Legally Downloading Media

[Arsenal_fan]

Any feedback on Spotify? have been using the free version for desktop's. Was thinking of upgrading to the premium version for 10 SGD per month. Just noticed they have a free version for mobile devices in the US but not here, wonder why.

Downside is once you stop paying you cannot access your playlists.

[iamsen]

I buy blu-ray movies from Amazon and ship them here but I get all my music off iTunes. They won some battle against the record companies few years back and their files are now DRM free. Or if you REALLY want to avoid all things Apple, then just get a Google Play or Amazon mp3 account, have it registered to your parents' addresses or something.

(Got a blu ray drive on my last trip back to JP and have been absolutely mesmerised by the wonder of 1080p.)

[nakatago]

Most CDs bought from Amazon come with auto-rip; that is, you can get free MP3 copies which will be stored and can be downloaded to your device. The caveat is there can only be 10 authorized devices at a time. If I read it correctly too, you can revoke authorizations, in case you change your device.

While you wait for your audio CD, download your free and LEGAL MP3s. The MP3s are at 256 kbps (which is fine for heavy rock).

Unless something has changed, you have to be in the States to get your Amazon mp3s from CDs bought from them.

If they now put what you buy in the cloud, there is an awful lot of my music out there that I don't know about, I have spent a lot of money on music from Amazon.

Meanwhile, while I share your distaste for things Apple, I use iTunes as it's a pretty good way to get free podcasts (yes I know there are things like FeedBurner and the like) and albums when I don't mind the lower quality. But for the latter, I now tend to get it off YouTube, and if it's something I really like, buy the CD. I personally do see the big deal between listening to something on YT to downloading it from YT to listen on my portable player. Same for shows on YT.

Just go to Amazon Cloud Player--it's different from Amazon MP3. I've accessed it from two countries already and I can download my MP3 copies. I don't recall fiddling around with my account so I don't think I did anything special.

www.amazon.com/cloudplayer

[Mi Amigo]

Meanwhile, while I share your distaste for things Apple, I use iTunes as it's a pretty good way to get free podcasts (yes I know there are things like FeedBurner and the like) and albums when I don't mind the lower quality...

Brah, just on the subject of podcasts, I've been using the Podkicker (Android) app for some time and found it to be very good. Far better than iTurds, which I can't stand (a classic example of the Nanny State mentally of Apple if you ask me). IMHO of course.

[Brah]

Meanwhile, while I share your distaste for things Apple, I use iTunes as it's a pretty good way to get free podcasts (yes I know there are things like FeedBurner and the like) and albums when I don't mind the lower quality...

Brah, just on the subject of podcasts, I've been using the Podkicker (Android) app for some time and found it to be very good. Far better than iTurds, which I can't stand (a classic example of the Nanny State mentally of Apple if you ask me). IMHO of course.

Thanks for that. I just started using Sticher and TuneIn Radio on Android, and have been using BeyondPod.

I do like having a PC-based app so I can download and archive the files. It's not the most efficient way, because I copy from PC to phone and have to remember what I've listened to.

I've noticed some podcasts go away over time, some I want to keep.

Re naka on Amazon Cloud Player, that's only for a subset of what you bought, I have spent thousands on CD from Amazon but there were only 280-something available on the cloud, but I didn't really configure it so must be doing something wrong. I only spent 5 minutes looking at it so don't understand how it works yet. I didn't want to go through n-years of much to select the few to put on the cloud. But it's a good way to go.

A friend uploaded most of his music to Google and listens to that at work and phone.

[nakatago]

Meanwhile, while I share your distaste for things Apple, I use iTunes as it's a pretty good way to get free podcasts (yes I know there are things like FeedBurner and the like) and albums when I don't mind the lower quality...

Brah, just on the subject of podcasts, I've been using the Podkicker (Android) app for some time and found it to be very good. Far better than iTurds, which I can't stand (a classic example of the Nanny State mentally of Apple if you ask me). IMHO of course.

Thanks for that. I just started using Sticher and TuneIn Radio on Android, and have been using BeyondPod.

I do like having a PC-based app so I can download and archive the files. It's not the most efficient way, because I copy from PC to phone and have to remember what I've listened to.

I've noticed some podcasts go away over time, some I want to keep.

Re naka on Amazon Cloud Player, that's only for a subset of what you bought, I have spent thousands on CD from Amazon but there were only 280-something available on the cloud, but I didn't really configure it so must be doing something wrong. I only spent 5 minutes looking at it so don't understand how it works yet. I didn't want to go through n-years of much to select the few to put on the cloud. But it's a good way to go.

A friend uploaded most of his music to Google and listens to that at work and phone.

