Probably the best piece of career advice i ever received when i started out in journalism was to keep a book and fill it with anything interesting that i heard, read or saw about anything and everything.
As this was the days pre-internet, this proved invaluable and i kept it up collecting names, facts, figures, years, anniversaries, scandals and events and i had a good collection of books of scribblings and then around 1999 i had the great idea of putting it all on an access database so it was quickly retrievable.
I dutifully updated it with the facts gleaned that day and saved it to a floppy disk, then a CD and then a DVD as each computer died i transferred it onto the next one and then a month or so ago, the computer died and i lost it all, or rather, it is sat uselessly on the hard drive that is currently in a box in a draw in the desk until i find a way to retrieve it if i can.
Where i could type 'David Mellor' in the query box and bring up a whole list of dates, names and events, now i have to go back to my books 13 years out of date and search Google and go to 7 different sites for the information that i could access in 30 seconds previously.
While that is the most annoying thing i lost, i am also having to turn all my CD's back into MP3s again so i can play them on my MP3 player and on the computer but it is not a quick process so i have a dilemma.
As i have already purchased the CD's once, would it morally right to download the MP3's from a Torrent site?
Alanis Morissette and her record company have already got my £15 for her 'Jagged Little Pill' CD, so i have paid for the songs on her album so all i am doing is getting the songs in another format, songs i have already paid for once, twice actually as i brought it on cassette first.
It's hardly theft, i have the physical CD here beside me and I am turning them into MP3s anyway, isn't this just the same thing only quicker?
I would understand if i never had the CD and downloaded it so i was getting it without paying and depriving Alanis of her 75p or whatever percentage she gets from it but i'm not, she has already been paid for it, twice.
Not sure and the idea of what may be downloaded along with the songs scares me enough to keep firing up the CD Ripper and steer well away from the torrent sites but it still bothers me that if i never, would it be right or would an angry Alanis Morissette be scouring the streets looking for someone with headphones singing along to 'You Oughta Know' and leaping out demanding her 75p ?
As for the database, it is a very useful tool for anyone who writes and spends time looking up facts and figures and i give that advice here free unless you are Alanis Morissette, it will cost you 75p for my advice so we are now all square. Ironic ain't it.
7 comments:
I know absolutely nothing about any torrent sites... and nothing, absolutely nothing... about a certain website called Pirate Bay... (which is - allegedly -available by proxy these days, as it gets blocked by most ISPs)... Honest, Your Honour... So I'm sorry, I can't help you there...
(Cheezy looks casually into the middle distance, whistling under his breath)...
I feel your pain though, and fear that an angry Alanis Morrisette will now pop up in my own nightmares... eeeeeek!
i buy my music from itunes. legal. cheap enough. no ethical issues. pick the songs you want instead of entire albums. can redownload from ituens after a computer or phone meltdown...
q
I have heard tales of this fabled Pirate Bay but i have some Motorhead songs to make into MP3's and while an angry Alanis is bad enough, a ticked off Lemmy is another thing. Maybe i should download bands that are a bit wimpy (REM, Pet Shop Boys) and rip the bands who would scare me if they came knocking (Motorhead, Motley Crue).
itunes doesn't solve my dilemma of already having paid for them q and i don't even know if i could put them on my mp3 player
you can load the music on CD's into the itunes library (a software product that you download to your PC). then you can load the music on your MP3 fro itunes (yes, itunes supports MP3).
in addition, you can go to the itunes store and buy individual songs or entire albums...
geez, i'm almost 60 and i'm telling a youngn like you about technology. give me a break...
q
Hang on Lucy, q only told you half the story. Yes you could get your songs from itunes and pay 99p each time but not all the songs are mp3 compatible. Apple doesn't really like you playing their stuff on non-Apple products and as you called it an mp3 player and not an ipod, i'm guessing you haven't got an apple mp3 player. Not only do you have to make sure that the songs are DRM-free but you will need to convert them from AAC (the itunes format)to MP3 so they will play on your mp3 player.
May as well keep ripping the songs from CD, less steps and no cost.
http://ipod.about.com/od/itunesproblems/f/itunes_mp3_play.htm
As for downloading them from Pirate Bay, technically downloading them is not illegal, it is sharing them that is but unless you know what you are doing and what you are downloading, i wouldn't advise it as best way to get something nasty on your PC.
my understanding is that it is "illegal" for you to let others have a copy of the song regardless of format (cd, mp3, etc.) whether you give it away, sell it, or barter it.
it is legal to make copies, but you are only supposed to use one instance at a time. in other words, you aren't supposed to play it your mp3 in your garden, and at the same time play the CD in your house on a CD player.
to me this seems like one of those cases where morality and legality are the same.
q
That's quite shocking and confusing at the same time q. I guess there must be rules of what you can and can't do with a CD you own somewhere on the internet. I remember 'copying kills' back in the days of vinyl where they tried to stop copying of albums onto cassettes and i guess this is the same sort of thing only with CDs and MP3s.
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