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But can DRM truly be the solution to prevent exploits and worms? I doubt it. I expect that it will be trivial to exploit a program that's already been verified and make it do something it shouldn't even with fairly well implemented DRM.

Email viruses may be halted in their tracks - but most exploits will most likely not be. You say the Palladium implementation of DRM is sophisticated enough to detect a code change during runtime from a stack overwrite? I doubt it, but if so - just change the data instead. Same effect. It raises the bar, but viruses share a characteristic there with open source - the bar only has to be hurdled once before the flood. See the recent rash of RPC hole worms and exploits - one guy did it, now everyone and their 12 year old can.

And licensing a piece of software for $1000-$2000 so that it could run in the first place is ridiculous. Do you like freeware, shareware, or open source? It'd kill it on that platform. Might be great for the competing platforms, but not the one it's on.

I think the real threat with DRM though is that it'll be used in the ways we've already seen, only more expansive. Wanna play a DVD you bought on an unauthorized operating system? Pay the fee, or, if the owners are too lazy to write software for your OS, just forget about it. And don't even think about writing a program to play it for you if you value your freedom.

If left unchecked, CD's will become that way. Downloadable audio has already started to. Tried to download an mp3 from iTunes on Linux? Find anywhere else you can get the same tunes legally? For now - yes, just buy the CD. For now. Hopefully consumers will be upset enough as use of such copy protection schemes increase to purchase alternatives. I subscribe to E-Music myself - no DRM, but I'm paying for the industry to create more, and mostly to smaller lables (mainly Napalm, if they keep track - bands like Tristania, The Sins of Thy Beloved, etc).

I'd also highly reccommend Townhall. They got a sloppy/tight groove kinda sound... and Allmusic likes 'em too.

Thank you for injecting a much-needed reality check into a /. discussion on music swapping. If there's anything about your comment where I would nitpick is the use of the word "stealing". I think that copyright infringement is not "stealing", it's copyright infringement. This doesn't make it any less illegal, I just wanted to be clear.

As for conscience-clear cheap music aquisition, try out EMusic. It's not for everyone, but if you're into indie rock and/or jazz, it's well worth it. $10-$15/month for all-you-can-eat, no-DRM, 192Kb/s average VBR mp3s (encoded with LAME, no less). Support for Mac/Windows/Linux.

They're actually encoding music now using a VBR, which averages out to about 192kbs, using the LAME 3.92 encoder w/ -alt-preset (which someone else mentioned I believe).
see The Emusic VBR FAQ for more info

I was really hoping buymusic would expand the pool of legit music but based on the responses here, the fact that they've locked out my browser, and (it sounds like) their files are drm'd. With eMusic the selection is not extensive but they have real mp3's with no limits on how many times you can play or download. Ten bucks a month, no threat of prosecution, all the mp3's you can eat. I'm not an employee or a stock holder just a happy customer.

May I also recommend EMusic
$10-$15 a month. "Unlimited" (mostly) HQ MP3 downloads.
I signed up a few months ago, and I've been quite happy with them.
They even have a download manager for Linux, although it required a bit of tweaking...

I suggest you check out their catalogue. If you find something interesting, they have a 50 track free trial.

The downside? Customer service is slooooow. But the forums are OK, and you can find help there.

I need money. You offer me money in exchange for my television. I sign a contract giving you the television in exchange for money. Later, my neighbor, who has been coming to visit me to watch my television, is outraged that I gave it to you. Since he's been watching it at my house, he goes to your house and demands to watch it there. You say no. Since you're denying him his right to watch television, he breaks into your house and watches the television whenever he wants. If you ask him to leave, you're obviously a greedy SOB. Sound familiar?

I don't care for the current state of IP law in this country. However, it is the law. As a citizen, I have the responsibility to obey it or change it by peaceful means. Those who suggest my desire to listen to whatever music I want to for free requires civil disobedience to free us from government tyranny do a great disservice to those who have used, and continue to use, civil disobedience to accomplish noble and worthy goals.

