I have heard the this track on radio one but it ain't realeased till the 7th of january has anyone got a copy or knows of where i can get it.

Puretone Totally Addicted to bass

WinMX... Morpheous... etc. File-sharing apps. If anyone has it, that's where you'll find it. Just make sure you pick up a copy at the shops when it's released.

Bruno

Speaking of file-sharing apps, does everyone else have the same problem where you generally have to download a song from three or four different people before you get one that's even remotely acceptable? I'm not talking about bit rates, etc. -- I can understand having a less precise ear -- but, rather, pops, clicks, and squeaks. Are other people so totally unconcerned with the way their music sounds? And, if so, why do they bother at all? And there's basically the same problem with all the online title databases. If someone's not going to bother to even try to make sure that he's spelled words correctly (especially considering he must be looking at the source of the titles in order to type them in), nevermind capitalizing properly, why bother at all?

It might be the fact that you are listening to your MP3s on slightly higher quality equipment

You have to expect crap when people are ripping for target players with only little flash memory capacity. Plus people are using encoders like XING which are absolutely terrible compared to LAME and Fraunhoffer. Not to mention ripping on sub-standard drives with sub-standard programs. Not everyone knows about EAC and Audiograbber and to use Plextor drives.

Apart from the pops and skips you then also have incomplete files - I don't want to tell you how many of those I've checked out. I don't have broadband at home, so I don't make a habit of using the sharing apps. I grabbed some stuff from work a few weeks back over a period of a few days. Mostly just for preview purposes. Plus some tracks that I hadn't heard in 15 years or more. I stuck to only tracks above 128kbit. I tried to get them at 192 and above when possible. Barely any of them had complete file names or ID3 tags. The majority of them were listenable, but not of the quality that I've been encoding my own CD collection.

When you're getting stuff like this, I guess you have to take your chances and be patient. I didn't worry about it too much because I didn't intend for any of it to be archival. The missing ID3 tags were the worst problem, because I really wanted to know year and album info for a lot of the tracks - now it's off to allmusic.com to find out where to look for the tracks when purchasing.

Bruno

but, rather, pops, clicks, and squeaks. Are other people so totally unconcerned with the way their music sounds?

Yes. Many of the people using the filesharing apps never even listen to half of what they've downloaded and re-shared. They're only concerned with increasing the size of their collection.

The other problem is that these files are often multi-generation downloaded copies. Sometimes they get damaged in the transfer, and no one checks to make sure that they weren't damaged. So the errors are propogated around the sharing network.

This is the main reason I prefer to make my own MP3s from my own CDs. Morality and legality are secondary concerns for me.

Yes. Many of the people using the filesharing apps never even listen to half of what they've downloaded and re-shared. They're only concerned with increasing the size of their collection

Very true. I'm glad most of my mp3 collection (about 90%) comes from my own cd's and I've ripped myself.
The other 10% I had the pleasure of downloading from Napster... that was back in the days when sharing music was actually easy. I'm pretty sure if my collection ever got lost I wouldn't be able to replace it EVER again.
Nowadays I use Audiogalaxy, but since they've updated their sattelite a couple of weeks ago, a big part of the fun (and functionality) is also gone there. Most files are now "locked" and not downloadable anymore.
Audiogalaxy was the last file sharing service which most of the time provided good copies (meaning 192kbps and above). On all others (winMX, Morpheus, Bearshare) it's hard to find a file better than 128kbps (which is not acceptable for me). Really, I can't understand how anybody can be happy with the quality level 128kbps provides! In the early days of mp3, when most of us were logging in with an analog modem I could have some understanding for it. But nowadays, when practically everybody has high-speed internet access, this really shouldn't be an issue anymore! So why so many people still use 128kbps is beyond me!

Only service I haven't tried yet is clubpie.com, because they ask 3$/month, and I don't know if it's any good or not. I certainly wouldn't mind paying 3$/month (and even more) for a Napster-like service, but somehow I don't think it's going to be like that so I'm not quite sure I'm willing to try it before I've heard some good things about it. Anyone over here familiar with it?

Really, I can't understand how anybody can be happy with the quality level 128kbps provides!

Because most people are listening on cheap computer speakers through a cheap sound card. With that kind of listening environment, you can't hear a difference between 128 and 256.

A significant portion of my collection is still at 128 for this reason. It was only after I got the Empeg that I realized I'd made a mistake ripping my stuff at 128. I am slowly backfilling my collection with re-rips as time allows.

