Guest Review By: Nick Stropko

I heard about SpiralFrog several months ago from a news story I saw, and I was immediately intrigued with the concept. A music download service that is supported entirely by ads seemed to be a fantastic way to achieve the Holy Grail: free, legal music downloads. Well, after several labels signing on, an upheaval of the Board of Directors, and months of waiting, I have been accepted as a beta tester for the fledgling service. Unfortunately, though the business model is admirable, this specific iteration needs some serious work before being released for mass consumption. The interface is confusing and poorly designed, there are several major bugs in the software, and it frankly doesn’t make sense. Though the promise of free, legal music is extremely tempting of music downloads, you may want to look elsewhere until SpiralFrog gets their service on track.

Take Note: This program is still in beta, so any and all features may change in the final version (or subsequent updates).

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Michael Roberson, the guy who founded MP3.com and Lindows, has another venture called MP3Tunes. This service allows you to upload and store you music collection to their servers. You can then access your music via virtually any device: web browser, PDA, EVDO laptop, GPRS phone, and now even TiVo. The MP3Tunes application for TiVo will work for Series 2 and above, but is still in beta stage.

Another interesting note about the service is that it will automatically select the correct file type and bit rate based on the device you are accessing the service with. For instance when accessing from a GPRS phone, it will stream in 32kbps and select a compatible file type based on what your brand of phone supports. I have not had a chance to try it myself, but it looks pretty slick. Check out the video demo for more info.

[Video Demo via Listening Post]

David Berlind the editor of ZDNet enthusiastically explains in a video why we should boycott DRM based devices, telling us that they should have named DRM “Content Restriction, Annulment, and Protection or CRAP for short. The basis of his 100% justified rant is that all of these closed DRM schemes are not compatible with each other, locking you into one type of DRM, giving the examples of Microsoft’s Janus, Apples’s FairPlay, and Sony’s ATRAC DRM systems. This similar to my response to a New York Times article on the same topic.

Berlind suggests that we boycott all of these devices containing DRM that limit our use of music. While that may be very hard to do since most devices are DRM enabled, I would suggest a different approach to this boycott.

• Do not purchase any DRM media. Buy music from the store and rip the CDs yourself. You will be able to put them on any device you want.
• Purchase only devices that support UMS. Devices that are UMS require no drivers and do not lock you into one computer or one operating system. Be wary of Microsoft MTP and Apple devices that lock you into one operating system or one computer.

If you watch one thing on the internet today please watch this video and join the boycott.

[ZDNet Video via dapreview]

So your kid just got one of those new Disney Mix Stix MP3 players. Now What? Instead of loading it up with the latest inappropriate pop music, load it up with some fairy tales, nursery rhymes, bible stories and fables.

The good news is that the files are not DRM crippled so it can be loaded onto most any digital audio player. The bad news is that you can burn it to a CD requiring you to listen to Humpty Dumpy 47 times on your 12 hour ride to Grandmothers this holiday season.

[Storytime Audio]