Here's the way it is, folks: the musicians who sign away their rights for a bowl of lentil stew do so voluntarily. No one put a gun to their heads and forced them to do so. No one put a gun to their heads and forced them to become musicians. They chose to make music and they chose to market it in a certain manner. Now, they have to live with the consequences of those decisions. This is called being an adult.

How do I deal with the RIAA? Simple: I don't buy CDs I feel are not worth the cost. Neither do I steal the music via P2P. If it's on EMusic, I download it legally. If it's on the radio, I listen to it legally. If it's available at a used CD store, I buy it legally.

The latter is important, since the right to do so was established in a court of law after a challenge by the RIAA. No matter your feelings about the current legal system, it's the best we have at the moment. With time, and the proper case, sanity will prevail.

In the meantime, have the courage to act on your principles, not your appetites. If you object to paying outrageous prices for junk music, don't pay; but don't steal it. Instead, do the principled thing: listen to music that's offered to you on your terms. Better yet, learn to make music yourself...they can't take that away from you.

Emusic has better music (IMO, YMMV) and definitely friendlier terms and cheaper prices. (unlimited downloads for $15 a month, VBR encoded mp3s with no DRM).

www.emusic.com

But it *is* interesting to hear that Apple has been courting independent record labels (which largely make up Emusic's catalog).

Really?

Even if the licence stipulates you cannot move content outof the U.S. there appears to be no DRM type software "phoning home" or disabling the playback of downloaded mp3's.

emusic.com

It's variable bitrate, except for older stuff. At least from what I can tell anyway. I've only been a member for around 5 hours (thank you, BTW!). Long enough to fall in love with emusic.com. I grabbed some Django, some Frank Black, and a bunch of stuff I'd never heard before.

All the "older" stuff I've got so far (Billie Holiday, Arite Shaw, Django Reinhardt) is 128kbs. The "newer" stuff (The Future Sound Of London) is variable bitrate. Looks to be average like 190kbs.

I'm guessing anything that was mono to begin with is 128, anything else gets encoded VBR. They have a FAQ which helps some.

-B

iTunes is Apple only, for now. If you like Indie music (CDBaby's market), try emusic.com - they're also on CDBaby's distribution list. They sell MP3's with no DRM, and have download clients for Windows, Mac and Linux. Not many popular (RIAA) artists in their library, but if you're like me you don't listen to those anyways...

-j

Apple may not accept them, but this also covers a bunch of other distribution channels. Emusic is big with indie music fans, so I would imagine it's a little easier for CDBaby to get artists on there. Plus, they offer more consumer-friendly practices, like selling plain MP3's with no DRM.

-j

I would hate to see iTMS turn into a place where there is a bunch of crap music, sort of like MP3.com

Who's to say whats crap? They have a lot of music that I don't care for, but then I've been turned on to more great music through mp3.com then any other single source. I like what CDbaby is doing and hope to see them forming more partnerships, preferably with sites like emusic.com who have stayed away from the DRM stuff.

Personally I am waiting for some to do something with MP3's. I don't like DRM, it's my music I can do what I want with it.

Have you tried EMusic? They don't carry the latest Top 40 crap-ola, but they do have lots of cool stuff. All the MP3s you want for $9.99/month. I typically grab several albums' worth a month, so it's well worth the money. Some of their stuff is 128k, some is higher quality (don't remember the bitrate off-hand).

Why is this site overlooked?

-mp3 format

-no DRM

-unlimited downloads for $10-$15/month

-large catalog

-first 50 mp3's are free

Pretty cool. I just downloaded the entire Pavement and Pixies catalogs plus some Noam Chomsky "spoken word". I signed up for 3 months @ $45.

Most of my MP3s are replacements for CDs that were destroyed.

How many CDs have you destroyed? Are you that hard on them?

