Ian's (almost) daily recap of what spikes my interest

I spend a considerable amount of time online since I work in front of a computer. This blog is supposed to basically summarize what i think is interesting. Do with it what you'd like. Ian

Wednesday, February 16, 2005

Napster v. ITunes

Ever since the super bowl I've been bombarded with questions asking which service is better. While I'm certainly biased towards the ITunes platform, recent announcements about cracking Napster's encryption have forced me to look closer at the matter. Everyone knows that with ITunes you pay for individual songs are are restricted to playing those songs on your ipod (and only the ipod) and on 5 different computers. The napster model lets you pay a fixed fee for unlimited downloading which sounds like a great idea. The catch is that the second you stop paying your monthly subscription fee, you lose access to all the music you've downloaded. You're basically renting the music. Frankly, I prefer to have music that I can play 10 years down the road provided I don't misplace it on my various hard drives.

Recent articles floating around the web talk about being able to crack napster's encryption which makes this service a bit more palatable for me. Why not take the 14 day trial and download as many songs as possible? Sounds simple enough. Download a winamp plug in called Output Stacker that lets you convert those wma (damn microsoft) files to WAV files and burn to CD. In reality this is nothing new. You're basically exporting audio from these protected files and capturing them with your sound card. This is no trick. You're not breaking encryption. All you're doing is recording pretty crappy audio. For the hassle involved, I'd rather pick the songs I want from I-Tunes and authorize and de-authorize computers as my hardware platforms change. Then again, the best way to enjoy your music for longevity is to purchase the CDs you like, import them to I-Tunes as high quality MP3s and have complete freedom to do with them what you want. At least that way you're able to listen to Led Zeppelin on your IPod, because both the Apple Music Store and Napster don't carry them.

-ian

posted by Ian # 11:27 AM

Comments:

i thought the thing with napster is that you pay by the month for unlimited songs but the catch is that napster then comes over and has sex in the mouth with your mom. i like itunes, it doesnt do that. - mike

# posted by

Anonymous : Wed Feb 16, 11:48:00 AM EST

Ian's (almost) daily recap of what spikes my interest

Wednesday, February 16, 2005

Napster v. ITunes

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