Well, I did say most. When Amazon emailed me about auto-rip, they did mention a limitation which I forgot. Auto-rip should be automatic although there is a limit on the number of songs that you can have. Found out about it last night when I was fooling around with it. Maybe you can try downloading and deleting some songs off of cloud player to make room for other albums.

For what it's worth, I also have Google music and uploaded my collection on it. I don't like to stream music I already own, though, so I have copies of songs I mostly listen to on my phone (and the rest of my collection on my computer).

[Brah]

For what it's worth, I also have Google music and uploaded my collection on it. I don't like to stream music I already own, though, so I have copies of songs I mostly listen to on my phone (and the rest of my collection on my computer).

Cool - about how long did it take you to upload, about how many songs or albums, and are you within free limits?

Sorry many questions...

[nakatago]

For what it's worth, I also have Google music and uploaded my collection on it. I don't like to stream music I already own, though, so I have copies of songs I mostly listen to on my phone (and the rest of my collection on my computer).

Cool - about how long did it take you to upload, about how many songs or albums, and are you within free limits?

Sorry many questions...

Currently, it's 20,000 songs with 300MB per song maximum.

Note though, that Google Play Music isn't officially supported in Singapore. However, there are procedures online how to make it think you're somewhere where it is (I forgot how I did it; I just piggybacked on my friend's setup when he said he already made it work and literally just signed up on his computer five minutes after him).

After that, you don't need IP spoofing anymore and will work just fine--both on the web and the android app.

Uploading of course depends on your bandwidth of course but the desktop client has settings for how fast/slow you want it to go--128 kbps to 1024 kbps to 'fastest possible.'

[heliotropic365]

I want to buy some MP3s legally but I don't have iTunes (I don't want to use Apple products as matter of principle). Amazon MP3 is out because it's US-only and even Ubuntu One doesn't have the major labels because of geo-restrictions...unless I make it look like my computer's in the US. And the CDs aren't even available locally if at all!

Any ideas?

"Oh, here's some money. I want to give it to you in exchange for your product. What? I can't have it because I'm not in the US or Europe? I'll just have to resort to other means then...What? You'll sue me?!?!?!?"

This is so exasperating...

haaaaaa, i totally agree. it's super frustrating how tough it can be sometimes to buy the music you want online. i do use apple and iTunes, (although my phone is samsung s3), but in SG so many songs are only only available in the US itunes. luckily, i have a bank account still active there so i can still use the US itunes from SG.

[Brah]

haaaaaa, i totally agree. it's super frustrating how tough it can be sometimes to buy the music you want online. i do use apple and iTunes, (although my phone is samsung s3), but in SG so many songs are only only available in the US itunes. luckily, i have a bank account still active there so i can still use the US itunes from SG.

Just curious, and hope you don't mind my asking - are you Singaporean?

[heliotropic365]

haaaaaa, i totally agree. it's super frustrating how tough it can be sometimes to buy the music you want online. i do use apple and iTunes, (although my phone is samsung s3), but in SG so many songs are only only available in the US itunes. luckily, i have a bank account still active there so i can still use the US itunes from SG.

Just curious, and hope you don't mind my asking - are you Singaporean?

i'm american. sg is great though

[swifty]

Any feedback on Spotify? have been using the free version for desktop's. Was thinking of upgrading to the premium version for 10 SGD per month. Just noticed they have a free version for mobile devices in the US but not here, wonder why.

Downside is once you stop paying you cannot access your playlists.

I use Spotify premium. Got a 1 yr subscription for my birthday.
I really like it but I've never used the free version (went straight to the premium version) so I can't really compare.
I think the main differences are you can store a certain number of songs offline (not just stream it) and maybe at a higher bitrate, plus no ads.

I find the iphone Ap a bit buggy but the computer version seems to run fine.

Not all songs are available and though I don't run into this problem too often, its quite annoying when it does.
This is true for many of the back catalogues eg. I was looking for an older Crystal Method album that I use to own but they only had recent albums.
This makes exploring the 'classics' not always possible.
Other notable omissions include ACDC, Metallica, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and The Beatles.
I think their licences must always be changing too as I've found previously downloaded songs are no longer available to me and whited out on my playlist. Could be that I've moved regions from Australia to Singapore, but I'm not sure.

Yea.. so that's the low down.
I haven't decided if I'll continue my service after my 1 yr's up, nor what would happen since I'm now based in Sg. The Singapore price is cheaper than Oz but I wonder what regional restrictions there might be.

[heliotropic365]

oh yeah, spotify! a friend recommended that to me recently and it slipped me mind to really check it out... does it work for mobile android devices?