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Having had a kid's DVD become unreadable the other day, not having been able to take a backup of it because of the "let's break the DVD in subtle ways so it can't be ripped, but can be played" scheme, I welcome anyone who cracks down on these stupid schemes.

If there was a Kickstarter or similar funding scheme, I'd donate to it (well, perhaps checking the local laws first).

For now, I've resorted to never again buying a DVD from that publisher again.

Yes, I could buy a streaming solution, but, and this surprises me, a couple of similar incidents over the past years, have made me realize that for things I do care about, and I probably care about these kid's movies for the next 5-10 years, it's better if I own the media myself.

I do have a Magnatune subscription, because I feel I can trust those people, but I'd never trust someone in the cahoots with the big media corporations.

Well, they do have a download for Linux. But it is unsupported. It needs to either be supported or open source so we can self-support (like we do for so much other stuff). So, clearly, I am not in their intended market. So, clearly, they don't expect money from me. So, how can they make a valid legal case that me not paying them means they are losing any money (that I have deprived them of anything). FYI, I do pay for my music that has a cost attached, like at Magnatune.

... any RIAA crap. i use Magnatune.

It's not because of the money, although my share (like all the other artists) was dramatically reduced by bad deals made without my consent.

then stop dealing with the big record companies.

It's about sound quality. I don't need my music to be devalued by the worst quality in the history of broadcasting or any other form of distribution. I don't feel right allowing this to be sold to my fans. It's bad for my music. For me, It's about making and distributing music people can really hear and feel. I stand for that. When the quality is back, I'll give it another look. Never say never.

put your music on Magnatune. then it can be heard in the lossless FLAC format. which is actually better than CDs if you use the 48k sample rate.

For more varied musical interests see also:
Jamendo for royalty free music, often CC licensed.
Magnatune for decent licensed music usually listenable non-commercially for free.

try

https://magnatune.com/

i personally love it, and a few years ago bought a life time membership (even after buying several albums from them).

Only thing i wish was that their phone app was better (and had random across favorites) and that they had a desktop player like PandoraOne so that i don't have to leave a web browser always running to listen (and the player would work with media keys for play/pause/stop)

It's working pretty damn good, actually.

Sure, if you are playing label music. There's plenty of good music out there that's not attached to the RIAA.

Not the GP, but my CD collection went up from a handful to 220ish CD's during the Napster era.

Through napster I discovered music and artists I didn't even knew existed. I would then go to the local Circuit City and would buy their CDs (sometimes their whole discography) since I had got a taste and I liked it. I wanted more and I wanted it all at the highest quality.

When Napster was shut down I refused to send a penny to the RIAA and its labels. A Nine Inch Nails album - Ghosts (which Trent released as an independent an sold directly through his website) was the first CD I bought after all those years.

After that I bought a few CDs (less than 10 though) thanks to the guidance from RIAARadar (a website that has sadly gone silent).

I bought a lifetime membership to Magnatune. I have gotten my money's worth in album downloads from that site.

I pitched in a donation to Musopen (many CDs worth) during their Kickstarter a few years ago to help them record and release free open music. The recording was done, the donors were given the first downloads and it has been great.

So I have been willing to put money in the proverbial guitar case, but to this day I still refuse to hand money to the RIAA. When given the opportunity I will gleefully hand my entertainment dollars to their competition instead.

I now own about 230 physical CDs and I will likely own no more than that for the foreseeable future.

I'll continue to pump my (now more numerous) entertainment dollars to other non-RIAA recipients at every opportunity. Not (just) out of spite for what they've done to the music scene and to stifle the growth of consumer friendly distribution channels, but to cast my votes, my dollars to a better alternatives.

Magnatune does this . So if you're a member, you are free to use their music in your non-commercial projects.

This was the reason I took all the money from CDs I had abstained from buying from RIAA Members and instead got a lifetime subscription from Magnatune.

I'm streaming from Magnatune to my Bose QC 15 right now.

This is where I buy music today: http://magnatune.com/ I bought their entire list, past present and future, in a lifetime subscription. I listen to everything, whether it's something I think I like or not. I like lots of it, and the rest expands my listening capacity.

During the Napster days, my CD collection grew from a dozen CDs to over 200 for precisely that reason. Before I only knew a handful of artists I would want to buy CDs from. After I was exposed to Napster, I was able to download songs from people who had the similar tastes (you could search for obscure songs you like, find a user with that song, view all songs shared by that user, download away) and because of this I discovered tons more music I loved and bought (and also tons of weird stuff).

