PlugOver the years, I’ve been aware of music-downloading services such as Napster, eMusic, and the ever-popular iTunes. During this time, my thoughts have remained the same: This site doesn’t have the music I want. I don’t want DRM attached to my music. I don’t have a credit card. F%$#.

Perhaps you can tell that I never really frequent these places. However, you could imagine my joy when Amazon.com launched their new MP3 download store. Why? What makes it any better?

First off, the download selection is huge. Last time I checked, iTunes held the record for the largest library of songs available for purchase. Please correct me if I’m wrong… and please correct me if I’m wrong again, because the first thing I’ve assumed is that Amazon knocked iTunes off of it’s throne (in terms of the number of songs). I realize that for many people, this does not really matter; however, it certainly matters to me. You have no idea what I have to go through to get some of the music I want.

What’s next? Pricing. Most of the songs on Amazon.com are set at eighty-nine cents. Not too shabby. (I still think it’s a bit pricy, but I suppose I’m just cheap.)

What’s the best feature of all? Drum roll, please…

No DRM.

Those two words are so cool, they deserved their own paragraph. In all seriousness, DRM is one of the primary reasons why I don’t use online music stores. Sure, I could hand over my one dollar and download my song, but then I wouldn’t be able to do anything with it. Why? I payed for it. The file is mine now. I should be able to copy it and burn it as many times as I’d like.

With Amazon.com, I don’t have to deal with these kinds of restrictions. With that and everything else, it’s pretty much a winning situation. Now I feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

More power to the peoples.