Is Downloading Free MP3 Songs Illegal?

[Diego440]

mp3.com offers a range of free mp3s, as does last.fm, although don't expect to find top-of-the-charts hits or similar. You'll probably get indie music at best.

I know Wikipedia has an entry of royalty-free music as well, which are songs whose copyrights have already expired, or something like that.

Just don't Google "Free MP3s", as you're sure to get tons of ads, pop-ups and other similar stuff. There are ways of finding them, mostly on blogs, bu I wouldn't want to discuss them here since their legality is questionable.

 

[zoxxy]

Still waiting for some proper mainstream major artists to release free stuff... like U2 for example!

Robin

U2 will be the last band on earth to release a free album. That is, unless they find some other way to shuffle in their millions.

 

[Duke]

From a personal view, I say that it's illegal when you profit from it. If you're just downloading it for personal use, then you fall in the gray area.

Well like -Diego- said, if you just download songs for your own use, then i think it would be alright and not get you into too much trouble.

I have to disagree. That's like saying you can just "download" someone else's car off the street for your personal use, as long as you don't turn it into a taxicab.

If you want to hear music then you should pay for it, unless the artist himself is giving it away.

People who hate the RIAA don't understand how copyright laws work. If an artist or copyright owner does not actively defend its copyright, then the law assumes that the owner is abandoning their rights. That's one way that stuff passes into the public domain - the owner abandons defending ownership.

So Lars isn't just being an ass - he's bound by law to protect Metallica's ownership rights, or else they will lose those rights.

The only time you enter any grey area at all is when the owner ceases to exist without assigning rights. That's why you can get so many DVDs or old movies at the dollar store - the studios that made those movies are either gone or have forfeit ownership. Or like emulators of long-deceased video game publishers.

 

[FoolKiller]

From a personal view, I say that it's illegal when you profit from it. If you're just downloading it for personal use, then you fall in the gray area.

So, say you download 10 MP3s from a P2P site for free that would otherwise cost you $0.99 each on iTunes. You just did not pay $9.99 that you otherwise would have if you got it from a publisher/artist approved site. You just profited by $9.99, even if it was in the form of music and not cash.


Now, my thing is that I feel it should be legal for me to legally buy a copy of the song on CD, MP3, whatever format and then also copy it on to my iPod and hard drive for purely personal use. However even that practice is being called into question.

 

[Danoff]

I have to disagree. That's like saying you can just "download" someone else's car off the street for your personal use, as long as you don't turn it into a taxicab.

Totally correct. Personal use is still 100% illegal if you violate copyright.

People who hate the RIAA don't understand how copyright laws work.

Ok, that's not entirely true. I hate the RIAA quite a bit and am married to an attorney who deals with copyright issues. Moreover, my wife has no love for the RIAA and she definitely knows how copyright laws work. But your point below is entirely accurate.

If an artist or copyright owner does not actively defend its copyright, then the law assumes that the owner is abandoning their rights. That's one way that stuff passes into the public domain - the owner abandons defending ownership.

This is not only true of copyright. It's also true of trademarks and (I think) patents. Basically the entire field of intellectual property is policed by the property owner. It's analogous to having to call the police every time you see someone speeding - but if you don't call the police, speeding is legal.

The best example I can think of here is Band-Aid brand - which has basically lost all rights to the name Band-Aid as a trademark because it has entered the public vernacular as a generic term. Band-Aid didn't do a good enough job protecting their trademark.

Other companies who's trademarks get abused:

Coke, Pampers, Kleenex, Tylenol, Aspirin

I'm not sure any of those companies have actually lost any rights, but "Cola" is definitely open for use.

So Lars isn't just being an ass - he's bound by law to protect Metallica's ownership rights, or else they will lose those rights.

The operative term being "just" in that quote. He is being an ass in how he goes about it. But, you're right that he has an obligation to protect his property.

 

[Diego440]

Okay, I was saying it from my own personal opinion... (Danoff is going to like that one).

