And here's another thing to chuck into the pot. What about those of us that want the flexibility of being able to choose our tracks to be able to download, but will not compromise on sound quality (i.e. want pure linear PCM WAVs or lossless)? Apart from quasi-legal Allofmp3.com, where's the download store for us serving up popular music for those of us who want quality and flexibility? Not all people want DRM laced low bit-rate files you know.
http://www.bleep.com do FLAC / 320kbps MP3 albums for around the same price as iTunes. A far more limited stock, granted. And there's also http://www.emusic.co.uk and http://www.tunetribe.com too. The former has 192kbps MP3 for around 28p a track, while the latter has a splattering of WMA (bleurgh) in amongst the MP3s. Just some ones I've used in the past. With this bunch, I seem to be doing perfectly fine at the moment getting high (enough) quality DRM-free, legit copies of the stuff I want to listen to. And as a last resort, many 'hard copy' chart CDs from hmv.co.uk/play.com/cdwow/etc come in at a similar cost to iTunes, sometimes cheaper. But that kind of defeats the point, somewhat I know. - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/