I don't think there's anything wrong (let's leave legality aside for now) with obtaining copies of works you've purchased, for any reason, but that's not really the point of a bill that goes after the "sharers". Those people are offering copyrighted material for unrestricted copying without a license to do so, or indeed even checking to see if the recipient of the copy is even morally entitled to the copy.

And that brings me to this -- you may be morally entitled to copies of the same work you've paid for, but that certainly does not mean anyone's entitled to let you copy their copies in the manner that is currently done on file-"sharing" networks -- without checking to see if the recipient is morally entitled to that copy.

FWIW, my MP3s are either from Emusic, or of CDs I own for convenience purposes (to play on the portable or in the office). I've never managed to destroy a CD; they're pretty hardy lil buggers considering the amount of computer equipment I have destroyed... :-)

Try Emusic I've downloaded several things from boards.. and autechre...

10 bucks a month and all you can eat. I've probably downloaded around 1000 albums in the past 6 months.. So about .60 per album...

Some mainstream stuff but mostly eclectic off the beaten path..

eMusic

Emusic is the kind of online music service I think most of us want. You pay a monthly fee to download high quality MP3s. No DRM, no embedded advertising. If they had all the music you might want, there would be nothing more to wish for.

And that's the main thing, of course. They don't generally have the name bands, so your satisfaction with the service depends on you being open to discovering lesser known music.

If that's what you're looking for, you'll find plenty. Go check it out. Also, there are some things there that you may already want, and you could maybe get a good deal by signing up for the minimum term and downloading, say, just the Pixies and a truckload of comedy albums.

It's probably too much to hope for, but if they continue to grow, they may expand their catalog to the point where most music is available from them, free of restrictions.

Unfortunately, it's not all wine and roses, but close enough for me. Here are some things that may turn you off:

• They recently angered their Linux-using customers by making their closed source download manager mandatory. The Linux version sucks rather badly. Some customers can't download at all.
• Use the service excessively (in their view) and they cut you off. There's a 2000 track/month limit.
• The download manager only allows you to queue up 45 tracks. Limiting this is probably the reason they made the DLM mandatory. Why they don't do this on the server side, I can't imagine.
• Some albums are only available to US subscribers.
• You have to commit for 3 or 12 months.
• If you have extreme audio quality demands, the VBR MP3s (about 192kbps average) may not be enough. I've heard warbling in a couple of files. I listen with Sennheiser HD600's.

Well, they do have a pay model of sorts - that is emusic. Emusic charges $14.95/month, or $9.99/month, depending on the duration you sign up for (3 months / 12 months). MP3.com and Emusic are both owned by the same comapny (Universal, I believe).

I for one have no problem with this, other than my wanting to side with the little guy and not "The Man." It's illegal, as far as I know, to distribute content that you don't have the right to distribute. Better the RIAA go after actual lawbreakers than they go after services which are used for legitimate purposes as well.

Oh, and for those of you who got freaked out after reading that the RIAA's cracking down, there's always EMusic and the Apple Store. I did notice that it is frequently cheaper to just buy the CD at Cheap CDs.com than it is to pay $9.99 for the AAC-encoded album. Check there first! Just a public service announcement so you don't get screwed like I did. :)

Vivendi Universal is the owner of Blizzard. Vivendi Universal hates the free software movement, why? Because its assosiated [sic] with the Mp3/FileSharing movement.

It depends on how you define 'research'. My research consisted of reading their online message forums [specifically, the emusic general section I've linked to].

As I write this, the first topic on the page is "I have been warned for abuse over 'reasonable' limits" where someone is complaining about unfairly getting hit with a warning letter stating that they have downloaded "too much" [too much from an unlimited d/l pool? hmmm...]

Also, this post would lead me to believe that using another d/l manager is specifically against the TOS and can get you canned.

I will have to concede the "counted against" idea since I cannot find the post that gave me that impression...but I hope I have proven that I have done a fair amount of research, and I am not trolling. [on an ad-hominem note - since you brougth out the T-word - I do have to wonder if you are not astro-turfing]

It depends on how you define 'research'. My research consisted of reading their online message forums [specifically, the emusic general section I've linked to].

