History

History has shown the development of each new medium and means of distribution eventually supplements other media and the media before it (Lorek, 2001, p. 43). This trend has continued with the new medium of digital files and distribution of music in the form of MP3. The acronym MPEG stands for Moving Picture Experts Group, a group which has developed compression systems for video data, including a subsystem which compresses sound called MPEG audio Layer-3. When shortened, it becomes known as the acronym MP3. MP3 compression reduces the number of bytes in a digital file without significantly affecting the overall quality of the sound. The MP3 format compresses a digital song file of CD quality by a factor of 10 to 14, which helps keep the file from taking up large amounts of space on a computer’s hard drive, and makes it easier to upload and download the file over the Internet (Brain, n.d.(b)).

“The MP3 format for digital music has had, and will continue to have, a huge impact on how people collect, listen to, and distribute music” (Brain, n.d.(b)). The MP3 movement is one of the most amazing phenomena the music industry has ever seen, and unlike other movements, such as the cassette or compact disc (CD), the MP3 movement started not with the industry itself, but with a huge audience of music lovers on the Internet (Brain, n.d.(b)).

The simplicity of the technology has made it easy for anyone to distribute music at nearly no cost, or for free, and has made it easy for anyone to find music and access it instantly. MP3 technology makes it simple for users to download an MP3 file from a website and play it, rip a song from a music CD and play it directly or encode it as an MP3 file. MP3 technology even allows individuals to record or convert files from one format to another and share them with multiple users across the Internet. To listen to an MP3 file, all a user needs is a computer with a sound card and speakers and easily available software. If a user adds an Internet connection, a compact disc burner drive, and an MP3 player, s/he can create MP3s and burn them to CDs. While this might sound like a lot of equipment, these items usually are standard on most computers purchased today.

There are literally thousands of sites on the Internet where one can download MP3 files, and all a user has to do is visit one of these websites, search for a song, and download it to the hard disk of the computer. Most songs can be downloaded quickly, especially with a high-speed Internet connection.