eMusic

[Ioman]

www.emusic.com

I signed up with them this week and so far I am in love. $20/mo for 90 downloads and you get to own them and do whatever you like with them. 203kbps bit rate and in MP3 format.

They are all indie labels, so don't expect Britney Spears

;)

Highly recommended for now!

[ECA]

Do they use any other formats???
and bit rates??

[Ioman]

Do they use any other formats???
and bit rates??


Not from what I can tell, I will try and check the settings. I know www.audiolunchbox.com supports OGG which is pretty cool.

[ECA]

Love to see the Wav, ogg, and other LARGER formats..I can convert them down if needed.. But to Burn a MP3 CD/DVD for playing on the DVD players is cool.
Waiting for MORE DVD players to use the other formats also..I have seen Wave(?) I think..

[heykiddego]

I've been using it for about 6 months, and I absolutely LOVE it! It is every bit as great as it sounds. It is by far the best deal out there for digital music.

If anyone else out there uses it, and is also a Myspace.com member, why not join the group I create there: eMusic artists on Myspace (http://groups.myspace.com/eMusicArtists).

This is a group for people to share information about artists they find on MySpace.com that sell their music on eMusic.com.

For eMusic.com fans (like myself) this could be a great way to discover more artists whose music they can get with their eMusic.com subscription.

--heykiddego

[Ioman]

Cool thanks for the link, I will check it out. Out of curiosity, how much does eMusic typically pay the artists there?

[ECA]

Did you see any orther supported formats??

[heykiddego]

no, eMusic only has mp3 format. But they are defnitely protection-free. They use VBR to try to get the best size/quality ration (for better or worse).

--heykiddego

[ECA]

I made a suggestion to Netflix, that they should let there listing be Viewed before people have to join. that way they can see the artists, and movies, Before they join.
Be nice if eMusic would also do this.

[heykiddego]

You can do this at eMusic, just go to http://www.emusic.com/browse/all.html

You can do it through the ad page as well, but it's harder. You have to click the "Why Join" button, then "Preview Music", then select one of the preview titles, then click on the artist's name to the right of the album cover. That will show all albums by that artist. From that page you can find a "Browse" tab toward the top left of the page.

--heykiddego

[ECA]

Look at the way they List by artist..
The T's are FULL or 'The' group and 'That' group, only because it STARTS with 'T' 238 pages of them...

[heykiddego]

Look at the way they List by artist..
The T's are FULL or 'The' group and 'That' group, only because it STARTS with 'T' 238 pages of them...

Hmm. You're right. I never noticed that. I guess I don't browse artists that way. I typically browse by genre or search for particular artists. Also, when your search produces no results, they provide a way of searching for similar artists if the artist name is recognized (from where I don't know. AMG database maybe?). Also, I typically find music I do like, and then look at what other listeners of that music like, to see if it's interesting.

But you're absolutely right, they shouldn't be alphabetized that way. Sounds like a suggestion that should be passed on to them. Maybe I will now, and I'll get back to you with what they have to say. :)

--heykiddego

[ECA]

It would be nice to change they're data base to include LAST NAME FIRST...
Tom waits is under T' NOT W'
Iv seen this on many sites, with Audio music.
Sputnik7, yahoo music, MSN music....

[heykiddego]

It would be nice to change they're data base to include LAST NAME FIRST...
Tom waits is under T' NOT W'
Iv seen this on many sites, with Audio music.
Sputnik7, yahoo music, MSN music....

Yes, I wrote comments to them, and included that already. I'll let you know about their response to that, too.

--heykiddego

[heykiddego]

Ok, here's the latest. I sent eMusic the following message:

Browsing for all artists (sorted by artists name) that begin with things like "The" (for example, The Charlatans UK), is very burdensome becuase they DO NOT appear in the proper place (The Charlatans UK should be under "C" for "Charlatans", not "T" for "The").

Also, it seems that it is very difficult to find named artists by browsing. Browsing for Robbie Fulks, It was nowhere to be found under "F" for Fulks (at least I couldn't find it). I did find it under "R"

Artists names that represent a person, should most definitely be under the letter representing the LAST name, not the first name, and presented like this: "Fulks, Robbie". I have no problem with them ALSO showing up in the letter for the first name, but in that case they should be displayed like this: "Robbie Fulks", and they should be sorted with the rest of the items (i.e. Robbie Fulks should show up somewhere between "Roadog" and "Rock Star Club", at wherever is appropriate, not like it is now where it is dozens of pages before "Roaddog", even though "Rob Perry" is not).

In short, someone REALLY needs to revist your entire alphabetical sorting scheme.

Finally, I find it very cumbersome, when there are 200 pages of results, that there are only links to jump to page 2, 3, 4, or 200. If the item I need to find is on page 112 (which, of course I don't know because I haven't browsed to it yet), I have to click page 4, and then I have the option to go to pages 1-7, or 200. Then I click 7, and I have the option to go to pages 1, 4-10, or 200. Next I have to click 10...
....can you see how long it takes to browse to page 112 this way? Maybe you could try some new ideas for jumping pages more quickly (maybe a jump ahead 20 pages and a jump back 20 pages button, or something).

This is the response that I got:

Hello,

Thank you for contacting eMusic Customer Support.

I do agree, some of these features are not currently ideal and apologize for any inconvenience or frustration they may cause you. We are working on new and updated features all the time. We are aware of most of these issues, but I will make sure that your concerns are passed along.

We are sorry that you were not satisfied with our service and appreciate you taking the time to give us this feedback concerning your experience with eMusic. We will use your feedback to continue to improve the level of service we provide our customers.

We'll see what comes of this on the site. :)

--heykiddego

[ECA]

WELL,
Its interesting that they GROUP, the GROUP names with the Artist names..I would think that there would be 2 lists for such.
Iv done enough programming in my life, and I cant see WHY they cant use a spreadsheet/database format, and search/sort/display the proper columns. Just lazy programming to me.
I would think 1/2 the nerds HERE could do the sort routines.
Even if you look at netflix, they sort 1 word only most times.

[Ioman]

Wow I am impressed they got back to you. If it was a "canned" response, it was well written!