With all kinds of File sharing applications and with various programs to defeat copy protection control, would you rather download mp3's free or pay for music either through the internet
or buying albums from your local music store.
I know from when I first started dowloading music I thought it was great but also as I was downloading I found that I was buying more music albums from the shops. The reason being I wanted the real McCoy.
Now I find myself buying music rather than downloading. Is it not better to have a single/album rather than a collection of mp3's.

I also imagine one main reason for people downloading music is because they like to mix and match songs. They like certain songs from parts of albums and they want to create a compilation album.
Which is fair enough.

Attempts by Sainsbury's and other stores to create a system where you can come in mix and match songs and pay for your cd are good. I think the problem with this that conumers will have is since a mp3 isn't the same quality as a CD, should they pay as much? At least it seems to be a step in the right direction from the music industry rather than spending millions in copy control. Dont get me wrong they should still invest in copy control but not as much. From years of trying companies should know there's always a way to break their copy-protected cd's.

I would go out buy a CD that has got a copy protection on it and see if I am able to copy it. Just for the buzz of doing it and it lasts for all of 2 seconds. As Long as the copy protection doesn't intervere with people backing up their music then im all for it.
The real people the music and movie industry need to go after are the people who sell their stuff on market, copy Cd's and movies on mass. These are the people that are causing trouble not the ordinary consumer on the street. Sure he may download some songs but he also goes out and buy's his fair share of music
from the shop. The Music and movie industry need to stopp the people who make a business from it and I guarntee majority of people on those file sharing programs arent the ones who should be punished. They may do wrong but they dont cause as much damaged as the people that sell on markets and come round are door. Would you accept the latest movie out on cinema on DVD or the unreleased album for a £5? You probably would.

Dont Get me wrong either the music companies to make alot of money and the arguement how much does it cost to make Cd does really stand up too. An artist makes his real money from doing concerts and tv appearences etc Alot of money goes into promoting an artist. Whether it justifies the cost of a CD? I dont know but from my point my fav artists have give my countless hours of listening to good music. So I say Its money well spent.

So whether you buy or download is purley up to yourself. If there is a good alternative, consumers will pay but I feel its a more of consumers getting used to paying for music rather than downloading for free. Finally I would like to say its people like shauwn fannings and other innovators of the inertnet should be applauded and encouraged to develop new technolgy instead of sued etc. Maybe then the music and movie indusrty can move on .

Any comments welecomed.

I buy probably a little less than I used to. Not because I can get songs for free from the internet but because I can check them out first by downloading. I buy the stuff I really like. No more cds sitting on the shelf with only 1 good song on them. I have discovered so many new groups I like by downloading. 1 example is I have the new white stripes that I downloaded. I love it and will buy it the first day it comes out. I'm sick of the people who just want to steal. If you find a cd you really like you should support the band. If a band only has 1 good song I say download it. If the whole cd is good then buy it. One other thing I do is download cds of music I already own on vinyl. I have a lot of older stuff on vinyl (I'm showing my age here). I should not have to buy it again. I would like to see a site that lets you buy 1 song for 50 cents. I think thats a fair price and you should be able to burn the song if you like. So I say I still love to own the complete package sometimes so I want cd stores to stay around and I also want a fairly priced place to buy single songs on the net. It's all going to shake out in the long run I believe

i think u're failing to see the point of having a copy protection. if it doesn't keep anyone from copying, then it's not really a protection.