Between 1988 and 1998 I bought not less than 500 CDs, and I really got tired of xbuying a CD by an artist you liked only to end up liking one song while the rest of the album was pure trash. In the same way, CDs went from costing 11-13 bucks to a whopping 22!

If that wasn't enough, say you bought a double CD for $30, if you ended up not liking it, the store wouldn't take it back. So your best option was the buy-back stores, and IF they liked it and it was in mint condition, you could get as much as $2 for it... even if you bought it at the same place, new, the day before.

I had that happen to me many times. And ever since the last one (October 11th, 1998), I've acquired my music through other means, which I won't go into detail. I think in the last 10 years I've purchased two CDs.

 

[Duke]

Okay, I was saying it from my own personal opinion... (Danoff is going to like that one).

Between 1988 and 1998 I bought not less than 500 CDs, and I really got tired of xbuying a CD by an artist you liked only to end up liking one song while the rest of the album was pure trash. In the same way, CDs went from costing 11-13 bucks to a whopping 22!

If that wasn't enough, say you bought a double CD for $30, if you ended up not liking it, the store wouldn't take it back. So your best option was the buy-back stores, and IF they liked it and it was in mint condition, you could get as much as $2 for it... even if you bought it at the same place, new, the day before.

I had that happen to me many times. And ever since the last one (October 11th, 1998), I've acquired my music through other means, which I won't go into detail. I think in the last 10 years I've purchased two CDs.

It's still theft if you DL pirated stuff, no matter how much you don't feel like paying for it. Sorry.

That's what makes online purchasing such a great idea (even though I rarely use it). Only like one song? Only buy one song! Or, find better bands that don't make crappy albums with one good song on them.

Though I agree, once you purchase a song legally, you should be allowed to make as many copies as you want FOR YOUR OWN PERSONAL USE as long as you do not give them away to anybody else. I should be allowed to have a song I've bought from iTunes on my home computer, my good iPod, my old Nano that I use while I'm mowing the lawn, my work computer, and burned to a CD for use in the car. If I wish.

 

[Sharky.]

Though I agree, once you purchase a song legally, you should be allowed to make as many copies as you want FOR YOUR OWN PERSONAL USE as long as you do not give them away to anybody else.

Funny you should mention that. RIANZ (the Recording Industry of Australia and New Zealand) want to ban ALL copying of music, regardless if you bought it or not.

Basically, they want to prohibit the copying of music onto iPods etc. This is stupid. If you bought the music, you should be free to copy it onto any device you want, as long as it's only for your use.

 

[Greycap]

It's odd really. One is allowed to make laser copies of magazines in the library for their own use. One is allowed to borrow a C cassette from there and copy it for their own use. But one isn't allowed to download music from the web for their own use. Odd laws, I must say.

 

[GrumpEone]

...From a personal view, I say that it's illegal when you profit from it. If you're just downloading it for personal use, then you fall in the gray area...

I agree, profit is the key to if it is really prosecutable. So, don't blank CD manufacturers in-directly profit from piracy too?

But technically, taping the radio for an hour and a half, then dubbing the songs you like onto another tape, is illegal too. But when I was a kid, we did it all the time.

 

[Danoff]

I agree, profit is the key to if it is really prosecutable. So, don't blank CD manufacturers in-directly profit from piracy too?

Profit is important, but by far not the only factor.

 

[exigeracer]

Here is an interesting essay about the death of OiNK, the general music landscape as it sits right now, how this tension came to be and how the record industry is about to die.

Language Warning.

 

[GrumpEone]

So, say you download 10 MP3s from a P2P site for free that would otherwise cost you $0.99 each on iTunes. You just did not pay $9.99 that you otherwise would have if you got it from a publisher/artist approved site. You just profited by $9.99, even if it was in the form of music and not cash.

