Great Sites To Legally Download Music & Movies
Do you like downloading music and movies but you want to ensure you are not breaking the law? If so, then be sure that you only get movies from legal download sites. Good news is that there are a lot of them in the internet these days. Knowing that, obtaining your favorite movie, music single or album can now be done without having to worry about copyright infringement. Some of the best sites where you can download movies and music legally are as follows:
Legal Movie Download Sites
- Netflix – This is a very popular legal movie download site holding a huge database of various kinds of films. Although Netflix had some tough competition from the likes of Blockbuster and Amazon, it still emerged as the winner in the end, and remains as the best movie download site.
- Blockbuster Movie Downloads – This site has become one of the closest competitors of the movie download giant, Netflix. Blockbuster offers an amazing range of movies which can be rented by mail or can be easily downloaded from the website. The site even offers recently released movies so you can add that new blockbuster on your queue as soon as it has been released in the theater.
- CinemaNow – A movie download site catering exclusively to US and Canada users, CinemaNow offers competitive subscription rates with the option of monthly or annual payments. Currently, the site has about 1500 Hollywood movies that users can easily select from.
- MovieFlix – This is yet another paid movie download site providing easy access to a great number of movies, TV shows and even documentaries. All paid members need to do is to pick, click and then watch the movie they want without any legal restrictions.
Legal Music Download Sites
- Last.fm – This is a well-known legal mp3 download site that allows users to preview the songs on their database using the integrated player before deciding to download them. The site currently has over 250 free mp3s from over twenty genres available for download with no strings attached.
- Jamendo – Yet another free legal music download site, Jamendo features thousands of free mp3 downloads that anyone in the world can obtain without having to login to the site.
- iTunes – When talking about free mp3 downloads on the internet, iTunes should definitely be included in the list. This is a free application that can be installed in any Apple or Mac devices. It doesn’t only allow users to download music and videos but also the app also helps them to organize the downloaded media on their computer..
Solving The Problem Of Digital Piracy
Piracy has long been a social problem and a nuisance to several industries. Not only is it rampant in the music and video arena, it is fast becoming a silent crime in the virtual world. Articles and music applications on web pages are now freely available to every cyber user. One can even obtain the entire content by simply using the copy and paste technique and post them on their own blogs. This unauthorized use and distribution of articles and applications voids the writers and creators of the financial gains that they deserve.
Piracy is a silent crime that goes unnoticed. Even a lot of the youth today are the prime movers in this illegal action. Though piracy cannot be totally eradicated, there are still ways to somehow reduce the incidence of this petty theft. Since the likelihood of being caught is very minimal, piracy is very widespread and even comes to a point that it becomes uncontrollable.
Increasing Awareness
Anti-piracy educational campaigns should be taken a notch higher. Though piracy awareness has been taking place, it needs to evolve into something that would demand more attention. Since the youth spends most of their time in front of the screen and are most likely susceptible to the temptations of downloading applications without obtaining the permission of the owner, it is then a crucial step to incorporate piracy details in the school curriculum. Parents should also educate their children on the dangers of indulging in piracy and inculcate in them the moral responsibility that comes along with their computer usage.
Fair Prices and Quality Content
Why do people find piracy very tempting? It is because they can get an almost good a deal at a very low price. That said, the key to stopping piracy is to sell quality content at fair prices. Apple is actually taking the first step in this not so popular method. Apple has been doing it with the I-Tunes Music sore. With several digital restrictions on copying, better quality at fair prices, piracy could really be diminished. Though this effort would not completely stop piracy, and some people will and still pirate, making an affordable alternative could very well cut the piracy population in half.
Policy Amendments
With stronger copyright laws, it might be more difficult to download items without going through the hassle of acquiring legal license. Not all “pirates†are willing to go through the hole. Enforcement techniques should be delivered sternly. In September 2003, several lawsuits were filed against individuals who illegally downloaded copyrighted content via file sharing networks. This is the first progress to discourage Internet users from even committing this petty crime.
Read More
The Issues With Peer To Peer Sharing
Peer to peer file sharing (also referred as P2P) is one method of sharing game, music, movie and software files among computers. Since no one can really monitor the sharing process, legal and copyright issues are being faced by P2P file sharing. The issues on copyright is considered to be the most problematic for P2P file sharing networks, in fact, legal problems are increasing every year because more and more people are resorting to the use of P2P to share all kinds of media online.
Anybody who likes to watch movies, listen to music or read books usually encounters copyright issues. Copyright is not just confined to books—it can be applied to just about everything from tires to music to soles of the shoes. It is defined as a legal right of a publisher or creative individual to control the reproduction and use of their masterpieces of original works. Asking permission to use other people’s original work may or may not come with a cost. But sometimes, the owner grants one person the permission with some terms that must be adhered.
You are most likely breaking the copyright laws when you distribute, download or get music, movie or other files from musicians, authors and artists without their permission. Aside from this problem, P2P file sharing can also become a means to gather and distribute people’s information of other people and use it for pornography or as a form of other illegal files not suited for the public. Identity theft is also highly possible with file sharing because other people can have access to your personal information and use this to set-up a fake account using your name and all the other data about you.
When a person downloads an illegal file, he may not know that he have also downloaded illegal pornographic materials along with the other files. The person (who have downloaded the file) will just realize this when it shows up on the computer. This will become a legal issue when someone accuses you of something you did unintentionally. Of course, the downloaded material can be used as evidence against you.