I think you missed the point. Yes music companies want to stop piracy but the people they should go after are the people who make a business out of it. yes copy protection should work, most of them dont, they all can be advoided by playing your cd from your HI-fi to your computer. But this takes time and quite frankly why bother even doing it? Of couse the music idustry has lacked vision.
They are playin catch up with the internet. Napaster has come and gone. There are dozens of other p2p applications out there.
So the idustry comes up with copy protection in order for them to catch up with on-line trading and then to start make some money from the net. But of course there are people who can advoid or break protections and there always will be. The copy protection is no longer here to stop you but meant to limit you in ways you use your music. So when it comes to downloading music, you download legally and not illegally.
You can also have copy protection but limit the users in ways they copy the music or how many times they copy the music.
I think the keyword here is "limit". Of course there will be ways round protection but this seems to be the best way. If you can't stop something limit your damages.What needs to happen is some sort of universal soloution from disc companies and software vendors like microsoft and other companies. Much like what the playstation 2 dvd's have. A watermark which is used to verfiy whether the disc is copied or real. When a CD is copied into mp3 or whatever, wmp includes a unique code which identifys it to which album it came from E.G serial number from the album, in the encoding of the wmp or mp3. This could could be at the start of the song or the end or perhaps in the middle. WMP then takes the unique code and details of the album and compiles a database which when connected to the internet is sent to an online database. The information included could be how many times it was copied, album details, the mp3 details or any or any other relevant information from the computer.(privacy issue here)Perhaps a better way of gaining information from customers would be to have a loyalty reward card. This card can be linked to the purchase of CD's i.e. when track 001 appears on the net they can use the unique code on the mp3 to trace the customer through the loyalty reward card. When the card is swipped the customer details are taken. The information is used to compile a database with CD's purchased and by whom. A simple I.d check can be done to make sure customers are who they say they are.
This would be huge system and whether its viable or not is another question.
I rather tend to think that the answer to copy protection is not technolical but in the actual system of online music trading although technology will have a part to play.
I have copied CD's and downloaded music but mostly now I listen to music and just go out and the buy the music. I'll have good and bad albums some mixed. No big deal. The thing I hate the most is people copying music and using the excuse music is too expensive in the shops?? Pull the other leg will ya. Music in the states is cheaper than hear in the UK. A new album hear will roughly cost you £14 on average 10-14 even more songs. Thats a £1 per song depending. Is that not fair enough?
If your not sure whether you like songs or albums listen to it on the net. There are loads of streaming radios stations.
Or would it be fair to say your a cheap skate who doesn't want to pay for music???

In my opinion, the question to buy or not to buy a cd/music is not so easy to answer.

There are a few problems, which can prevent you from buying:

>The following claims are purely subjective, of course!<

Many many great songs from great artists will stay unreachable for you, because you simply don't know, that they exist!
This is (my) main issue.

If you like a song, do you like the whole album?
Probably not! Will you buy the CD just for one or two songs, you like?

There are CDs, that they are so old and so rare, that you cannot buy them anymore, even if you wanted to.
A little example would be the early versions of 'Café Del Mar' from Energy 52. Especially if you want the original LP-Releases.

Sometimes there are artists, that appear only on compilations and don't release an own album (correct me if I'm wrong)

just a few examples:

Cantoma - Balafia, The Call, Katja, Pandajaro, Early Till Late, ...
Miasma - Serum Switch
Ajax - Story of Life
Carbuncle - Drum & Bossa
Cydonia - Galactic Rebirth
Ohmega - Tribe Panacea

If I like an artist's album and if I have the ability (import orders included), I buy the music!

Again a few examples of cds, which I bought just because I heard about them through the internet or radio/TV:

Aural Float - Freefloat (heard the song 'Zwei G' @ HR-XXL digital radio)

Saafi Brothers - midnight's children (heard the song 'the witness' @ Space-Night)

Der Spyra - Elevator to heaven (heard the song 'last train to bayreuth @ shoutcast)

Der Spyra - my little garden of sounds (heard the song 'seeds' @ shoutcast)

Bobby Hughes Experience - Fusa Riot (heard the song 'Seasons' @ shoutcast)

Tosca - Suzuki (heard the song 'Doris Dub' @ shoutcast)

The Sushi Club - Sushidelic (heard the song 'Niku Jaga' @ HR-XXL)

Gentle People - Soundtracks for living (heard the song 'Journey' @ shoutcast)

Global Communication - 76:14 (heard the song '14:31' @ shoutcast)

De|Phazz - Godsdog (heard the song 'Anchorless' @ guess what? right, shoutcast )

Energy 52 - Café Del Mar [Nalin & Kane / Hybrids Time Traveller Rmx] LP (heard the song 'Café Del Mar - Three 'n One Rmx' @ DF1 radio, Germany's first digital broadcaster, now merged into 'Premiere World')

Since by prefered music genre is more or less away from mainstream, you won't find them out easiliy.

u need to keep ur emotions in check and calm down timetrex. i was stating a simple fact about what a copy protection is supposed to do, which is obviously to interfere with a person's ability to copy something, and u launched into a tirade against an imaginary opinion that i didn't even state. nowhere in my post did i say anything about a consumer's right to backup his/her cds nor how i feel about buying cds, so i guess u've decided to state my position for me.