Yeah, and I could have paid lots of money buying ringtones for my phone, but instead I used my technology to copy bits of songs and loaded them on my phone as ringtones. I don't consider that I have profited, I had to buy the accessories, and spend the time to make it work.

Virtual profit, is not profit; you can't spend it. Anyway, to dowload your $9.90 worth of songs, you still have to have a computer, which on average costs $1,000 (low end) or so, so you are still in the red $990.

Anyway, most mp3's online are an inferior product, far lower quality than CDs, a compressed format, with many flaws. Selling for $.99/ per song is a ridiculously high price.

Anyway Piracy has moved and ruled the computers industry since its inception. Also it will never end, almost as soon as a new copy pretection is created, it is defeated, which starts a pursuit for a new copy protection, and so on. Drives the industry, some of the greatest breakthrus in computers are figured out by the pirates, hackers, and programmers.

 

[Danoff]

Yeah, and I could have paid lots of money buying ringtones for my phone, but instead I used my technology to copy bits of songs and loaded them on my phone as ringtones. I don't consider that I have profited, I had to buy the accessories, and spend the time to make it work.

It's not a matter of what you could pay money for, it's a matter of copyright. If you're gaining access to copyrighted materials without paying the copyright holder, you've broken the law. It actually isn't as complex people think.

Virtual profit, is not profit; you can't spend it. Anyway, to dowload your $9.90 worth of songs, you still have to have a computer, which on average costs $1,000 (low end) or so, so you are still in the red $990.

It's also not a function of how efficiently you figure out how to violate copyright, or even what it costs to comply.

Anyway, most mp3's online are an inferior product, far lower quality than CDs, a compressed format, with many flaws. Selling for $.99/ per song is a ridiculously high price.

Yea, a dollar for a copyrighted work is a super high price, especially for a high quality compression of that work. I don't use this much, but here it is

Anyway Piracy has moved and ruled the computers industry since its inception. Also it will never end, almost as soon as a new copy pretection is created, it is defeated, which starts a pursuit for a new copy protection, and so on. Drives the industry, some of the greatest breakthrus in computers are figured out by the pirates, hackers, and programmers.

It drives the industry to protect itself. That's like saying it's ok to beat people up because it drives them to learn to defend themselves, or that it's ok to steal from a bank because the bank learns to improve security. It's nonsense.

 

[GrumpEone]

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[Danoff]

You obviously miss the point, which was that Piracy has moved and ruled the industry and that it will never end.

I didn't miss that point, I just didn't argue with it. It doesn't invalidate anything I wrote above. Piracy is not special here. Crime has played an important role in many industries and will never end.

We, as the consumer, need far more protection from the industry, than the industry needs from us.

Oh? What have they done to do you? Offered you music to purchase? Oh noes!! Protect me!

MP3's are an inferior product!! you say highly compressed, but compressed none the less, thus changing the 'copyrightted material' into a lesser form.
If you copied a copyrighted photo at 5 DPI, could you still be charged for 'breaking copyright' even though no one could recognize the photo??

Probably not if the end result was unrecognizable. Are you seriously arguing that the music you download from itunes is so bad that it's not recognizable? Please, tell me that's your point here. Because otherwise what you wrote above is totally useless.

 

[GrumpEone]

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[Tornado]

Ever here of Spy-ware??? Started by major computer corporations! Also is standard operating procedure for many computer corporations.

So, you get back at these terrible, awful, non-music-related industries by stealing from the music industry? Brilliant. That'll show 'em.

iTunes incurrs virtually 0 production cost,

I'm sure the music produces itself. And the servers that the music is stored on create themselves. As does the iTunes software itself.

and screws the music fans with an inferior product for a high price.

99 cents a song is usually far cheaper than nearly all CDs on sale today.

MP3's are unrecognizable on a high powered system, when compared to the actual CD product.

File conversion FTW! It takes all of 15 minutes if you don't have conversion software, and about 2 if you do.