To keep yourself safe from any legal and copyright issues surrounding P2P file sharing, always remember to be careful. Pay attention to the details of the copyrights of your files. You might want to gain copyright from the rightful owner or opt not to share the files to other people. Firewalls and other safety measures can also be applied in most P2P file sharing sites, so make sure to use these for your own sake.
Read More
Will Big Music Companies Ever Embrace Digital Distribution?
The music industry losses billions of dollars due to the illegal and unauthorized distribution and sharing of music in the internet. Now that we are in the digital age, it seems that big music companies are facing yet another fierce competition – digital media distribution. The internet has offered us utmost convenience when it comes to accessing information online and also downloading various kinds of media, such as mp3. Because of this, sales of cds and dvds continue to drop which means record companies are losing a huge amount of money. However, some saw this as an opportunity to turn the table and also to put a stop to digital piracy.
Over the past years, the music industry has been fighting against piracy but although copyright laws are made to protect the rightful owners, it turns out that this has not stopped pirates from copying music and even entire albums only to be distributed for free online. But since people like easily downloadable media, rather than wasting their energy in stopping piracy why not just simply copy them. This may sound like a ridiculous plan but this is actually something that might work.
It is expected that sites offering unlimited access to mp3 downloads will start to proliferate the internet in the years to come. Record companies will sell copyrights of their songs to these sites in return they will have to share a percentage of their profits to them. Sounds like a good plan right? Doing so will also help ease the problem on illegal music download.
Truth of the matter is, this is not a new plan. In fact, iTunes successfully introduced legal music downloads a long time ago. Though there are still record labels and music companies that are not ecstatic about the idea, they are not completely shunning it either. Besides, as mentioned earlier, we are now in the digital age. Everything we use today, from tv, computers even airconditioners are now digitalized. So why not do the same when releasing music albums. In fact, record companies will save a lot when they opt for a digital release. They won’t have to shell out money for the cds or dvds where the music will be recorded. Instead, they can use that money to advertise their digital music releases which is now very convenient thanks to the emergence of social media. In addition to that, they can even put up legal mp3 streaming sites where users can listen to their favorite music without having to download them. With this said, it is very likely that huge music companies will eventually embrace digital distribution completely. After all, it is better to offer their music at a lowered price than not earning profit at all.
The best thing that huge record labels and music production companies can do is to adapt with the changing trends in the industry, and use the advancing technology to its fullest advantage. However, I strongly believe that copyright laws should be revised to ensure that no one will take advantage of the ease of distributing digital music online. By doing so, the law can protect the rights of not only the record companies but also the music artists as well.
Read More
What’s Preventing Online Movie Streaming
These days, you can practically watch or download anything online. Radio stations are now being streamed live in the internet and so are movies. While it is clear that streaming unauthorized content-may it be movies or music- online is illegal, sites offering free and paid online movie streaming services have been popping up in the cyber world like mushrooms. Because of this, I’m sure I am not the only confused as to whether streaming movies online is legal or not. Common sense would tell you that a newly-released movie being streamed in the internet (days after or even before its release on theatres) online screams illegal all over it. But if there are already a number of paid online streaming sites claiming to offer legal movie streaming, what’s keeping legislators from acknowledging its legality?
For one, the law governing copyright issues is very complicated and too broad to say the least. In the US, copyright infringement occurs when someone illegally reproduce or make profit from distributing any copyrighted media, be it movies, books or music. If this is the case, then it is safe to assume that movie streaming online are illegal since they are being viewed by thousands of users worldwide, with no clear idea indicating whether the copyright of the movie has been bought legally or not. But if it is illegal, why are these sites still in full operation and with the looks of it, more online movie streaming sites-paid and free- continue to emerge on the internet.
While piracy has been an on-going problem even before the conception of the internet, the advancing technology has provided an even better platform for illegal copies of movies and music to be easily distributed to the public. Try browsing the internet, and you will find hundreds, if not thousands, of free movie streaming sites offering the latest movie releases. Although not all of them offer the best copy of the movie, still the movie industry is losing millions or even billions of dollars because of the unauthorized and illegal internet streaming of movies. Since the internet has a worldwide reach, anyone can gain access to the media being streamed online.
What I don’t understand is that, if law makers are not yet ready to get to terms with the legality of internet movie streaming, then how is it possible that Netflix is able to stream and share movies legally for a fee? Knowing this, the copyright law in terms of streaming movies online has just got murkier, at best. Truth of the matter is, there are still a lot of loopholes in the copyright laws. A good example is a copyright lawsuit filed against Zediva, an online movie service that has just been recently launched.
Upon the site’s launch early last year, it became an instant hit. What Zediva does is it that it buys the copyright of recently released movies and then plays the movie on DVD players on their servers and then rent the player for 2 dollars, with the user’s computer acting like the remote. The movies are played on the company’s players one at a time, which Zediva claims give them legal coverage. However, it looks like the law and movie studios are not agreeing with them, since they have been shut down by the US District Court due to an impending case of copyright infringement filed against them.
While the future of Zediva is a bit bleak, at the moment, the company is still positive that they will win the case. The company has come up with two compelling defenses – one gives emphasis to copyright law first sale doctrine stating that anyone who bought copyrighted work assumes the right to do things like modifying its cover or reselling it so long as the copy has been acquired through legal means. Their second argument, meanwhile, states that they the company must not be punished for innovating.
Reading this case got me into thinking that lawmakers must come up with a definitive set of rules as to what really constitutes copyright infringement in the virtual world. With almost everything being distributed, shared and streamed online, if there are online streaming sites that were able to operate legally, then it is safe to say that it won’t be long until legislators finally verify its legality, noting though that movies being streamed were obtained and purchased legally.
Read More