As I write this, the first topic on the page is "I have been warned for abuse over 'reasonable' limits" where someone is complaining about unfairly getting hit with a warning letter stating that they have downloaded "too much" [too much from an unlimited d/l pool? hmmm...]

Also, this post would lead me to believe that using another d/l manager is specifically against the TOS and can get you canned.

I will have to concede the "counted against" idea since I cannot find the post that gave me that impression...but I hope I have proven that I have done a fair amount of research, and I am not trolling. [on an ad-hominem note - since you brougth out the T-word - I do have to wonder if you are not astro-turfing]

It depends on how you define 'research'. My research consisted of reading their online message forums [specifically, the emusic general section I've linked to].

As I write this, the first topic on the page is "I have been warned for abuse over 'reasonable' limits" where someone is complaining about unfairly getting hit with a warning letter stating that they have downloaded "too much" [too much from an unlimited d/l pool? hmmm...]

Also, this post would lead me to believe that using another d/l manager is specifically against the TOS and can get you canned.

I will have to concede the "counted against" idea since I cannot find the post that gave me that impression...but I hope I have proven that I have done a fair amount of research, and I am not trolling. [on an ad-hominem note - since you brougth out the T-word - I do have to wonder if you are not astro-turfing]

Run, do not walk, to emusic.com. For $10 bucks a month, you get unlimited MP3 access to an outstanding jazz collection. They've got some great historical collections, a reasonable sampling of modern artists, and you've got an easy way to try out some music you otherwise wouldn't have risked money on.

Plus you've still got leftover money for a CD each month!

I'd like recommend the recordings from the 1930's by Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelli (Quintette of the Hot Club de France). Groundbreaking and virtuoso (acoustic)guitar and violin playing in a unique 'European' swing idiom (double bass, 2 rhythm guitars, lead guitar, violin).

Some ideas:

The Classic Early Recordings in Chronological Order
Quintette du Hot Club de France: 25 Classics 1934-1940

Also, EMusic has a lot of this stuff available for download.

JP

there is an even better option 4. Buy from people like cdbaby

This helps precisely zero when I can't control the artist and song preferences of a family member who prefers major label teen pop.

I would prefer an option 5 though. A digital music service where I can download individual tracks with no DRM

Anything like eMusic?

I don't know if it's a typo or what, but $21/ month for eMusic??? I'm paying $9.99 a month cuz I signed up for a year. Month to month is $15 or so. . . . Why $21?? Is there some pricing plan that I'm missing?

I've been enjoying EMusic for more than a year now -- dozens and dozens of indie labels put up albums and songs, for a flat rate of $21 / month, as non-DRM mp3s. I *love* this service -- it's helped me find a lot of new bands because it's subscription-based (and thus there's no risk when downloading a song by somebody new).

Indie labels stand to make a lot more money off of Apple than they do EMusic -- and I imagine they'll flock to it. While I support this in principle, Apple's DRM, lack of try-before-you-buy, and (lets face it) expense really rubs me the wrong way.

Emusic? Multi-platform support (including Linux), VBR mp3s at 192kb/s average (encoded with LAME, no less), subscription based (all you can eat for $10 or $15). The only thing they DON'T have is the records of the big ones (unless you think Yo La Tengo and Modest Mouse are big).

All these new online music services are great and all... but I'll stick with EMusic, 10 bux a month, unlimited downloads of non DRM encumbered Lame --alt-preset standard encoded VBR mp3's that play on my mp3 player and can be burned to cds. Tons of good music in every genre known to the ear. No, they don't have all of the latest popular music, but they do have tons of lesser known but fantastic albums.

I at least suggest you use their free trial.., and no I dont work for them, I am just really freakin impressed with their service.

www.emusic.com

If you're after older catalog material, then emusic.com may be to your liking. They have lots of old catalog stuff and for $10 a month you can download all the tracks you want in 128kbit MP3 format.