After the whole debacle where Napster was shut down I refused to buy any RIAA member label CDs. Thanks to sites like RIAA Radar, artists releasing their own albums (ex: NIN), and alternate labels (like Magnatune) this has been pretty easy so far.

Odd... Riaa radar seems to be down for now...

Yeah, my first thought was that I'd find it hard to find ethical music suppliers in the UK - specifically the ones run by the labels.

I guess the only places I'll by buying from now will be Magnatune and Bandcamp

Actually, I have never pirated. But I have downloaded. What I did was use the downloads to preview the music. Then I discarded them. The only downloads I still have are ones from a few artists sites that were intentionally giving them away. I used the preview downloads to make decisions on which CDs to buy, and actually did buy CDs based on the previews. The rate was about 8%. That is, if I had bought a CD corresponding to every downloaded tune, that would be 100%. But most of it I didn't like, such as Electronica that had vocals injected somewhere (I much prefer instrumental music, but I do have some vocal music I like, too). The downloads helped me to actually buy CDs. Had the downloads NOT been available, these are CDs I would likely never have.

That said, CDs are today very impractical. It's physically too large. No one carries a player anywhere near that size. The RIAA needs to get that clue bashed into their stupid heads and figure out better marketing. Still, I have bought a couple CDs in the past few years ... and "ripped" them so they could be a part of my collection. If I can't "rip" them I can't play them. If I can't play them, what's the point in buying them.

Today, most of my music collection comes from Magnatune, a site I do believe the RIAA has tried to shut down by means of illegal tricks, because it's a business model (not be evil) that they don't like. One of the great things with downloads from Magnatune is that I can modify and remix them. A lot of the music has a faster beat than I want, and I can actually slow it down in mplayer (I have my own wrapper program to do it). I can't do that with music played by some proprietary player program. And I doubt it hurts the feelings of the artists if I play their music in a different way or even remix it for my own playing as they get their bits either way and they can't hear how I might have corrupted their art.

Sales of CDs has gone down for reasons very similar to the reasons that vinyl has gone done ... there's something better out there. Unfortunately for most big corporations, they didn't figure it out soon enough ... to actually give people what they want. The vinyl format was industry produced. The CD format was industry produced. Music files that can be downloaded was not, and they just can't stand that they didn't invent it.

Not me. The CD is already a physically obsolete medium. If there were no internet, I would still not by CDs. If the music industry didn't provide music on micro-SD cards, I'd just get it on micro-SD cards at the local flea markets.

BTW, when music hit the internet, but before the flash devices were practical, I actually did buy more CDs as a result, because I could sample so much more music and be sure I was buying something I knew I would like. Then I had to copy them into my "juke box" system (Linux based).

Now days, most of my music collection comes from Magnatune ... all legal (and not evil).

No, your parent post was right. Some of us around here are still troglodytes who prefer to buy their music on CDs. It's still by far the better way to get decent sound reproduction than those crappy compressed files you might get from iTunes. Of course, there are some outlets who let you download and send you optical media, but I guess they're in the minority...

It was one thing when it came to buying digital music. You could spend $1 to get the song that you wanted, rather than paying $25 to get a CD with the song that you wanted. That's a big enough price difference to make it worthwhile. But with e-books, it's just stupid to spend $15 on a e-book, while the actual book is only $17.

But you're merely haggling over price, as the old joke goes. I don't think digital handcuffs become acceptable at any price because I don't want to be taken advantage of. The physical book confers rights of ownership DRM is designed to take away regardless of how little one pays for the DRM-riddled alternative. As George Hoteling saw first hand years ago, one might not have right of first sale anymore. Even ostensible advantages one might imagine come nearly free in digital format aren't necessarily there like they should be as Wil Wheaton saw when he updated his iPod software with Apple software and lost all of his tracks only to learn Apple would restore them in what Wheaton called a "one-time only do-over to replace all of your purchased music, free of charge". Magnatune.com, on the other hand, lets you restore purchased tracks as many time as you want, share tracks with others, and Magnatune always sold its wares DRM-free. Inexpensive digital media doesn't become more attractive with restrictions management.

