What Legal Music Downloads Sites Are There?

There are literally hundreds of music downloads sites on the Internet these days but unfortunately under close scrutiny very few are actually what one might call "legal".

The problem with those that most people would admit perpetuate illegal activity online is that the software itself isn't illegal. The software doesn't do anything inherently that isn't legal. What it *does* do is provide the facility to do something illegal.

A gun doesn't do any damage until you fire it at someone. These sites don't do anything wrong until you aim to download copyrighted material from someone else.

Many of these sites do exactly that - you can download the content of other people's CD collections so long as they can do the same for you. That is exactly why sites like Napster have been brought to their knees in the past with legal problems by helping people illegally download music.

However in amongst all this there are a range of legal music downloads sites that provide a safe, legal experience. It absolutely *is* possible to enjoy a wide range of high-quality yet reasonably priced mp3s without risking breaking the law or ruining your computer by downloading viruses and worse.

Many of the legal music downloads sites are featured either here at this site or at one of the host of other music download sites out there such as Music Download Sites.

Here is a quick rundown of just 3 legal music downloads sites that you might like to consider investigating further...

Emusic - Offers 3 different subscription models at present with a free trial available for a month. The subscriptions offer a different number of tracks so the more you pay the better the value becomes.

You have total control over what you want to do with the music you download - whether it's listening to it on your PC, downloading it to your mp3 player or burning it onto CDs.

It is certainly quite a reasonably-priced option however please be aware that many of the artists are lesser-known so you are unlikely to get many of the "hotter" artists of today featured there.

The best bet is to get a free subscription and see what you think.

Musicmatch - Recently bought by Yahoo (and now part of their Yahoo Music service) Musicmatch offers two distinct services.

You subscribe to their Musicmatch Jukebox which is a fancy name for an application that will let you download and listen to music from their service. This is an unlimited service and Musicmatch claim access to over 6 million songs.

However in order to listen to the tracks you must have a current subscription to their service. If your subscription lapses, you won't be able to listen to these tracks any more.

If you want to actually burn CDs or transfer music from your PC to a compatible music player (which doesn't include the Ipod) you need to buy the tracks outright for the cost of 79c to 99c each.

Pleasantly though, the Musicmatch Jukebox also includes the faility to print your own CD labels and covers which is a nice touch and in addition the range of major artists is good. Among the playlist are James Blunt, Pink and U2.

There is a 14 day free trial period you can take where you can see what you think and try to track down your favourite artists.

A little complicated to understand how all the licensing works I think, but well worth a look - and at an absolutely bargain price!

Napster - With 2 different subscription models plus a sort of "pay as you go" option there are plenty of different ways you can use the Napster legal music downloads service.

It offer over 370,000 albums and 4 million tracks of a wide variety of artists - many very well-known.

You can download music onto your home computer and/or onto your mp3 player or burn it onto CD depending on your preferences and which subscription you opt for.

Possibly the best-value and most flexible offering available at present and one well worth checking out.