Is Kazaa really free?

Kazaa - file format - name of pay sites

• Hi, my wife has used Kazaa to download music files. I would like her to use a pay site. But, my understanding is that many of the pay sites use their own formats. The file formats my wife uses the background music for family videos is AVI and WAV. So what I need is a pay site that will let her download music that see can use in her family videos that use the same format as Kazaa. Thanks

• Answer:

  Dear just4fun2, The file format used for almost all music files on Kazaa is MP3. Kazaa Media Desktop (once capitalized as "KaZaA", but now usually left as "Kazaa") is a peer-to-peer file sharing application using the FastTrack protocol. It is commonly used to exchange MP3 music files and is (as of late 2004) the 2nd most popular application for this purpose (the first being BitTorrent). Wikipedia: Kazaa http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazaa The WAV format is very rarely used on Kazaa, or anywhere else on the web for that matter, because a WAV file takes up about ten times as much space as MP3 without offering significantly greater audio quality. In most cases, listeners can't tell the difference between a WAV file and the equivalent MP3 file. This is especially true if the MP3 file is encoded at a high bit rate, such as 192 kbps. I assume, therefore, that your wife has been downloading MP3 files from Kazaa and will be happy to use MP3 files in future. As file sharing over the Internet has become popular, the WAV format has declined in popularity, primarily because uncompressed WAV files are quite large. More frequently, compressed but lossy formats such as MP3, Ogg Vorbis and Advanced Audio Coding are used to store and transfer audio, since their smaller file sizes allow for faster transfers over the Internet, and large collections of files consume only a conservative amount of disk space. Wikipedia: WAV http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wav As you point out, nearly all of the pay sites that are completely legal -- unlike allofMP3.com -- and that offer albums from artists most people have actually heard of -- unlike music.download.com -- use a proprietary format such as WMA or NAP. The only major music store that lets users download files in MP3 format is eStore. To get an idea of the music selection available on eStore, take a look at its charts. eMusic: Home http://www.emusic.com/promo/home.html eMusic: Charts http://www.emusic.com/charts.html Among the smaller music stores featuring lesser-known independent artists, my favorite is Magnatune. Actually, Magnatune is a record label that treats its artists fairly and offers liberal licensing terms to music buyers. On the Magnatune website, you can preview albums by listening to their full content in streaming MP3 format. To purchase an album, you can download it in WAV format for a fee that depends on how much you like the music. The artist receives 50% of your payment, and you get to choose any whole-dollar amount from $5 to $18. Magnatune: Home http://magnatune.com/ So if your wife purchases an album from Magnatune, it will be in WAV format, which is what you say she uses in her family videos. Music purchased from eMusic is in the MP3 format, the same one used on Kazaa. She won't need any additional software to use either type of file for listening purposes. If, however, she seeks to convert a file from WAV to MP3 or from MP3 to WAV, she'll have to use a program made for that purpose. One such program is Waver. I can't vouch for it, but you can download a 30-day trial version for free. The full version costs $29.95 to download. Waver: Home http://www.mp3towav.com-http.com/ Waver: Download http://www.mp3towav.com-http.com/downloads.html I have enjoyed addressing this question on your behalf. If you feel that any part of my answer is unclear or incorrect, please advise me through a Clarification Request so that I have a chance to fully meet your needs before you assign a rating. Regards, leapinglizard