Wil Wheaton nailed it when he said "make it simple, make it cheap, and folks WILL buy it. Make it expensive and a pain to use? people will just BT". he gave a perfect example, he bought the Doctor Who episodes on iTunes and then when he crossed the Canadian border his videos wouldn't play so his first thought was 'If I would have just pirated it i'd be watching my shows now".

I'm glad to see that he's coming around to seeing this from a more wisened user's perspective, but apparently he still has much to learn about doing business with Apple and becoming more articulate about defining his interests. In 2006 Wheaton lost all of his iTunes tracks while "upgrading" to some version of iTunes. Wheaton contacted Apple and then Apple restored the lost tracks to his account. Wheaton treated this as a reason to do business with Apple ("If you make a purchase from the iTunes Music Store, and something horrible happens and you lose all your music, Apple will give you a one-time only do-over to replace all of your purchased music, free of charge.") instead of looking at this as a problem to be solved. Removing all DRM and letting users make copies of the media puts users in a position where users can rescue themselves from unfortunate losses. Users ought to be able to re-download purchased media as many times as they wish, and share tracks as well. Magnatune.com, by contrast, does all of this: they never got into the DRM game so Magnatune has no (apparently halfway) Apple-style backtracking to go through on DRM. Magnatune contributes to FLOSS player programs; programs that give technically-minded users the opportunity to inspect programs before you run them so users don't walk into the trap Wheaton experienced in 2006 with iTunes. Magnatune lets users re-download purchased tracks as much as the customer wishes upon supplying an email address at purchase time (for logging in). Magnatune also lets you share membership downloads with some friends. Purchasing media from Magnatune means you can play the media as much as you want without anyone tracking what you play, where you play it, or restricting what you use to play the media they sell.

Wil Wheaton nailed it when he said "make it simple, make it cheap, and folks WILL buy it. Make it expensive and a pain to use? people will just BT". he gave a perfect example, he bought the Doctor Who episodes on iTunes and then when he crossed the Canadian border his videos wouldn't play so his first thought was 'If I would have just pirated it i'd be watching my shows now".

I'm glad to see that he's coming around to seeing this from a more wisened user's perspective, but apparently he still has much to learn about doing business with Apple and becoming more articulate about defining his interests. In 2006 Wheaton lost all of his iTunes tracks while "upgrading" to some version of iTunes. Wheaton contacted Apple and then Apple restored the lost tracks to his account. Wheaton treated this as a reason to do business with Apple ("If you make a purchase from the iTunes Music Store, and something horrible happens and you lose all your music, Apple will give you a one-time only do-over to replace all of your purchased music, free of charge.") instead of looking at this as a problem to be solved. Removing all DRM and letting users make copies of the media puts users in a position where users can rescue themselves from unfortunate losses. Users ought to be able to re-download purchased media as many times as they wish, and share tracks as well. Magnatune.com, by contrast, does all of this: they never got into the DRM game so Magnatune has no (apparently halfway) Apple-style backtracking to go through on DRM. Magnatune contributes to FLOSS player programs; programs that give technically-minded users the opportunity to inspect programs before you run them so users don't walk into the trap Wheaton experienced in 2006 with iTunes. Magnatune lets users re-download purchased tracks as much as the customer wishes upon supplying an email address at purchase time (for logging in). Magnatune also lets you share membership downloads with some friends. Purchasing media from Magnatune means you can play the media as much as you want without anyone tracking what you play, where you play it, or restricting what you use to play the media they sell.

See the Magnatune blog. They sent a $614 check to GNOME, but Canonical's part is still waiting. The thing is that nowhere users are made aware of the fact that Canonical keep the cut for themselves, I had to stumble upon this article.

Visa already did this to Magnatune and covered it up with excuses. Every business gets fraudulent charges coming through. But Magnatune was treated differently than most.

I'd like to provide my feedback to both parties in this. I found the email addresses of a couple people at PCMAG that I could write to an express my views. So far, I have found NO email addresses of ANY of the executives who wrote that letter to PCMAG (as seen on Billboard).

My conclusion is clear. PCMAG has at least some interest in what its readers, and the general public, think about this. But the music industry executives clearly have no interest in what people think. They have their heads in the sand. They have some idea of what product they want to deliver, and all they want is to push it so hard that people will just accept it.

