say they want PI to be have the most "diverse" content. Yeah, right - everything from Britney Spears to Jessica Simpson!

I've been using eMusic.com for several weeks now. I really like it: track prices are very reasonable, no DRM (you get MP3s) and there are loads of great and diverse bands you can find without having to wade through Britney and Justin.

I have no affiliation, just a very satisfied customer.

That's a matter of taste. Ella is fine but I haven't a clue what you would think is better. Check out emusic. They have the best selection of independent music of any service I've seen.

I'm sure you'll fine something you like.

Ideally I'd like:

• ca. $5/album
• if you throw in all the album art in printable-quality pdf format or something, jack the price to maybe $6 an album.
• buying track-per-track doesn't really interest me much generally, price that however you want so long as it's no more than $1/track on the rare occasion I *do* want just one song.
• No DRM, of course. mp3 or ogg is fine, not terribly particular
• good tagging of the files I get
• No subscriptions
• Legal, of course. I like it when musicians get money.

Emusic was absolutely heavenly before they changed their pricing scheme. They're still pretty good I guess, but at ca. 23c/song (higher once you've gone beyond your subscribed monthly "limit") it's still a bit steep for trying bands you've never heard before, and seeing as though Emusic does mostly indie stuff that you've probably never heard of before, that's kind of a drawback. (Mind you, I found some really really great bands on there when they were doing unlimited subscriptions, but I probably wouldn't have heard most of them on their new subscription service.)

Bleep is great. I don't mind the $10/album thing quite so much because I'd otherwise be stuck importing a lot of those albums which drives up the average price for the hardcopy album. Plus they've got stuff otherwise only available on vinyl, etc.

They Might Be Giants' online store is great, mostly for their live shows available there, though the price ($10/album) is a bit steep for anyone who's not already a fan, and obviously the other drawback is that only TMBG is available there.

The price is going to have to be far less than 99c, since so many people here resent all things associated with the Apple store. I'm thinking what, 30 pence will please you guys?

Given the practical considerations that the world brings with it, I could not expect a better service for my needs to emerge than Emusic. Two of the chief positives for the service consist of what it does NOT have: No overblown overproduced overhyped releases from the corporation-grown performers that have been cultivated by the music industry for 70 years (exceptions made for has-beens interesting enough to be remembered). No DRM. What it does have is tons of music that I've never heard of, a worthy percentage of which agrees with me tremendously. They just added a label, "Saregama," which apparently owns the rights to thousands (4,179 to be exact) of soundtracks to Indian musicals...I can choose between the 1950, 1965 and 1999 soundtracks for three films named "Arzoo" for chrissake! (note: the following links are .m3u playlist items for streaming media) Most people don't think this (a sample from 1999's Arzoo) is good music, so I guess it's not for everyone, but I'm happy as a pig in shit. And stop thinking that Bombay musicals all sound alike! Here's the title theme from Dream Girl A search for Lata Mangeshkar brings 539 album and single results! I just wish they could bring back the "all you can eat" policy.

Given the practical considerations that the world brings with it, I could not expect a better service for my needs to emerge than Emusic. Two of the chief positives for the service consist of what it does NOT have: No overblown overproduced overhyped releases from the corporation-grown performers that have been cultivated by the music industry for 70 years (exceptions made for has-beens interesting enough to be remembered). No DRM. What it does have is tons of music that I've never heard of, a worthy percentage of which agrees with me tremendously. They just added a label, "Saregama," which apparently owns the rights to thousands (4,179 to be exact) of soundtracks to Indian musicals...I can choose between the 1950, 1965 and 1999 soundtracks for three films named "Arzoo" for chrissake! (note: the following links are .m3u playlist items for streaming media) Most people don't think this (a sample from 1999's Arzoo) is good music, so I guess it's not for everyone, but I'm happy as a pig in shit. And stop thinking that Bombay musicals all sound alike! Here's the title theme from Dream Girl A search for Lata Mangeshkar brings 539 album and single results! I just wish they could bring back the "all you can eat" policy.