I simply stated that copy protection was meant to limit you rather than stop you thats all. then I offered a suggestion that could prevent piracy. I was just a bit bored yesterday and nothing really to do in work. It wasn't your view but mine.What way do you think the music industry should go about it? Im just intrested to know what people think about it.
I would agree with little-endian that this is music that is very hard to come by. The only source for it is the internet. Maybe the music industry need to look at releasing material which is not available in the shops.

so then i suppose that this statement wasn't aimed directly at me and "my" view:
also, a copy protection is made precisely with the intent of stopping someone from making a copy of the product. just cuz workarounds have been found doesn't mean the intent to prevent ppl from copying the product doesn't exist.

Why should I buy copy-protected CDs when they won't play in my car CD player? It's nothing really unusual, just a standard Clarion manufacturer-fitted CD player. They won't play in my DVD player either.

Copy protection is basically going to mean that I buy less CDs not more for these reasons.

If a CD's good, then it's worth buying, but if I can't play it when and where I want to, I won't buy it. If they can't copy-protect a CD without meaning it won't play in your car/DVD player or wherever, then they shouldn't be doing it. End of story.

And there will never be a hack-proof audio CD copy-protection. Someone somewhere will always have the hardware or techniques to do it (even if it's just making an analogue copy from a normal CD player into the sound card) Once it's "out of the bag" and someone has ripped it and put it on file-sharing networks, then the copy protection becomes even more useless, and all it does is annoy the legitimate users.

Wonder how long it will take them to realise that they sell fewer CDs with protection? Idiots.

Well it seems somebody needs to wind their neck in.
There may be intent to stop people from copying music but
now its more of a case of limiting you to the way you use your music.
You have totally missed the point altogether. People say I want to listen to my music on my computer or in the car, well you can.
Majority of copy protected CD's let you do that plus you can download or buy mp3 alternatives. The Fact remains as you pointed out in the quote- you dont want to pay for music. You want it for free. Why should you get the music for free. Is it not worth paying a dollar or a pound for a song? or one monthly fee?

Most cd's are labeled if they are copy protected plus many shops provide alternatives without the copy protection. If you dont want the copy protected cd dont buy it. All of the copy protected cd's I have bought have worked fin in my computer cd player, dvd player. I've been able to make back up's fine.So there are alternatives if you want you music on car players etc are you willing to pay for them just the same way you pay for a cd or will you download them for free???

As for theres a few songs that you just like from an album- Many shops are doing trial runs off mixing and matching the music you like and the burning them on to a cd. So really I dont see the problem.

how exactly do u keep manufacturing this position for me that i only want my music for free when the only thing i've given any information about is what a copy protection is supposed to do? why do u think a copy protection is called that? obviously it's to protect someone from making a copy.

i never said anything about refusing to buy a copy protected cd nor refusing to pay for music. in fact, i buy all of my cds.

Well for starters i never said you in particular I was talking in general terms to somebody who may read it and copy music.
I was refferring to other people's post not yours, what I did say about yours was copy protection now is a limitation. They may have started out intently to stop you from copying but its more a limitation than anything so I think you'll find that I agree with you in most respects. Maybe not I dont know!!!

I would be intrested to know whether you think and as you so called "my rant" that a system could be implemented so that it would discourage people from file sharing for free?
As your very first point to me about if the protection doesn't stop you from copying then what's the point in having it?
I guess the terminology they use "copy protection" is incorrect. The music industry main focus is not to stop you from backinig up your music but to stop you from sharing it over the net. At least I think they know,no matter what format they have the audio in, it is always possible to rip it.It hasn'tbeen successful yet but im sure there's along to go yet.

What do you think AZImmortal

i think copy protections will indeed alienate the population at large if the consumers are unable to play cds wherever they want.

on the subject of downloading songs, bootlegging isn't necessarily a negative thing for record sales. the recent success of 50 Cent is the epitome of how bootlegging can increase consumer awareness and result in huge sales. before 50 signed his record deal, he was already very popular in the underground rap scene cuz of the popularity of his songs over the internet. the buzz surrounding him became so great that even tho his retail album was heavily downloaded, his first week sales were the most ever for a first album by an artist despite having only four days to sell, and it continues to have good sales. this shows that consumers will indeed buy what's good even if it's available for download, and that the internet is a powerful marketing tool.