I really just wanted to ask them ... personally ... and that means NOT some secretary answering ... I want to hear directly from these executives themselves since they think their names are so important ... just where I can BUY music that will work for me (beyond what Magnatune has). Do they even consider me to be part of their target market? I have some serious doubts. And I bet a lot of people do, now.

And society loses by losing an artist.

No disrespect intended to artists, but (largely due to copyright) we already have far more "art" than we need—quite a bit of which barely qualifies as mediocre entertainment just a way to stave off boredom for a while. Certainly the end of copyright would lead to fewer artists, full-time or part-time. Those who remain will do so because (a) they want to, regardless of the degree of compensation; or (b) because they are good enough to attract the notice of individuals or organizations both desiring the creation of original work and having the means to pay for its production; old-fashioned patronage, essentially, but to membership- or donation-based groups (e.g. cultural societies, endowments for the arts, private libraries, fan clubs) rather than just a few wealthy individuals. I imagine (b) would be the dominant factor, but one need only look to sites like Magnatune and Jamendo to see that free distribution of copies is not an impediment to creativity.

http://www.magnatune.com/

http://www.amazon.com/Indie-Music-CDs/b?ie=UTF8&node=266023

http://www.itunes.com/indiespotlight

that took all of 30 seconds

There will always be thieves in the world. It is the nature of some people. The proper question you need to answer is why do the honest people need to suffer?

But there is also the fair use issue. And NO, this is NOT a case of fair use being lost because of the thieves. Fair use is lost because the content producers see taking it away as a form of increasing their revenues. They want to force you to buy more copies of the content. If I want to be able to listen to a good song on my computer while posting on Slashdot, and also listen to the same song on my portable player while jogging, they want me to buy it TWICE. Compare this to places like Magnatune

that, instead, play fair with consumers ... and artists.

If your optical media is damaged, they don't want you to be able to play it from a backup source, even though you have paid for the music or movie. They want you to be forced to buy a new copy from them. A copy in which the artist gets less than 10% for music (it would not be good enough for them if you paid the artist directly for the cost of a replacement ... they want you to buy their piece of media ... again).

They also don't want you to resell their media to someone else just because you bought it to see if you might like it, and discover that you don't like it. If you don't like the content, they want you to be stuck with the full cost, regardless (and as such, they don't want you to even preview the content online, such it could mean lost sales because only people that like it would buy it).

They do it on http://www.magnatune.com/ but then rock stars would rather be rock stars than be good artists.

http://magnatune.com/

Website looks like shit, but they pay their artists 50 of gross income, or so they claim. They also have no DRM, and are doing something with CreativeCommons, although I suspect they haven't fully groked the implications of that.

http://magnatune.com/ has already been mentioned, they have some good Early Music recordings. Check out the folk stuff, too, there's some good crossover material.

... download music (and some movies), and then delete it after they figure out if they like it or not ... and actually buy what they like. I've done this (and I'm just middle class). But here is the really important point: like you say, most of what they put out is, indeed, utter crap. It used to be I'd have to spend over $1000 a year buying albums back in the day of analog, just to discover half a dozen great songs. Now days I spend way less, and still get even more good music, all legally.

Now days, in the age of the internet, I'm more informed (as is most everyone else). And that includes being informed about the quality, or usually the lack thereof, of big media company produced content. Sure, there are some people who steal the content. But there are plenty of people who pay for what they want to listen to. They just figure out what it is they do want, more accurately, by doing things such as downloading, sharing, or just listening to someone else's portable media player. The big media companies are selling less these days because people do have a better idea of what they want, and what is crap.

BTW, around half of what I do spend is at Magnatune. Even Magnatune has "crap" (defined as stuff I don't like). But with Magnatune, I get to listen and figure out what I like and what I don't like.

We do need front companies, bands like Radiohead already have thousands of fans reading their website daily but Google isn't good enough for finding new music to listen to.

However, as Magnatune and Jamendo prove, there's no need for that company to be evil either.

Dunno how that'd extrapolate to the videogame market, however. The thing about copyright is that it covers such drastically different areas that a "one size fits all" solution would necessarily be as flawed as copyright itself already is.

If only there was a way that you could listen to a song before buying it, or read someone else's opinion about a movie before watching it. And if only there were free sources of music and movies to watch...

i'm describing a technological change

No, you're describing a series of choices made by people and spouting a bunch of crap about how the technology (which you barely touched on) somehow makes copyright obsolete. And by copyright, you mean labels, which still doesn't make your claims true. If your post was about the internet itself, and detailed information how it can be used to promote and distribute a work, and financially support an artist, with a similar effect to what the labels are doing now, then I would be interested and respectful.