By the way, I'd love to know where you are getting illegally downloaded music that isn't written in mp3 format. I will admit to stealing music (quite a lot of it, in fact. Most of it that I later purchased on CD), and I never saw anything written in anything but Ogg Vorbis or MP3, so your point is pretty meaningless (especially since AAC is better quality than normal MP3).

At least I make points, while you are just whining, adding little to the conversation.

You are making up terrible analogies with incredibly far fetched conclusions. Danoff is calling you out on it. He's not the one contributing little to the conversation.

 

[ceiling_fan]

File conversion FTW! It takes all of 15 minutes if you don't have conversion software, and about 2 if you do.

I'm pretty sure he meant 'unrecognizable' as low sound quality.

 

[Tornado]

I'm pretty sure he meant 'unrecognizable' as low sound quality.

Than in that case, I'd love to know where he is stealing music encoded to a higher quality than the stuff you pay for.

 

[GrumpEone]

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[GrumpEone]

Than in that case, I'd love to know where he is stealing music encoded to a higher quality than the stuff you pay for.

I'm not stealing music! And when did I say that MP3s are at a higher quality then what you pay for?(meaning CDs) I said Mp3's are an inferior product, oh how many times now??

You certainly have little clue, I speak plain english, try and keep up.

 

[Tornado]

Gosh you people can be dense, I never said that I d/l illegal music.

So why, pray tell, did you start an argument in a topic discussing legality of downloading music if it wasn't about that?

iTunes has virtually 0 production cost, due to the 'product' (the music)is already produced for CD's,

Once again, no it does not. Just because the music isn't produced specifically for the service doesn't mean there isn't production costs. It simply means that the production costs are divided up between CDs and online downloads. And that is ignoring the costs for running and developing the systems for the online music sales.

any compressed format is more lossy than a CD.

Congratulations!

On a High-Powered Audio System, you get a huge loss in both the High-Highs and the Low-Lows, thus it is inferior to CD's. Ever listen to a MP3 even at 320 kbps on a 1000+ Watt system, with 1/8" tweeters and 8", 12", 15", & 18" woofers??? You can definately tell the difference, and the inconsistencies!!

The funny part is that I know quite a few people with "high-power audio systems," and all of them have/use DVD-Audio. Of course they don't use online music. Most don't even use CD music anymore. So what is your point?
That people with expensive audio equipment use it to the fullest? That people with expensive audio equipment only buy expensive and high quality music transfers? That is rather a "no 🤬" statement. Your not getting very far bringing up how people bring nothing to a topic and then turning around and spewing common sense as an argument.
That is an especially pointless statement, because a very small minority have high-end systems as you described, so the fact that they are listening to lower quality audio doesn't really go noticed by those that don't.

Lets see, CDA format the song is say 50-60MB yet the MP3 is about 6-8 MB, just by the numbers the quality is about 10%-20% of the original.

File conversion FTW! It takes all of 15 minutes if you don't have conversion software, and about 2 if you do. And by the way, there is a such thing as a CD burner. Invented in the mid-90s, I believe.

Would you buy a car with 80%-90% less quality, from a dealer for the same price?? No you wouldn't.

The difference, of course, is that the lower quality is for lower price and much more convenience. And that the quality difference is no where near 90% difference, and that it goes unnoticed in all but the most extreme of circumstances. So, yeah, you just made another terrible analogy.

I said Mp3's are an inferior product, oh how many times now??

Once again with your "I'm superior in intellect because I state things that are common knowledge." Oh, and by the way:
File conversion FTW! It takes all of 15 minutes if you don't have conversion software, and about 2 if you do. And by the way, there is a such thing as a CD burner. Invented in the mid-90s, I believe.

How many times do I have to say that?

You certainly have little clue, I speak plain english, try and keep up.

You could totally do without the personal attacks, especially considering how terrible some of your arguments actually are.

 

[Danoff]

My question is, where's the -rep button when you need it?

That was my whole point in that post. So you decided to argue with the non-points, are you running for office or something???

