| Product: |
Napster |
| Date: |
03/01/01 (37 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Free Music, and gives exposure to less well known groups.
Disadvantages: Will destroy the music industry. No one will go into the music indusrty if no one buys albums because they can get it free.
A few years ago, an American undergraduate and a couple of friends began work on a file sharing server, so they could share their music with each other across the net. This little project became know as Napster.
In the relatively short time this program has been available it has turned the music industry on its head.
Now at first I thought 'Great free music!' and when people started filelaw suits against them I thought it was stupid, because Napster wasn't actually breaking ANY copyright laws - the users were.
But this leads to a chicken and egg theory. Who's going to say no to free music? and who hasn't at one point or another taped a friends CD?
However, think for a moment about the music industry. Now imagine if you were an electrician, you went to someones house, did a job for them and then they refused to pay you. Thats exactly what people are doingby downloading full albums off this server.
I'm not saying Napster is, in itself a bad thing. It's an ingenius piece of software and a fantastic tool. It's also very good for downloading a few songs by a certain group to see if you like them, and then buying the CD. It has other good points, it gives newer groups the wide exposure they may need to create a fan-base.
So, I think Napster should be used in the same capacity as radio. To see who is who, what groups you like and then to buy their album.
Now for the actual things available. It allows the user to search hundreds of thousands of mp3s and wma (win amp media files, basically the same compression as an mp3, but they can only be played in winamp) for the one they want. It also allows advanced search capabilities such as specifying the bitrate (size/quality) and connection speed of the other user (download speed). Having said that a large number of the mp3s on their are poor quality or have buzzing in the background.
Once mp3s have been
downloaded, the default setting is to share them. This means people can now download them from you. However it is possible to choose not to allow anyone to be able to download form your own personal library.
Again I think it's best use is for finding out about new groups and finding out what they sound like and if you like them.
For a piece of programing this gets 5 stars BUT I will not rate it on ethics or laws, that is the users choice.
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