I'm always interested in ways to make the labels obsolete, but the internet is not there yet. All it does is replicate one of the valuable services that the labels provide. You could argue that it's high time that we had labels which, to drive down overheads, that distribute online only. You could argue that, but it's actually happened already. I have no problem with this business model. I just have a problem when consumers, instead of constructively contributing to a competing business model, instead decide to destroy another business model for their own profit. That's not a technological change, that's unadulterated, hypocritical greed.

your current attitude towards me is as if i have personally introduced the compact disc, and i am now forcing people by personal fiat to stop using vinyl, because i said so. that i'm taking away the right of artists too choose vinyl. wtf?

Allow me to explain. You seem to have taken it upon yourself to be a standard-bearer for piracy, making up some bullshit about how the internet somehow obsoletes copyright law, and somehow it's therefore OK to ignore. It's not that you caused it; it's that you stand for it, encourage it, and I can only assume, are part of it yourself (either that, or you're a hypocrite), and it is this movement that is destroying choices for artists. So yeah, you are responsible.

the way you describe the situation is of course ridiculous. cds replaced vinyl because they're obviously better. that's all that is happening here: the internet is replacing labels and distributors. because it's BETTER. there is no function you can describe for a distributor or label that is not done by the internet now, for far cheaper if not completely free. thus: bye bye distributor and label

Promotion, distribution of CDs (for people who don't have access to large internet bandwidth caps), financial parachutes for artists, lowering the still large barrier of entry, handling business strategies/responsibilities, just to name a few things that the internet can't do that labels can. So remind me: how are labels obsolete?

labels and distributors are a dying breed. because of the internet. not because of some intrusive ideology from some guy you are arguing with on the internet. now deal with it

You don't seem to understand (how could you?) that this perception of obsolescence is the same thing as your ideology. A little thought and research about what labels actually do would reveal that the internet is laughably under-equipped to handle the majority of services required by artists from their labels. You also don't seem to understand that I have no attachment to the labels, and I have no problem with their demise, so long as artists and our culture aren't devastated by said demise. That's why I suggest people support constructive solutions, like Magnatune, so that we can actually institute some positive change, rather than just sitting on asses, claiming that labels are dead, all the while enjoying the fruits of their labour. The latter is extremely bad for our culture.

or continue yelling at me, as if i am the one driving this inevitable technological process. who needs adjusting to reality when you can just shoot the messenger, right? whatever

OK. Consider for

Have you heard of Magnatune? I've tooted a horn for them before but seeing as I don't have much of a music budget, I consider it good karma to toot whenever it seems apt.

You can listen to all the music on their site at 128 kbps in each song's entirety. They do add some bits to the end of songs, saying basically, "Brought to you by Magnatune," and then sometimes talking about deals they have. It's completely mellow and not at all disruptive like every fucking commercial on TV yelling at you or trying to get a damn jingle stuck in your head.

If you become a member ($15 a month, unlimited downloads), you can download the music as VBR MP3s, AAC, FLAC, OGG, or even WAV without DRM.

The same held true for me with Magnatune. They aren't just "whatever you want to throw in" and do filter for quality, but license under CC-BY-SA-NC. And despite the fact that it's entirely legal to share it (so long as you don't do so commercially, anyway), they've been around for several years now, and put out some very good music where the artists actually get paid a significant share.

I've also run across the independent band Roger Clyne and the Peacemakers, and quite like them. They do amazing live shows (and most of the time you can sit down and have a beer with the band afterward), and I've been to several. They highly encourage fans to share their stuff-if my sister hadn't sent me a copy of Americano, I'd probably have never heard of them. That sharing sure didn't hurt them a bit.

Filesharing is in no way bad for the artist. Now the media cartels, those are horrible for the artist-and distribution channels existing outside their control is in turn disastrous for the cartels. The "artists", aside from a few very big names, get very little to nothing out of record/box office/etc. sales, and then the cartels deliberately fudge the numbers to avoid paying even that small amount.

You could buy music from Magnatune

Know any good sites that of course will have samples of the music to help guide me?

Jamendo, Magnatune, Bandcamp, Amie Street, TheSixtyOne and Zunior; to name a few.

