i think this is proof that mp3 players and music piracy don't necessarily go hand in hand

It's not proof per se, but I will say this:

I've bought more albums since owning the Empeg (four months) than I've purchased in the entire prior two years. Knowing that I can have the albums with me at all times without swapping is encouraging, giving me more confidence to make the purchase. Plus, it allows my wife to use the original CDs in her car whenever she feels like it.

Interestingly enough, the Empeg also encourages me to use places like Amazon.com instead of going to local record stores. Since I know I can't stick the CD directly into the car on the way home, I'm not motivated to go shopping for music in a physical store. Plus, I'm rarely in the car long enough to hear an entire album in a single sitting, so I often wouldn't get to hear an entire CD right after I bought it. But having the CDs delivered, I know I can stick them right into the computer and have them ripped and uploaded to Emma within the hour. I can listen to some of the album at my desk, then stick the Empeg in the car and have it pick up right where I left off. In this way, I can hear a new album from beginning to end, regardless of whether I'm going to and from work or not.

I have tried downloading music from the internet, but I don't like it very much. Mainly because I can't control the quality of the rips, the encoding, or how accurately the ID3 tags are filled out. The few songs I have downloaded are characterized by bad rips (skips and pops, or even aux-in dumps of LPs or tapes), bad encoding (too low of a bitrate, lower quality encoding methods, swishy/gritty high frequencies), and incorrect tags (incorrect year, "greatest hits" album name instead of original album name, or no tag data at all). I much prefer to control that stuff myself.

So, all in all, I'd definitely say that I prefer to buy my music rather than pirate it. Eventually, we'll reach the point where the CD is no longer used as the interim transport medium. I'll be buying the MP3s on the internet straight from the artists (who hopefully will care enough about their music to encode and tag the files properly).


Tony Fabris
Empeg #144