I decided to argue with some really horrible analogies and just plain bad arguments. If your point is that the earth is round, but your evidence is that marbles are round and so the earth must be - I'm going to argue with you, even though I agree with the point.

See? That's how you make an analogy.

Ever here of Spy-ware??? Started by major computer corporations! Also is standard operating procedure for many computer corporations.

ZOMG! Let's steal from those bastards!

My photo analogy was an exageration, genius, but you just can't get what I'm saying, can you.

I understand that your analogy was an exagreration. You exagerated the point so far that it no longer applied. Let me slow it down for you.

You exagerated your analogy a lot
so far that it was no longer relevant
You HAD to exagerate to get the result to come out right.

See the problem yet?

iTunes incurrs virtually 0 production cost, and screws the music fans with an inferior product for a high price.

Doesn't matter. CDs incur virtually no production cost. Books do too. Even reproduced paintings or photos incur little cost. In fact, it's almost as though the CREATIVE content is what you're paying for and not the actual production.

What a concept!

MP3's are unrecognizable on a high powered system, when compared to the actual CD product.

Unrecognizable? Seriously?? You can't even tell what song you're listening to? Well then, I guess the record companies are safe from pirated music.

I can plainly see that either your clueless to my points, or you are just trying to not understand what I am saying. At least I make points, while you are just whining, adding little to the conversation.

Is this you adding to the conversation? Personal attacks? I get what you're saying. I completely understand it and you're dead wrong.

FYI - You should probably use logic when making an analogy.

Take your own advice. Oh, and I created a tutorial on logic just for people like you right here in the rumble strip. Just search on logic, I'm sure you'll find it.

Ever listen to a MP3 even at 320 kbps on a 1000+ Watt system, with 1/8" tweeters and 8", 12", 15", & 18" woofers??? You can definately tell the difference, and the inconsistencies!!

I thought it was unrecognizable? Now it's "you can tell" that it's different. Which is it?

Lets see, CDA format the song is say 50-60MB yet the MP3 is about 6-8 MB, just by the numbers the quality is about 10%-20% of the original.

When you run winzip on a text file, is the content of the zipped file of lower quality? It certainly is smaller - sometimes orders of magnitude.

See? Another good analogy!! If you don't know the first thing about compression, don't try to act like an expert.

Would you buy a car with 80%-90% less quality, from a dealer for the same price?? No you wouldn't.

And here's another bad one.

A) not the same price
B) 80% is incorrect
C) Music and cars are totally different when it comes to purchasing criteria.

Bad analogy. Very bad analogy.

 

[GrumpEone]

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[GrumpEone]

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[GrumpEone]

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I Think I said all I need to say in this thread. I'd like to see people actually adding some opinions, rather than just attacking mine, with faulty assumtions no less.

I'll leave of with my original Points.

1) 90% of 'free' MP3's are illegal.
2) There is a large grey area concerning what is prosecutable concerning MP3's.
3) MP3's are inferior to CD's but sold at similar prices.
4) Piracy has existed since the computer industry began, and will always exist.

I'll leave the rest of the pointless/ opinionless bickering to Toronado and Danoff to handle. Out of the two Danoff was the much better arguer though.

 

[daan]

Please use the edit button, GrumpE, and stop the double, and triple, posting.

Thanks

 

[Casio]

I would kinda agree with GrumpEone, in that companies like iTunes sell music at effectively the same price as if you brought it from a store (~1$ a song), yet sell a much inferior quality product.

However, if you don't like it then just buy the CDs, it doesn't mean you have the right to steal the 'inferior' versions. Given the average (and growing) interwebs speed at the moment, maybe it would be good for iTunes to give the option of downloading the full, original quality, lossless version as well as the compressed one? (If they already do, disregard that as I've never used it)

 

[Duke]

Actually, I don't believe it is illegal to tape off the air, because the song is broadcast on a free medium, and the songs are given to the station for airplay by their owners. Dan's wife could probably refine that for us, though.