Q & A #1

KC from NY wrote to ask……Hey Chuck, I was thinking about downloading Limewire to get music…You seem like the best person to ask…is it ok to do?
thnks kc

KC, What a great question…..

I would highly recommend AGAINST using Limewire.  You have to understand how that works.  All P2P (Peer to Peer) sites share bandwidth with users from all over.  You just never know who you are connecting with and what “other stuff” they may be sending you.  You just have no idea who these other users are and there are a lot of bad guys that hang out on sites like Limewire.  Not only that, once you download a song from Limewire, by default that song goes into a special hidden folder which allows other people to download it from you.  You can shut this part down but you need to know exactly how to do it.  The RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) is actively seeking out people who are sharing music illegally, which is what you would be doing.  The chances of them finding you is slim, but I would not take the chance.  Read my post HERE.

Now there are some places where you can get music legally for free.  Free is good.  One of the sites is Songbird, you can read about it HERE. There are also some really cool streaming sites that will play whatever you want, and these are also free.  Pandora.com and Last.fm will both do this. You can enter an artist and it will create play lists of songs by that particular artist or another one whose style is very close to theirs. Rhapsody.com is a site in which you can play online radio, based on the genre that you select, for free. For iPhone owners, Rhapsody is also available at the app store.  Yahoo Music and AOL Music both offer internet radio which are quite good.

Now, should you like Classical Music, here is a link where you can download classical tunes legally for free.  Click HERE.

Again, I never recommend p2p sites to get music.  You just never know, and quite frankly, it would be just a matter of time until you get something other than an mp3 file. If you want to get music that will be yours, then the only way is to use the iTunes, Zune (for Zune users) or Amazon music stores. These sites offer DRM (copy protection) free music. That is the only legal way anyway.

Got a question, you can contact me at theedibleearth@gmail.com….