Back to the original topic.....
I am eagerly waiting, like the rest of us I'm sure, to see what J River has up their sleeve with the release of 9.1 and the music download test from a few days ago.
However, being the impatient person that I am, I downloaded Music Match 8.1 to try out the legal music download store.
I downloaded some single tracks that I wanted and imported them into MC. They were in wma format of course and played fine.
Just to play around I converted them to MP3. They converted fine are now in my library instead of the wma versions.
So what I don't get is, what's the big deal about all the copy protection (limited burns, transfers etc.) that are supposed to be part of these Itunes like services?
If I can just convert it to mp3 and use it like any of the other tracks in my library, where's the copy protection?
Is the assumption that converting to mp3 is too complicated and that the majority of the users won't know how to do it?
I'm all for the legal online sites, way overdue if you ask me. I love being able to get the 2 or three tracks that I want instead of having to get the whole album. I used to be a heavy cd purchaser back when they were regularly $12-$13. I haven't purchased a single album at $17 - $18 that they have been selling them for lately.
So since I want these online stores to succeed, I don't understand why so much is being made of the business model that limits what you can do with the tracks you buy. Converting to MP3 took me about 2 minutes per song.
Are the record companies going to realize that the restrictions aren't really working and pull the plug before the online stores even get off the ground?