So, now I have to find some independents to support. Know any good sites that of course will have samples of the music to help guide me?

Two websites that I know of: Magnatune, as its been mentioned on Slashdot a few times, is a "do no evil" music label that actually does that. Their classical collection in particular is excellent, and added to the fact that they've got FLAC downloads alongside the usual lossy formats it's a must-have for any classical fan, though they've got some interesting stuff in their other genres as well. You can listen to the whole album for free (as a stream) before purchasing, and they've even got an all-you-can-eat model with monthly payments as well.

And the other is Jamendo, which contrary to Magnatune has a fairly small classical collection but the amount (and diversity) of indie rock is simply staggering, and they've got a decent catalogue of other genres as well. Free downloads in both MP3 and OGG formats with handy donation buttons and user reviews.

Outside of that, though, all I know is good ol' MySpace where pretty much *every* independant artist/band/whatever has a webpage, though that makes it kinda hard to pick the wheat from the chaff but YMMV.

You can say anything you want about the internet as a marketing channel and cheap personal computers being capable of producing albums, but they really aren't. You need a good studio.

Not really, you don't. Specially to compete against the horribly mutilated shit the RIAA puts out.

Best-sounding non-classical album I've ever heard? Jade Leary's Fossildawn, courtesy of Magnatune. Of course, given that the artist in question is a pro musician his 'home studio' is far better than what you'd find at your average 17-years-old's bedroom, but it does show you don't necessarily need RIAA-levels of spending to make a good album either.

They also filter out the crap.

Ohh, yeah. They do *such* a good job at it... I mean, where would the world *be* without Lady GaGa and My Chemical Romance!

No, the RIAA filters out anything that's not easily marketable and sold to the masses. Unfortunately, the masses' tastes *SUCK* which is why there's so many "idiot bimbo singing about sex to electro-pop" and so very little creativity coming from them.

So read this and get out your p2p and help kill the industry to make the world safe for music and musicians.

P2P won't kill the industry, it will only help to spread the music's popularity. P2P = Free Advertising (similar to radio music). Some free music labels even distribute via P2P to cut server costs.

Start listening to free music from free sources. Start listening to and making some donations to the artists and companies that are already achieving your goals.

Go to a few concerts, buy a t-shirt or two. Check out the local music scene. The only way to "kill the industry" (by which I hope you mean "kill evil labels") is for the majority of people to stop consuming (even via P2P) the music they produce.

Most of what I listen to is produced and released by people working out of their bedroom or home studio (such as myself). I LOVE supporting people like that, because they get a large chunk of the money.

You might want to check out http://magnatune.com/...plenty to find on there, and I believe the artist gets 70% of the purchase price.

Regardless, google/youtube flagged the audio and the dispute has been open for a month. In the dispute filing, I pasted the relevant text from the license and linked to it.

The video itself clearly has a link to the artists site at magnatune (as required). So if any person were to intelligently go to the site and read the license or just read the dispute data I filed, the problem would cleary seen to be valid and legal.

But I'm still waiting to hear back from WMG. The point I have is that Bono's technical suggestion to track everything will not work. In a very closed and controlled environment like youtube, the false positives are so numerous that legal content cannot be cleared and shared.

Here's the license from magnatune (from link above).

"If you'd like to use Magnatune music in a video that will be posted on YouTube, ... simply buy the album and use the music. ... you're required to include attribution of our music.

.

I'm currently playing a "remix" (all I really did was speed shift it to run at 2/3 speed) of selected tracks from the 4 Domased Electronica albums I bought from Magnatune.

My playlist for this set that I think works well at the 2/3 speed is:

1. New Memories, Track 4: Tarantula (Hardtrance Mix)
2. New Memories, Track 8: Transfusion
3. Return Back, Track 2: So Easy
4. Return Back, Track 9: Spiral
5. Return Back, Track 10: Tarantula
6. Selection, Track 7: Wild Ride
7. Slowdown, Track 7: Too Slow

I'm currently playing a "remix" (all I really did was speed shift it to run at 2/3 speed) of selected tracks from the 4 Domased Electronica albums I bought from Magnatune.