...or, you could subscribe to emusic.com for $10 a month and burn all the CDs you want.

EMusic sells subscriptions for downloading (officially licensed) MP3s. I'm amazed this company isn't better-known.

There is an alternative for those who want to have their cake and burn it, too: EMusic. For $10/month, subscribers can download reasonably high quality, VBR MP3s and do with them as they wish, short of sharing them with the world.

The catch: if all you want is the latest ClearChannel dreck, you'll have to look elsewhere. The labels on EMusic are not the Big 5/Top 40 pablum. However, if your taste runs to the esoteric and the adventurous, as well as to college station material, you may want to check it out. 30 second samples of their entire collection is available for visitors to sample.

I don't really know why this service doesn't get more publicity. IMHO, it's close to the perfect model for online music.

It already exists, and it's DRM free. Emusic already has over well over 250,000 songs available from over 950 different labels (Such as Matador, SpinART, Beggars Banquet/4AD, Epitaph...). All tracks are cd-quality VBR mp3s (well, -almost- all, a few are still only 128bit). You can download individual tracks, or entire albums with a single click. It's $10 a month, but requires a 1 year contract. Not bad since I've easily downloaded $120 worth of CD's in the three weeks or so since I've joined.

I think enough people don't care about quality, or only listen to the music from the computer speaker system, that DRM will always be circumvented. All it takes is one patient person to make the digital copy (mp3 or ogg) then it will replicate everywhere.

How about emusic? Subscription service, 'unlimited' downloads, and you own the (high quality VBR) MP3s.

I say 'unlimited' because they get upset if you download more than a few thousand tracks a month... still good value though.

I'd rather go somewhere else where the music is better, the downloads are virtually unlimited and the sound quality is the best of any subscription service on the net (Lame VBR encoded MP3s).

What am I talking about? EMusic of course.

No, they don't have stuff like Britney Spears and Led Zeppelin, but they have more excellent indie, experimental, electronic, metal, jazz, punk, classical and uncategorizable music than you could ever listen to in a lifetime. If you're sick of Clear Channel bullshit and hungry for something exciting and interesting, it is a feast.

And you get to keep every single file you have downloaded. Permanently.

(I know they had some trouble recently with their new servers wbut that seems to be resolved now)

www.emusic.com/tmbg/

If they'd just release MP3's

Try here.

$0.99 per song is too much. CD's cost ~$15 these days, and contain ~15 songs.

First of all, the price of most albums on iTunes is capped at $9.99. (Multiple disc sets may be more expensive.) Second, most albums in pop genres that contain 15 songs do not contain 15 good songs.

Let's start with the "Emusic download manager," hmm? "Required to download any track or album." I.e., spyware. That's suckage #1.

Now let's talk about those .emp files. The DRM-encumbered .emp files. That's suckage #2.

Now let's talk about the catalog. It's awful. That's suckage #3.

Now let's talk about that subscription fee thing. What the fuck is that? I pay a monthly fee for my rent and my electricity. I don't pay a monthly fee for my CD's! That's suckage #4.

Emusic was dead long before iTunes Music Store came out. Somebody needs to bury that fucker.

emusic.com does not carry next year's Grammy nominations but if you're into Jazz or older alternative it is cheaper than Apple's offering, has been along longer, and is not DRM restricted.

None of the other services let you put the songs on a portable MP3 player, let alone burning it to an audio CD

That does sound pretty good, would you pay, say $59 a month or something for unlimited mp3s? I might...

Why pay $59 when it only costs $9.95/ month from EMusic (www.emusic.com )?

Dont have mac hardware etc, but I have tried this emusic which I liked. Unlimited downloads for 9.99 a month (for 1 year) or 14.99 a month (for 3 months). It has streaming samples so you can see what they have beforehand (mostly rare stuff moreso than mainstream), Plus a 50 mp3 free trial.

I would guess the music selections are different, but on balance, I think I would prefer something like eMusic to Apple's $1/song.