Heyday of the MP3 – A History

via Flickr







via Flickr







Ownership Matters: What Apple Music users and Jim Dalrymple should know








6 Reasons Why Music Ownership Matters




  1. Your music will always be yours.




  1. The quality is better.



  1. You’re not limited to a device or service.


  1. There’s no “Buyer Beware” terms and conditions.






Is hi-res audio worth the price?

As Onkyo plans to expand its hi-res music store to the US, it’s time to decide if hi-res downloads are worth paying more for than CD-quality files.

In recent times, we’ve seen more focus on the quality of music files online. For music lovers who enjoy digital music, this is a welcome change. Folks like musician Neil Young are taking a stance against the low-quality downloads that consumers are used to getting from online stores like iTunes.

“We live in the digital age, and unfortunately it’s degrading our music, not improving,” said Young.

To combat crappy digital music, Young launched his Pono device and its corresponding hi-res audio store online. Now, Japanese consumer electronics company Onkyo is planning to expand its hi-res audio store, e-Onkyo Music, to the US, and hopefully tap into the same audiophile market that prefers purchasing higher quality files.

CD-quality audio is better than low-quality files, and hi-res audio is considered to be even better than CD-quality audio in terms of bandwidth and dynamic rage. But when the two are compared in listening tests, even to high-bitrate mp3s, a lot of people can’t hear the difference. For this reason, the question of whether hi-res is truly “better” for listeners than CD-quality is still under debate. (Try comparing them for yourself!)

So how much do places like Onkyo and Pono charge for a hi-res album in FLAC format? Here’s an example, compared to the price on murfie.com for CD-quality FLAC.


Pono eOnkyo Murfie
quality 48kHz/24bit 48kHz/24bit 44.1kHz/16bit
price $22.99 ~$31.00 $16.00

The Diana Krall album is a new release. How about building your back catalogue with an old favorite?


Pono eOnkyo Murfie
quality 192.0kHz/24bit 192kHz/24bit 44.1kHz/16bit
price  $24.79  ~$30.00  $3.00

High-quality music is great, but it would be outrageous to pay for a hi-res album if you can’t hear the difference between that and CD-quality audio, which is already high. Some have even claimed that the hi-res movement is profitable trickery aimed at elitists and audiophiles.

Ultimately the choice is up to you, the listener. Find out what you can hear—and can’t hear—and make the choice that makes sense for you. When you choose to buy an album from Murfie, you’re buying a real CD that you can download (FLAC, ALAC, mp3, aac) and stream on different devices (320kbps mp3 or FLAC). Then choose to store the physical disc with us, or have it shipped to you.

For us, quality is key, along with providing access to your music that isn’t limited by any brand or device. Since everything released on CD can be ripped and downloaded in FLAC, Murfie just might be the largest source of high-quality FLAC music online. See for yourself!

Ownership Matters: A way to own digital media you buy online

In his piece for PoliticoMagazine, Kyle K. Courtney describes the questionably precise positioning of the “buy” button so commonly found next to music and movies online.

“When Amazon, iTunes or any digital retailer explicitly says ‘Buy Now’ and the consumer clicks that ‘buy’ button, there is a definite presumption of purchase, and, with that purchase, ownership. That presumption, however, is not reflected in reality,” says Courtney.

If you read the pages of fine print, which many of us don’t, you’ll see you’re not really “buying” anything. Your content is only as protected as the terms say it is, and only if the retailer maintains your access to the content you paid for, as they or their service can close at any time. Most of the digital content you buy is not protected by the solid legal rights you get when you purchase media in its traditional physical format.

So why do people keep buying into media they’ll never own? Courtney says, “We are attracted — and have become accustomed — to the convenience of rapid purchases and on-demand content. When it comes time to move our online MP3 collection or transfer digital content to another device, then we face a surprising reality: We do not really own our electronic music, books and movies in the same way we do when we purchase physical books, CDs, records or DVDs.”

With the Murfie service, we’ve created a hybrid of physical and digital ownership: digital content with true ownership rights in the underlying media you own. The music you buy on Murfie can be available instantly to stream, and you can sell it to someone else if you decide it’s not for you. This is possible because each album you buy is backed by a corresponding physical copy that we store at our headquarters. It’s up to you if you want to store your titles on our shelves or yours, but the digital access is available to you anywhere.

On-demand music and movies are convenient, and it’s true that not everyone will care about owning everything they pay for. But the main issue, Courtney seems to be saying, is transparency. If we’re not really “buying” the digital content from these other big-name services, that should be clear. Then people will have the information to make informed choices about real purchases vs. rental contracts, and go for an ownership-based model if that’s what they desired in the first place.

In the future, we could have ownership that’s free of the physical backups. This could be possible with better contracts around digital content, which could allow buyers to have permanent and transferable rights connected to the media they bought, in formats that work across vendors and services. At Murfie we refer to this as a Physical Equivalent License, and we’re working on offering one down the road—and when it happens, we’ll be sure to state what you are really paying for clearly, right on the buttons in the shops.

Top Posts of 2013: Murfie Blog



1. Creative Cover Caption Contest: Finalists! 

2. About Murfie


4. Music not on iTunes

5. Creative Cover Caption Contest

6. Henry Mackaman

7. Download FLAC at Murfie

8. Get Lossless Streaming with Murfie + VOCO!


10. Interview with the Simpkin Project [Podcast]



How to Convert Your CDs to iTunes

Digital music is a convenient way to listen to tunes virtually anywhere. Music downloads and streams are becoming more and more popular, as many people aim for convenient, instantaneous methods of consuming music, without dealing with the cluttering effects of CDs and vinyl.

So now a question comes to mind: What about all those CDs you bought? Do you keep them just to keep them? Sounds kinda inconvenient. Do you ditch them and replace them with digital files? Sounds kinda expensive. And inconvenient.

But, aha! What if you can get the best of both worlds? What if you could convert your CD collection to digital files, like iTunes music, instead of replace it—and keep the discs as a backup, but somewhere remote, not on your own shelves?

Bam. That’s where we come in. These simple steps are the most convenient way to convert your CD collection to digital iTunes music, without having to sit there forever and rip all your music yourself.

Step 1. Send your CD collection to Murfie.

Our expert-CD-rippers will rip your CDs in high quality FLAC format, and then add your albums to your online collection for you to view, play, and manage.

Step 2. Download your CD collection.

Choose your fave format: mp3, aac, or lossless formats FLAC and ALAC. Heads up: iTunes works with mp3, aac and ALAC. You can save the downloaded zip files to your desktop so they’re easy to find.

Step 3. Move the files to your iTunes

First, double-click the zip files to open the album folders. Then drag the folders from your desktop to your iTunes media player, and voila—like magic, they’ll get added to your library, listed alongside your other digital music.

Your CDs will remain safely stored at Murfie, allowing you to request more downloads in other formats. Since you really own the physical disc, you can convert it to whatever format you please, and download and stream it on a variety of devices. You can stream your music on the go with our Murfie mobile app for iOS and Android, at home with Sonos and VOCO devices, and via our website. And one of the coolest parts of all these cool parts is—your CDs will always remain yours. (And ya know, if you really want ’em back one day, we’ll send them to you.)