My playlist for this set that I think works well at the 2/3 speed is:

1. New Memories, Track 4: Tarantula (Hardtrance Mix)
2. New Memories, Track 8: Transfusion
3. Return Back, Track 2: So Easy
4. Return Back, Track 9: Spiral
5. Return Back, Track 10: Tarantula
6. Selection, Track 7: Wild Ride
7. Slowdown, Track 7: Too Slow

Magnatune works pretty close to this. Want to download an album? You can choose to pay between $5 and $18 or listen to it at 128kbps on the site (with occasional adverts on the end of songs).

http://www.klicktrack.com/klicktrack/home have Memento Materia and other strangeness.
MP3s at highest bitrate. About the rates of iTunes.

http://www.emusic.com/ might or might not accept you. They seem to be doing a lot of strange things to non-American visitors, but their selection is wide enough to lie for ;)
Plain MP3 or XUL-based downloader. Cheaper than iTunes.

http://magnatune.com/ for independent artists.
FLAC, Vorbis, MP3, AAC, WAV. No iTunes comparison, but you can either buy downloads or CDs cheap for listening, or you can licence it for other uses.

Other online music stores: Google a bit for ways to get a US-registered debit card and mailbox :)
I fully support lying and cheating to get the music - we're sitting here with money in hand, but they won't take it.

There's a difference between charging for a song, and extortion. $1 per song isn't too bad if the song was CD-quality and had no time limit on usage (i.e. rest of my life). But to charge $1 for a poor-quality lossy-compressed song whose license-of-use can be revoked any time "they" feel like it is pure theft in my opinion.

I believe charging at *all* for poor-quality lossy-compressed song with revocable licenses is an utterly moronic thing, which is why whenever I buy music I do so from Magnatune.com. I'd recommend their Classical catalogue in particular, some of the interpretations they have are the best I've ever heard, and given the size of my classical collection that's no small compliment.

Shop around, and you'll almost always find somebody selling what you want under reasonable terms and reasonable prices, so "piracy" isn't needed or, in my opinion, quite justifiable. Unless, of course, you can't stand the *thought* of listening to a rock band other than Pink Floyd or such dreck, in which case the problem isn't entirely on the RIAA's shoulders.

No offense intended but you completely misunderstood the guys point. Pressing CDs is cheap. "Throwing them in the landfill" was a metaphor for "losing the money invested" not for actually throwing away pieces of metal and plastic.

No, I don't believe I misunderstood anything. He was claiming that to sell lots of CDs, you need to make and distribute lots of CDs, and run an advertising campaign; and if you do that and the CD flops, it's expensive.

Yes, there are some costs that apply even with digital distribution: as you say, production costs. Even those need not be sky-high. There are lots of eager bands who will self-produce their first album with GarageBand or something. (And before you say anything about the self-produced albums being of inferior quality: not necessarily. With modern, affordable, digital equipment, the band can make a clean recording and do an acceptable job of mastering. Maybe even a better job than the professionals right now!)

The past of music is a whole bunch of failures and a few huge successes. I predict that the future is a whole bunch of modest successes and a few bigger successes. And you really can just take some music, put it on a server, and see if anyone buys it. Word-of-mouth publicity has never been easier to get than in the age of blogs.

My point is not that the true, proper cost to produce music is zero. My point is that in the 21st Century, it's cheaper than it ever has been to produce music, especially for digital-only distribution. The proper price of a music album isn't $0 but it isn't $18 either. The market will decide, with competition, but I'm predicting the price will fall.

Huh. So much for the internet revolutionising music. Here is an obscure DnB producer that I found through internet radio, whos website is on MySpace and .... guess what. He only uses the "legacy business model".

Sorry, but I don't really care what one "obscure DnB producer" does or doesn't do. I'm making broad sweeping predictions about future trends; of course we aren't quite there yet and of course there will be exceptions.

And I'll give you a counter-example: Magnatune. They are a small record label that does not make artists sign their whole futures away (they split the take 50/50 with the artists); they just put music on the Internet and see who buys it (and they let you listen to the whole album in medium-quality MP3 before you decide whether to buy it or not).

The future of music on the Internet is more like Magnatune and less like this.

steveha

I've purchased items from magnatune.

You can try before you buy.

You can download the format you want (128mp3 up to WAV).

http://www.magnatune.com/genres/classical/

What could easily change is eliminate the middle man and the musicians can deal with the public directly or maybe through a more reasonable consortium that actually represents them using the reality of technology available.

Check out Magnatune for a good example of this.