Life after Napster. It's OK!!! (KaZaA)

Member Name: lap dancer

Product:	KaZaA
Date:	15/12/02 (1332 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: easy to navigate the desktop, huge selection of files, something for everyone

Disadvantages: problems with preview play, can slow down your computer, porn

We are now in the post Napster age but has there been any change to download sites, in a word, No!!! The law changes which came in to ban and restructure napster have had no effect on other sites, in fact it probably highlighted the gap in the market and encouraged other sites of this nature to start up.

Sites like Napster, Audiogalaxy, Morpheus and indeed Kazaa have set up in the last5 years with the onset of new technology such as MP3?s, DVD?s, CD rewriters and the players which go with the DVD?s and MP3?s. This software has although expensive has made it easy for people to listen to music. MP3 players allow you to upload music files onto them. The players are small and easily transported which has attracted many people to them and therefore attracted many people to sites such as Kazaa. DVD players, although very expensive on their own are now even available on Playstation 2?s and most new computers have DVD players on them. Playstation 2?s cost around £200 and a good computer about £800 yet the DVD players on their own are costing around £400. People have taken advantage of this and as the Playstation 1 did so well there was a flood of people ready to buy the PS2, including myself I must confess.

With the on set of the availability of the new technology there was a vacuum which needed to be filled by the music and videos. CD?s are hugely expensive these days. A compilation CD or album costs around £15 and a single costs around £4. However these sites set up making the transfer of music around the world on a network hugely easy and inexpensive. It costs nothing to download audio or video files and they can be easily manipulated onto MP3?s or DVD?s which millions of us now do, be it legal or illegal.

The downloading sites have certainly filled the vacuum but why has Kazaa filled Napsters shoes?

Being so many different downloading sites out there why has Kazaa come to the for as opposed to Morpheus or Audiogalaxy or
others. The main reasons are:

1: the ease of navigation: Kazaa is very ease to navigate. It has 7 main different tabs at the top of the screen, Web, My Kazaa, Theatre, Search, Traffic and Shop. Web is the page, which appears when you open Kazaa up. It tells you some information about the site and tells you how many downloads last week etc and advertises. It gives you a Kazaa guide and info on how to check your privacy and just basics information that you would need. My Kazaa is the tab which you can open to see the downloads you have completed. It is split up into, audio, document, image, other, software and videos. When you have completed a download it is sorted into one of these categories. In My Kazaa you can also sort your different playlists out. You can hit tabs like more info and folders, which basically change the way the screen is laid out. Theatre is the tab, which is used to view all sorts of videos or pictures, which you want to view. However in the new version pictures are viewed in adobe, if you have it. Search, this is the tab you will use to search for a file, which you would like to download. You can be more definitive by filling out the search filter and then typing what you would like to search for. The search is very quick and once it has finished it displays all the files, which it has found. On the right hand side of the page it displays the files giving different categories which are of use, title, artist, size, ETA, bandwidth, quality and length. It is useful to know how long it will take to download. It?s also very useful to know how long the file is because eg if you want to download a film but the size of the file is very small you know that the file is not the right one. To start downloading a file just double click on it. Immediately that file will be transferred to the Traffic tab. This tab is where you can see what you?re downloading and what other people are uploading off your computer. The tab shows you
the progress of your download, the time left and the speed of the download. If you right click on the file you?re downloading you can pause, cancel or resume your download. You can also preview play your download. However I?ve found, especially with videos that you can?t preview play a lot of your downloads which is frustrating especially if you?re not sure whether you are downloading the wrong file. This doesn?t happen with audio files however. A good tip is to clear upload and erroneous by right clicking on a file which is being uploaded. This can sometimes speed up your own download. The Shop tab is a tab which you can use to buy music from Cornerstore which is a bit ironic when that?s legal but Kazaa isn?t!!!! 2 other tabs of note are tell a friend which explains itself and there is a link to Ebay.

2: The huge number of files: There are huge numbers of files which are available to download. I don?t know how many but there are about 3.1 million downloads per week on average.

3: The snowball effect: As some people got the Kazaa media desktop and saw how good it as, they told their friends etc and gradually everyone got it. There are now over 160 million media desktops in the world. This obviously increases the amount of files available.

4: Something for Everyone: People may think that there?s only recent music on the site but no, I?ve downloaded the likes if Gustav Holst and Edward Elgar. Every different taste is catered for.

5: I recommend that you use Kazaa along with a good Internet connection which most people seem to have now. Broadband works most effectively.

The new version of Kazaa has a virus protection system called Bullguard Lite but I recommend that you combine it with another protection system as like other Kazaa is not alone in having numerous viruses on it.

If you don?t have Kazaa it is simple to get, go to www.kazza.com and on the front page it tells you about the latest versio
n of Kazaa, it also has a link saying download it now. Click on the link and it will take you to the next page. Now this page takes you through all the steps you need to download it. Also, check the minimum system requirements to make sure that you fit in to the requirements and then you are free to download.

Having said all that I must make you aware that Kazaa?s not just as rosey as it makes out. It has come to my attention that Kazaa although claiming in it?s disclaimers and privacy statements that there is nothing dodgy going on but it appears that there is different ?spyware? or software to that effect on the system. It?s all to do with monitoring your activity etc and sending you pop up adverts and the like. The information, which Kazaa gets back, is used for other purposes.

Also there is a problem with pornography as this site is ridden with it and some innocent files even have it. So be careful and watch your children aswell.

If you are willing to run the risk of all this spyware then you will have a very good, easily navigable media desktop ready at your disposal, which will give you no ends of fun and files to download.

I highly recommend this site and despite the negatives the pros far outweigh the
Cons.

Enjoy

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