So how many people actually purchase mp3's?

[dawman]

It doesn't matter who your friends are. It is not acceptable. That is not an excuse for you to be talking that way. It doesn't matter how nice of a person you think you are.

Regardless,
The offer still stands.

[netguyjoel]

So how many people actually purchase mp3's?......

[Mr Arkadin]

i don't. i like physical stuff that i actually own, can sell if i want, can copy as many times as i like and doesn't get lost when my hard drive crashes like it did last month - losing everything including my Scope 5 presets i was working on .

[braincell]

A CD isn't physical. It's data. If you download music and burn it to CD, it's the same thing. True, you can not sell it.

[Mr Arkadin]

Don't know what world you live in, but in this one a CD is solid and has three dimensions - that's enough to define it as physical to me - plus my comment wasn't just about CDs which is why i said 'physical stuff'.

[braincell]

A hard drive has dimensions. I guess you are saying a CD seems more real because you hold it in your hands while a hard dive is inside the computer.

[siriusbliss]

DRM is 'cloaked' copy protection that never really worked, and hurt the industry, which is why Macrohard, er Microsoft is getting away from it.

It's all BS anyways...Constant Comment rules the day - the rest of the artists can scramble and claw their way through the old antiquated ways of doing things, but they are only hurting their careers in the long run.

I've been known to compile a music library for travel using flac, but not mp3, and I've also been known to release my music on mp3 - for free.

Nowadays I actually prefer to go to concerts and buy t-shirts to support artists in their real-world environment.

Greg

[Fluxpod]

I usually buy lp´s.Yeah they are still available;) I record them and store them as mp3.

[dawman]

Agreed..
I have always enjoyed live performances and only wish I could hear more Symphonic concerts.
But the college has Artists In Residence concerts that are usually pretty good.
I do purchase mp3 downloads of tunes that I need to learn for rehearsal purposes since it is cheaper to buy a 99 cent download as opposed to an entire CD of something I really don't care to own anyways.
I actually have more T Shirts from AES & NAMM shows than concerts now.

[Mr Arkadin]

I guess you are saying a CD seems more real because you hold it in your hands while a hard dive is inside the computer.

Plus CDs don't crash very often corrupting all your data (like i just had).

[garyb]

hey everybody!
let's just leave it to the experts and go have fun! yay!

[braincell]

I'm not convinced that the 320kbps mp3 format which Amazon sells sounds worse than a CD. In a related story, Apple wants to bring back the album with linear notes, lyrics, photos and video:

http://music-mix.ew.com/2009/07/27/itunes-liner-notes/

[valis]

Vinyl, CDs & MP3s all have their limitations actually.

One upside to physical formats though is that the recording industry still hasn't found a way to keep you from reselling & trading them.

[irrelevance]

i don't. i like physical stuff that i actually own, can sell if i want, can copy as many times as i like and doesn't get lost when my hard drive crashes like it did last month - losing everything including my Scope 5 presets i was working on .

Ouch! Backup is a real worry aint it! Actually maybe there is a good example of how mp3 really must be the shining star of the music industry. It's so much easier to loss data compared to hard copy formats which are a bit more robust. So now we have folks lossing thier data and possibily repurchasing entire libraries and higher likelyhood that people will impulse buy because of the relative ease. I'm sure that the move to cd from vinyl would have been just as wierd a notion withlower res arkwork, no more pictures disc!! (not the greatest quality though, eh?) and having to lose the technics (if you were a dj). I say bring back mini disc!

[irrelevance]

Vinyl, CDs & MP3s all have their limitations actually.

One upside to physical formats though is that the recording industry still hasn't found a way to keep you from reselling & trading them.

Right! I'm not old enough to remember maybe some others here are but I would have guessed that format change has never been accepted by die hards and purists and the advent of tape was probably met with mistrust. Well I have been doing some searching and came across Junodownload which has a decent selection of tracks and offers wav.

[braincell]

I think by now everyone should know that you need to backup data. This talk of losing data is user error not the fault of the mp3. You can even back up your data in the cloud. If your house burns down all your CDs will be gone but if you backed up online, then it is not. That is an advantage of the mp3.

[astroman]

backup in the WHAT ???
I wish the ages back you could sell your soul to the devil - at least he would give you some kind of a reward ...
the slime isn't just oozing out from the TV set, it's getting omnipresent
end on a technical note - a proper EMP will blow up enough of the 'cloud' that all you'll receive is a 'sorry, we lost all your stuff'
and you bet that you signed a contract that frees them of any liability whatsoever...
... while my carved black plates will spin and sound even without electricity

cheers, Tom

ps: not to overdramatize the EMP, they might as well fake it, as everything is a fake anyway

[braincell]

I didn't say as your only backup. I meant in case your house burns down in which case you are screwed. Anyway media is so cheap there is no excuse not to backup your mp3 files. Maybe leave a copy at a friends house; as for the rest of your gibberish (something about the devil,) I am sorry don't understand it. Maybe the meaning got lost in the translation since English is not your native language.

Don't be foolish people, backup your data; anyone who doesn't do that, shouldn't be even using a computer. Someone said don't use RAID 0. That is idiotic. I have my RAID 0 backup up on a hard drive not connected or turned on.

I have been using RAID 0 for months and no crash or problems.

I like mp3 files.

[astroman]

good luck using your 'backup drive' after a couple of years on the shelf...

'raid 0' doesn't prevent from data loss due to OS failures or user errors (still the most common source) - it will replicate the mess immediately.
The way you use it will not be reliable either, as harddrives are mass products.
It's highly probable that your drives are from the same production charge and will bear identical vulnerabilities.
This is not speculation, but what you find in statistics by people dealing with mass storage as their daily job.

It's a matter of fact that a proper backup is way too demanding and too expensive for private use.
Most people have no idea at all about it, but those who do (frequently) start to find this 'cloud' idea somewhat attractive for it's convenience and supposedly saved cash...

But that someone, who presents himself so 'critical' regarding certain corporate strategies, buys into the thing is extremely concerning...

cheers, Tom

[valis]

Most harddrives last for months if not years without problems, noone says that data failure (or even your house burning down) is fate. It's just when the problems occur eh. I've actually lost a few thousand cd's & records some years ago to an apartment fire, I don't think having a CDR or ripped backup of that stuff would have really made any difference to me in the long run.

And Tom is right, harddrives and CER's have bit-rot rates that are 10x worse than were advertised even under ideal conditions. If you're silly enough to use one of the printed label methods or the laser inscriptions etc with CDR's that just increases the problems. CDRW's are worse...

I personally use external drives for backup, but mostly for offsite/easy to grab Work backups (event of fire/theft/etc) so that I can get back to work quickly without losing client data or my working projects. I haven't bought an external drive yet that's lasted longer than 2-3 years of relatively light service (backups once a day isn't heavy use), and I tend to keep these things on a shelf sitting on top of a piece of foam to reduce external vibrations. The PSU for the units is usually the first thing to go though, so if you can press the outdated drive into use in an old machine it's not a complete waste of money.