However, in defense of 128, if you have a good encoder set to high quality mode, then 128 can be fine for a large portion of the pop music out there today. I was using registered Fraunhofer for a while, and it did a decent job at its high-quality setting. (Slow, though.)

Morality and legality are secondary concerns for me.

In my defense, I only get stuff off of file-sharing services to see if the rest of the album is any good to see if I want to buy it. Or rather, to verify my guess that it's not any good. But even that's gone in the crapper in recent times, as there's nothing on the pop music circuit that even begins to pique my interest.

Hmmm..I've used the Fraunhoffer codec too, and although it was better than most other @128kbps, it still wasn't good enough for my standards. I found that the high tones were not encoded correctly, and the music was too "shrill". Then again, that could just be me, but I know I'm very picky when it comes to audio quality.

Nobody has replied to my other question, and if nodbody does I may just enter a sparate post for it : has anybody ever used the Clubpie service? (www.clubpie.com). This is one of the last file sharing services I haven't tried yet and I'm curious to know if it's any good or not.

Thanks!

Nobody has replied to my other question, and if nodbody does I may just enter a sparate post for it : has anybody ever used the Clubpie service?

Maybe that's because it sounds like a PORN website... Sort of like www.teenpie.com

Bruno

I just typed [something]pie.com to see if anything would come up, and it did. :)

Maybe that's because it sounds like a PORN website
Hahaha! Yeah, I does actually. But seriously, if you go to the link http://www.clubpie.com it doesn't sound too bad. Again, if their service is good I'm willing to pay for it. But I'm not prepared to pay now and find out later, even if it is only $3.95. So if anybody has any info, it's appreciated...

Forget about club pie. To put it politely, it looks like total CRAP. That means garbage if you're not familiar with that Canadian term. :) In fact, it looks like a big SCAM. Crooked, and not because they're finding music for you. Keep reading.

The more I dig into the site, the worse it sounds. I could put that together in a couple of days, iron out the presentation and then start charging people too.

First of all, NEVER, EVER trust a place that keeps stressing the word "FREE" but at the same time, in smaller print, is charging you a fee of any kind.

All they are is a resource for other people's software. They will "tell you" but don't believe that they are providing you with any type of client/server or peer-to-peer solution.

The cel phone antenna booster on the front page is also a huge warning. Those things are complete BS, in case anyone is wondering.

Here's a quote from one of their satisfied customers: "There has yet to be a song I have not found using the software I found through ClubPIE"

Notice how he said "the software I found..." So it sounds to me that Club Pie is charging to tell people how to find the music. It's like me charging you to tell you the following: "use kazaa to find music. download it here... You can also use morpheous. download it here..."

And then how about the part about combining multiple instant messengers? The only client software I know that does anything similar is JABBER and it's open source. So are they going to tell you where to download a Jabber client?

Now let's start searching the net to see what other people say.

Oh, how about this link: http://www.netscalped.com/_disc4/00000096.htm "internet scams"

And how about this: http://www.zeropaid.com/news/articles/auto/07172001c.php NIce discussion of spam from them and twistedhumor.com as well as proof of the points I made above.

Even more expose... http://www.geocities.com/p2ptech/emailsniff.html

Just search for "clubpie" in google.com and you'll find a lot. You'll also find a lot of broken links from people's personal pages. Looks like they're also peddling clubpie maybe for a kick-back.

So, in summary: CLUBPIE.COM is a money-making SCAM.

Ok, does that answer your questions mate? :) hehe.

To back hybrid8 up, from http://www.netscalped.com/_disc4/00000066.htm:

I have Clubpie as well for $3.95 a month. BUT, when you join them, you have to download KaZaA, right? Well, KaZaA is FREE!!!! I am NOT sure whey Clubpie has to come first!!! Right?? KaZaA is a Free Download, with Free Music to download!! Why is Clubpie involved??? I am calling my credit card company today!

Wow, some folks will do anything for a buck, huh?

Thanks. I figured as much, that's why I hadn't tried it yet. Actually I heard about it because I've got a subscription to twistedhumor (on my hotmail account ).

I had done some searches about it too and though I hadn't found the same links you are providing, I did find enough data to conclude this was bogus.
However, during those searches I did find out about some other sharing utility which I hadn't tried yet : Audiognome. I think I'll give that one a try this afternoon.
If it's any good I'll let you all know.