#1

Servers seized, all user data destroyed:

Any (ex) members here? I have used this site for pretty much all my music needs for years.

#2

No not a member. There’s no excuse for torrenting music, it’s a shitty thing to do.

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#3

Perhaps unless the stuff is out of print and impossible to find, but this site (and all other torrent sites) never restrict their content to just those cases.

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#4

yeah i was on it but can hardly bring myself to moan about it disappearing. just signed up to tidal so that’ll do me for now.

#5

besides the point really. it’s sometimes just the easiest way to get what you’re after and could be stuff you already own. there’s no legal equivalent to what what.cd was.

#6

Damn you 2016!!

#7

Pretty blanket statement. Lots of acceptable reasons for torrenting something I think. Few sensible reasons I do it off the top of my head:

  1. You don’t have a way to rip the music from physical media.
  2. I wait and buy the record from them when I see their show, so I don’t lose money on delivery fees/give to companies that don’t pay tax.

Then generally lots of other reasons. 1 album downloaded doesn’t equal 1 album sold. If I download an album and I like it I’ll usually buy it, otherwise it gets deleted.

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#8

For me it is/was basically Spotify or my record collection on the move as I could get it in mp3, plus a way of getting really obscure out of print stuff.

#9

wasn’t a what.cd user but have been downloading music since i was an actual child and didn’t have the money. a lot of music i wanted was out of print or really, really expensively imported. i had no problem with downloading music growing up because i didn’t have the money to buy actual albums, and christmas/birthdays i’d always go and buy five or six cds with the money i’d get from extended family, anyway.

i usually wasn’t sharing it with anyone else and didn’t have the money to spend on the actual physical copies in the first place, so there was no real moral argument against it? there were no streaming sites.

would you rather poor people were deprived of music? people who can’t afford it?

now i pay for streaming, am still poor, and buy probably only actually buy about 5 releases a year anyway.

#10

I can see your point about doing “ethically”, especially about buying records before going to gigs. But you’re still supporting sites which allow for easy access to free copyrighted material. It’s a machine that revolves around theft, and even though you may buy albums afterwards a lot of people don’t. Do you seed your own library? If so, do you somehow check whether the person torrrenting it has the same morality as you?

If you care so much about having MP3s, then why not invest in a record player which can do the conversion? You can get ones on amazon for £40.

I didn’t say 1 album downloaded equals 1 album sold, so I don’t quite know why you’ve thrown that at me. Besides, even if the ratio was for every 10 albums downloaded that would only have been 1 actual sale, that’s still a sale and important to a lot of bands.

You’re right but I think these sites would have a better leg to stand on if they actually made an effort to be an archive of stuff that you can’t get anywhere else, instead of having everything up for free. They don’t want to restrict their content though and don’t give a shit if people steal music. They don’t care about the music industry as a whole.

#11

With me I probably would have bought the same amount of music, but bought a load of duds. At my peak I was downloading a good load of albums a week, then without fail going out and buying 1-2 of those each weekend, or more on a binge. Meanwhile filling in gaps on mp3 for completeness sake - say some of the lesser known Bowie albums which I knew I would get round to eventually (usually bought second hand on vinyl, artists don’t profit from that either!). I bought some right shite in the pre-download era.

Probably a sign to move on to Spotify or whatever, but I am all set up for mp3 on the go currently.

#12

Note these record players are shite. Just a minor point.

3 Likes
#13

the music industry didn’t give a shit about digital distribution until way too late and to this day there is no service that has the range and depth of catalogue that what.cd had. is it any better for the music industry and buy a bad quality mp3 from amazon for cheap?

#14

I agree that the industry should have been much better with digital downloads when they first became viable, but I think it’s certainly better to buy through bandcamp/the label’s own site/bleep/amazon/itunes etc where the artist will get some payment, rather than to support a site where the artist gets no cut at all.

Yes what.cd probably did have a better range and depth, but that doesn’t mean people are necessarily entitled to it for free.

#15

In this day and age with streaming services offering unlimited music for a tenner a month, there’s no real excuse to use torrent sites. The music industry HAS caught up and are being (reasonably) fair - I’d like to see where my tenner a month goes, for instance., but it’s where they should be.

As for people who harp on about 320 quality MP3s etc. I must be lucky to have shitty ears as I can’t honestly tell the difference between a Spotify stream and a high-quality digital file.

#16

Looking back I maybe jumped into this a little too strong. I take back that there’s no excuse for it, but I do disagree with it personally.

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#17

Yes there is. As said, the depth of what cannot be found on any other place where music is offered (be it legally or illegally). And not only was what a place to download music, it was also a community where you could engage conversation on music and be inspired by other people (could happen here as well, you’ll say, but truth was that it happened much more spontaneously and much more direct to people with equal interests). It also provided a lot of neat ways to get informed on releases and artists. It evolved from being merely a place to download music to the center of musical experience. It wasn’t just people stealing music, it was getting together and exchanging.

Once streaming offers the same, I’d be happy to pay for it. At the moment, it really doesn’t. What had a feeling of solidarity and togetherness, not of some record corporations trying to force feed you stuff through hip computer generated playlists or conning you in listening to artists who spent money to make you listen to them. What was people.

Also, you’d be surprised at how limited this “unlimited” amount of music is on streaming services. It will always focus on new releases and a lot of older stuff will always be neglected.

And I’m pretty sure a whole bunch of people (including me) were spending a lot of money on music anyway, by buying physical records or attending shows. And for your information, I already have an account on spotify as well. But I hate it there. It still lacks a lot of heart (and convenience).

I am so gutted that it doesn’t exist anymore.

#18

Used to be a member but its been years since I’ve used the thing. Streaming killed all my pirating because I’m a sucker for convenience and not maintaining rations ^.^

#19

I do believe in paying artists what they are worth. I think the music industry is suffering because artist are not getting paid enough to be able to be to doing it full time.

But.

I feel like services such as Spotify have done much more damage to this then torrents ever have. The amount artists get paid for plays is pitiful.

Imagine what you would get for 2000 plays.

It make me laugh that we used to see adverts telling us that taping stuff was pirating and was killing music. This is on a completely different scale.

#20

Actually I can calculate that amount.

BRB

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