Given the practical considerations that the world brings with it, I could not expect a better service for my needs to emerge than Emusic. Two of the chief positives for the service consist of what it does NOT have: No overblown overproduced overhyped releases from the corporation-grown performers that have been cultivated by the music industry for 70 years (exceptions made for has-beens interesting enough to be remembered). No DRM. What it does have is tons of music that I've never heard of, a worthy percentage of which agrees with me tremendously. They just added a label, "Saregama," which apparently owns the rights to thousands (4,179 to be exact) of soundtracks to Indian musicals...I can choose between the 1950, 1965 and 1999 soundtracks for three films named "Arzoo" for chrissake! (note: the following links are .m3u playlist items for streaming media) Most people don't think this (a sample from 1999's Arzoo) is good music, so I guess it's not for everyone, but I'm happy as a pig in shit. And stop thinking that Bombay musicals all sound alike! Here's the title theme from Dream Girl A search for Lata Mangeshkar brings 539 album and single results! I just wish they could bring back the "all you can eat" policy.

It is nice to know thay still use LAME version 3.92
Do not know what preset thay use, I prefer -alt-preset standard

Well.. not to say anything bad about the quality of the site.. but.. they have Moby as a featured artist. Man that guy is scary.

The iTMS was the only online music store that really had me sit up and take notice. Now eMusic is making me do the same thing.

iTunes is nice since it's cheap per song, but the selection, though huge, misses out one some less mainstream, more niche genres. eMusic seems to fill in the missing areas pretty well (although still not enough psychedelic trance) and provides DRM-free tunes. This company could go quite far.

For most consumers, though, I think the price-per-song versus a monthly price could still be the deciding factor.

Here's the link to browse their catalog!

Stupid promo redirect.

• bleep.com (Warp Records)
• They Might be Giants (and Back Office Music, the place which created their store)
• Even though their subscription levels kind of suck now, emusic.com.

Sure. Magnatude http://www.magnatune.com/, GarageBand.com http://www.garageband.com/, emusic http://www.emusic.com/, and others. Just because sites with over 300,000 songs don't sell mp3s doesn't mean no one is.

Besides your mixing metaphors. First your comparing hardware, the iPod, to format or software. If you have an iPod, the question is when, where, and why would it make sense to buy wma files. If the files can be converted to mp3 or aac relatively easily, then sure go ahead and purchase. If they can't, then WHY would you purchase then complain.

The iPod plays an impressive, though not extensive, array of musical formats, including: mp3, wav, aac, apple lossless, and audiobook. I think I'm missing something else, but still. The iRiver is more extensive adding ogg, and wma. But if you exclude ogg and other marginal, but up-and-coming formats from the list, you could pretty much say the iPod plays EVERYTHING except WMA.

Microsoft licensed WMA DRM, Apple hasn't licensed FairPlay, but the have essentially licensed the iPod.

While not a fan of the WMA format, I can say sure its an okay format

it's priced as a subscription plan. you pay a monthly fee and are able to download "up to" a certain number of MP3 files during the month... it's $9.99/mo for 40, $14.99 for 65, or $19.99 for 90 songs per month. if you want to go over your limit they sell "booster tracks" (the help pages don't give any pricing info on these) and if you don't use your entire limit for a month they don't carry over to the next month.

eMusic

Mp3 doesn't support DRM. Actually, there are DRM'd mp3 implementations out there probably, but no digital music player will support them. The recording industry will NEVER allow the online sale of an un-DRM'd digital audio file.

Erm, eMusic has been selling MP3s for ages. I think that they are supposed to announcing some changes this month too. Yup, see here.

Mp3 doesn't support DRM. Actually, there are DRM'd mp3 implementations out there probably, but no digital music player will support them. The recording industry will NEVER allow the online sale of an un-DRM'd digital audio file.

Erm, eMusic has been selling MP3s for ages. I think that they are supposed to announcing some changes this month too. Yup, see here.