I want to download a song...why is it so difficult?

[The Revolution]

So I wanted to try and download "Holiday" by Green Day, and I've spent half an hour trying to do so with no success. I visited several web sites (itunes, napster, musicmatch). On all of them they want you to download their stupid player (I have my own player, I don't need another).

So I download the itunes player. So now i have this slow starting piece of crap player loaded with ads and I open it up and Surprise! the one song I want I can't download. I have to get the whole album for $12. Screw that.

And of course itunes just decides its going to start up with my system without asking me if I want to have it do that, and of course it doesn't include a uninstall option from the start menu. They're gonna make me go through the add/remove programs to do it.

I find it hard to believe theres no demand for a simple "download a song service". I tried to go legitimate, but apparently I can't...back to piracy it is then. Good job capitalism. :eyes:

</rant>

[WindRavenX]

1. try soulseek

NT

[Floogeldy]

6. REV, pay attention to WindRavenX's post.

Soulseek. Soulseek. Soulseek. Soulseek.

End of story.

[enigmatic]

13. Soulseek is daaaaaaaaaaa bomb...

For obscure music, there is nothing better..

[Radical Activist]

9. Maybe I'm a moran

But I can't figure the damn thing out. It has chat rooms where no one talks. I search for a song and I get a bunch of useless crap that isn't what I'm looking for. Kazaa lite is easy to use, but there aren't nearly as many songs or users as it used to have.

[WindRavenX]

11. what are you looking for?

I'm curious, coz I've never had any probs finding music. Soulseek is horrible for movies and tv shows and , arhem, porn.

[Radical Activist]

18. haha

No, I don't look for porn on soulseek! I get that elsewhere.
I've never been able to successfully download anything on soulseek. I just don't get how to use it.

[WindRavenX]

19. hmmm

Are you sure you're even connected? :D

[Radical Activist]

20. smart ass

I'm not that much of a moran. When I search for something I get a bunch of stuff that isn't anything like what I'm looking for. And when I try to download something I searched for it doesn't work.

[WindRavenX]

21. well, my ass is many things

Smart being only one of my ass' attributes :D

[Radical Activist]

23. haha! Care to

post a picture of that ass in the post a pic thread so we can judge for ourselves? :evilgrin:

[WindRavenX]

24. alas, said picture of ass does not exist

:evilfrown:

[Radical Activist]

25. It is the loss of all of DU

So when are you going to ask a question on my annoying thread?

[The Revolution]

15. Plus kazaa has become infested

with all these worthless files, like just the first 5 seconds repeating over and over or just 30 minutes of dead air.

[Radical Activist]

17. Exactly!

It isn't what it used to be.

[The Revolution]

10. Yeah, my brother has that

I tried download it once, on my old computer. The next day it was clear that my computer was having massive problems with internet connections. I never could fix it. (Tried uninstalling soulseek plus everything else from the previous week, ran ant-virus, ad-aware, other spyware tools, system restore, etc etc etc). Luckily I had my new computer built and ready the following week. I don't know if soulseek was the culprit, but I haven't been too excited about trying it again. Maybe I'll just have my brother get it and mail it to me.

[MrModerate]

2. iTunes sucks massively . . .

Based on the premise that if you haven't drunk the Apple koolaid you must be lower than dirt -- and you really appreciate products that are twice as expensive as everyone else's while (sometimes) being 2-3 percent better.

Their proprietary format and DRM policies also suck.

Myself, I either use eMusic (simple MP3s, one track at a time); buy the CD and rip it; or visit a variety of Usenet sites where selection and price are just right.

[ChoralScholar]

3. I don't understand it either...

I just checked the song on Rhapsody, hoping to suggest the free trial and 79 cent burn.. but it is one of two songs unavailable for individual burning from the American Idiot album...

Everyones got to get their piece of the royalty chump change, I guess...

[Goldom]

4. If you want to download legally, but don't want to use

their given player, crazy file format, etc, you can convert the file to an mp3. The auto-converters won't let you do it to a copywritten song (like something you get on iTunes), but if you get a program that records the stream going through your sound card, you can just turn on the recorder, play the song, and convert to your desired format, and you've got a legal file in your player of choice.

[Lone Pawn]

5. Uh...dude. A search on iTunes for "Green Day",

followed by clicking on the album, "Sessions@AOL", allows you to download Holiday for 99c.

And to be fair, you are asking for an 8 minute long song. That's twice as much bandwidth as a normal song.

[The Revolution]

8. I go to the American Idiot album, and it says

Album Only by Holiday. Why would it be availble one place and not another? It's needlessly stupid and difficult. Also, that "sessions@aol" album doesn't show up on every search. It seems to present a random list of albums near the top with each search.

[Lone Pawn]

12. Why? I really don't know. Probably related to the fact that it's

8 minutes long. That's actually the first I've come across a problem like that...so I assume it's related to the length.

Why do you want that particular song? I always thought it was the weakest on the album. Not insulting your personal tastes, just curious.

[The Revolution]

16. I heard it on the radio

and I liked it. That's pretty much it. :)

Plus there are some other songs listed on the album that say "album only" as well.

It doesn't matter now though...apple fucked with my computer (see other post below). Itunes is gone forever now.

[biscodawg]

22. i really doubt that makes any difference

disclogic.com sells tons of bands concerts in uncompressed flac formats. Entire concerts vary from 800 megs to 1.5 gigs and they charge from $8.00 to $15.00 (depends on what the band decides to charge). So i really doubt the bandwidth on a 8 minute mp3 makes that much difference. It's just pure greed.

[Lone Pawn]

26. 25-35% of every song download goes to distribution overhead,

55-65% goes to the record company, leaving about 10c profit for Apple for each song downloaded. It's not that profitable--it's just a hell of a self-sustaining advertisement for iPods.

[SW FL Dem]

7. MY 13 yr old downloaded a Green Day song last week

I don't think it was Holiday, but I know he paid .99 for it. Unfortunately, he's sleeping now and I have no clue how he did it.

[The Revolution]

14. DAMN YOU APPLE.

I EXPLICITLY told itunes NOT to reassociate file types. So what does it do? Changes ALL my icons and reassociates all my music files with itself. What a piece of crap this thing is. Apple can forget about ever getting one cent of my money. Now I'm gonna have to fix this shit.