What CD?

[NeutralMunchHotel]

I recently stumbled across What CD, a 'private tracker', which is a private database of torrents that require the user to upload a certain amount before he can download. The thing about this isthe sheer size of the database, with CDs you can't find anywhere else being uploaded in a number of qualities, the best of which is FLAC. The idea of legally finding this much music in this high quality is pretty much unthinkable, which makes me think why can't there be a legal site like this? The answer is copyright, but if the RIAA wants people to stop people pirating, they should probably come up with some alternative to this, quickly.

So, my question is, what do you think of a site that is illegal, but far surpasses the number of albums availible elsewhere and in a much higher quality.

Spoiler: For those musical buffs

The accepted bitrates are FLAC, 320, V0, V2, Ogg Vorbis, and AAC.

 

[strum4h]

320kbs and flac are tough to distinguish. Also I bet it discourages people from buying lower quality music when they can get it for free at the press of a button.

EDIT: Also flac is harder to work with because most portable music devices do not support flac. Personally I would love it because I am in the process of ripping my old records into flac so i can listen on my PC. I wish records were available at cd prices. Amazon is a little pricey. But going straight to flac would mean I would miss out on adding a record to my collection.

 

[Mafoobula]

For my purposes, anything I download is going to vary only a little bit in quality. This is fortunate, because the human ear, while a truly remarkable thing, isn't really all that great; you'd have to put two qualities of the same song right next to each other, then play them through a sophisticated sound system in order for most people to understand the difference.

So what do I think of an illegal site with a larger and better quality selection of music than legal means of getting the same music? Truth be told, I've never had any qualms about downloading music. Hell, forget music, I have about 300g in television, music and movies on a big hard drive, and another 50 already on DVDs.

On the other hand, I still have a sizeable collection of music CDs and DVDs that I'd purchased completely legally. I buy and download mostly on a whim, I suppose, and for movies and television at least, the difference in quality is noticeable enough to make buying a more attractive option.

 

[strum4h]

snip

I have heard about this website, they have music that it is extremely difficult/impossible to aquire legally. Many things that are not released anymore or tough to find are probably on that site. I think that is what he meant by the variety.

 

[NeutralMunchHotel]

320kbs and flac are tough to distinguish. Also I bet it discourages people from buying lower quality music when they can get it for free at the press of a button.

EDIT: Also flac is harder to work with because most portable music devices do not support flac. Personally I would love it because I am in the process of ripping my old records into flac so i can listen on my PC. I wish records were available at cd prices. Amazon is a little pricey. But going straight to flac would mean I would miss out on adding a record to my collection.

I'm sure that's part of the reason - it's one thing paying for something you can get for free, but paying for it at a worse quality?

 

[thenumberthirteen]

Do they have audiobooks? I don't really like music. I have 6gb of music on my PC, most of which is there because my family wanted me to put their CDs onto mp3 players, but I have over 13gb of audiobooks. Audiobooks can be virtually impossible to find some times.

 

[NeutralMunchHotel]

Do they have audiobooks? I don't really like music. I have 6gb of music on my PC, most of which is there because my family wanted me to put their CDs onto mp3 players, but I have over 13gb of audiobooks. Audiobooks can be virtually impossible to find some times.

Yes - quite an extensive number.