MP3 thing

I love the whole idea of mp3s. Unlike alot of folks, I am ready for a true paperless society. Perhaps, it is from years of watching my grandmother packrat. After all, who sees a cyber pack rat? ;) My first response is almost always "can you send me that in email" or "can I do this via email/online"?

I do not have issues with the whole digital copyright thing and I'm (more than) willing to pay for music. Yeah, we all made mix tapes as kids ('fess up) and I think that part of music will always exist. Did that mean that as a kid I didn't buy music? No. It just meant that I would try before I buy (hence, the reason subscription music is a good idea).

One thing that is really cool about mp3s is the whole independent artist marketing directly to the public. If I were a musician (which I'm not) I would definitely put out demos via the 'net. A chance to build some name recognition, gain an audience (hopefully) and a way to retain some of your artistic control... and if I got a fancy contract, that would be one of my clauses --the ability to continue to release music on the 'net. Seems like a win-win situation to me.

Of course, now I'm not a kid and although I don't have as much money as I would need to support my music habit in the style that I would like to, I can at least have a snazzy mp3 player and buy enough MP3s (or convert my CDs to MP3s) to fill it up.

To be honest, I've been a little disappointed by the whole experience. I am so ready to chuck out my CD collection and had been slowly doing that anyhow.

I never knew mp3 players were so confusing. When, oh, when, dear companies, will you realize that compatibility is a really great thing? Un-compatibility and proprietariness just means that some of us will not bother, until we have to. I REALLY REALLY want to use the music subscription services (not just the pay for download parts). However, I checked out the approximately 5 (!!) players that are compatible, and to be honest none of them really suit my needs.

Most importantly, I need a player that is tiny in size. The smaller, the better. Secondly, it can't cost billions of dollars. Thirdly, it would ideally work with a subscription service...and finally, if it has any additional features (flash drive, clock, fm player, etc.) that is cool.

So, I checked out yahoo, rhapsody, napster, and finally emusic. Personally, if I'm going to have download music vs. subscribe to music, emusic is the coolest. emusic is very indie oriented, so there's not a lot in the way of top 40, etc. It's pretty cool and I may decide to go with that one (for now). In my dream mp3 world, I would be able to use yahoo subscription service (which does have alot of variety and intergrates nicely into launch) and then emusic for what I can't get via yahoo subscription.

..and of course, I checked out ipod, which doesn't play well with most anything it seems, but is well, dang, way cool.

Oh, well, next mp3, I suppose.

one question that I need to figure out is if I convert a CD that I own to mp3, does that mean I have to keep the CD to prove that I purchased it? I really do want to streamline my life.