I can download one song I like, instead of having to find storage for a plastic disc in a plastic box that has one song I like and ten songs I don't. I can back up my downloads however many times I need to, or even burn them onto plastic discs if I must, but the cost and space savings of not having a bunch of music I don't like gives the download option top billing in my book.
If I didn't already have a computer with a hard drive and a CD burner, I could use the money I saved not buying $17 CDs full of songs I don't like to finance the needed computer upgrades.
Much as I love owning physical CDs, it is easier to do digital downloads, uses less resources (a good thing to consider during Earth Day), and I always rip my CDs anyways for use on my PC.
The only caveat I will say is that any digital download that is crippled to only work on the PC you download it with is NOT acceptable, since I usually have one PC for my downloads but move the file to a differet PC for storage and use.
I also prefer to not have to connect to a specific server every time I want to play the file since servers do go offline. But I find the "only usable on the downloading PC" more annoying of the two DRM schemes.
For me it's a quality issue. Digital downloads are still not as high a quality as the CD (assuming a professionally mastered CD to begin with). It's like asking "TIF or JPEG?"... I'll take the TIF, please, 'cause I can then downsample for as many JPEGs as I want, but I can't ever turn that JPEG back into a TIF. Same w/ music. I buy some stuff online, 'cause I mostly listen to music in the Trooper, which isn't exactly an excellent listening space, but if it's something that I really care about, I want the CD so I can listen to the full quality, as artist and engineer intended it, on the system in the living room.
1) I want something I can physically hang onto, pressed (not burned), complete with art and liner notes.
2) The audio quality is far and away better than any digital download - MP3 compression is lossy by definition, and a trained ear can spot the losses a mile off, even at a high bit rate. I don't even like the sound of iPods, and they claim that they're lossless...
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ericcoleman) wrote2009-04-22 09:51 am
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Digital downloads
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The only caveat I will say is that any digital download that is crippled to only work on the PC you download it with is NOT acceptable, since I usually have one PC for my downloads but move the file to a differet PC for storage and use.
I also prefer to not have to connect to a specific server every time I want to play the file since servers do go offline. But I find the "only usable on the downloading PC" more annoying of the two DRM schemes.
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1) I want something I can physically hang onto, pressed (not burned), complete with art and liner notes.
2) The audio quality is far and away better than any digital download - MP3 compression is lossy by definition, and a trained ear can spot the losses a mile off, even at a high bit rate. I don't even like the sound of iPods, and they claim that they're lossless...