Those @!%ing greedy pigs at the record labels have pissed many other people off, but now they got me angry too.  Did you know that if you buy a song from Itunes, you can’t place it on your Zune, or other devices?  Just play it on your Ipod or your Itunes… on the computer you bought it on.  So, here’s what happened, and here’s what you can do about it:What happened: So, the other day I wrote about how Tracy took me to the Panic at the Disco concert, which also had Dashboard Confessional open for them. We had concurred that Dashboard had given the best show from the bands that were there… maybe it was the best stage presence?  Either way, I’m working yesterday, when I get an e-mail from her with a subject “You have stolen my heart” (this was before the fancy dinner I cooked up ). I’ve definitely taken a liking to her, and was hoping that she likes me as well, but it was still a tiny bit shocking seeing that e-mail come in.  So, of course I’m smiling as I go to open the e-mail.  I realize that there’s an attachment “04-stolen.m4p”- I save it, and when I try to open it in 4 different mp3 players, I got denied…. This computer has not been authorized….  What the hell?? I mean, someone just bought a song as a gift, to be sweet, and they can’t give it as a gift?  Grrrrrr… you greedy fucks.  So… yeah… that’s where I get angry.  So… I’m going to tell you what “I have heard you can do”

WHAT YOU CAN DO: The 1st thing that “I hear people are doing” is to just download the songs without paying for them. It’s theft, but you don’t get the DRM headache.  Some sites that people are using are listed on this page -  Just be careful… some of them have some ads that you may not want kids to see.   This page lists the different software that you’ll need in order to download from these peer to peer networks (used interchangably with the name Torrent Sites). From what I hear, once you have a “client” software (Such as utorrent) installed, you can go to these sites, type in what you’re looking for (Hypothetical example: Dashboard Confessional), and then just download the ones you want… i.e. every album the band has ever made, or just the song you want.  If you find an album that has your song on it, and don’t want the whole album, you can deselect the rest of the tracks in the torrent software before you commit to the download.

Some things to be aware of:  grabbing torrents is a 2-way street… it’s safe, but you are uploading at the same time you are downloading…  and, one of the reasons you get such fast download speeds is because you’re grabbing it from many people at once.  The downside is that it may take up all your bandwidth, and if there’s other people in the house / office, their internet may slow down drastically.  I hear that the software does let you limit the down / up speeds, so… it’s not a problem, just something to be aware of. Additionally, to get faster downloads, you want to look for titles that have more “Seeders” (or people uploading the file).

ANOTHER APPROACH:  Remember… while torrents are explained in the above paragraph, the topic of this post is how to get around DRM, not how to download every song you’ve ever wanted for free (remember- external harddrives are inexpensive these days, as music/videos take up a lot of space).  So… you can always google “Remove drm” and find many sites that tell you how to do it.  There’s free software, there’s paid software, and then there’s shareware (Software that’s free to try, but then you’re supposed to buy it).  These sites will tell you about what software does what, and what’s recommended… but the short version is that many of these pieces of software make a copy of the song in another format… so… instead of WMV or m4p, or mp3 with drm, it makes an mp3 without drm.  You can then take that new file, and send it to people, or play it on your non-ipod mp3 player, etc…

So… again.. I”m not telling you to steal – that’s your own decision.  I am telling you not to let these companies push you around like that.  Selling you something you can’t use is unacceptable-  especially when you can get the same thing for free elsewhere!  Perhaps another solution is to change where you buy it from.  Amazon.com for example is selling DRM-free music (meaning that you buy it from them, and can already put it on nany device).

BY THE WAY: Remember how over the last few years the RIAA has been terrorizing people that have shared music?  You know… things like getting 64 year old ladies, and 10 year old kids into court, and trying to scare the bejesus out of them with massive fines and jail sentences?  Well… clearly, they’re not trying to make their money back, they’re trying to scare the shit out of other people so they won’t try file-sharing.  So… this one guy who got caught for sharing 7 songs has gotten a Harvard Law Professor– who’s recruited his whole class to beat the RIAA in court.  You should read the article- I found it pretty entertaining.  Did you know that I went to Harvard?  Yup, I really did go there (to see my older brother graduate)