ThreeSixty -

By Alexandra Sifferlin

With the Recording Industry Association of America cracking down on illegal music downloading, many buyers have resorted to using iTunes to purchase their music. The RIAA has already sued sites which provide illegal music downloading such as Napster, Kazaa, and Gnutella.

According to the RIAA, American record companies lose $300 million to pirated music each year. If caught illegally downloading music, downloaders can be fined between $750 and $150,000 if the infringement was willful. However, there are alternative sites for music downloading which are cheaper and most importantly-legal.

Two such sites are 3hive.com and eMusic.com Both sites provide music from all genres and non-mainstream tunes.

3hive.com was created by three friends who call themselves the “3hive crew.” The group includes Jon Armstrong, Sean Ziebarth and Sam Cannon. All three were working in music journalism and decided to create a music Web site as a side project.

Cannon has written for Rolling Stone magazine, MTV, and Musician. He also collaborated on a magazine with Armstrong called grid magazine. Ziebarth was the music director at an alternative radio station where Cannon interned. Although the 3hive crew all work together on the site, they live far apart. Cannon resides in Detroit, Armstrong in Salt Lake, and Ziebarth lives almost five miles from the Pacific Ocean. All three men are now married with families.

The site provides online music surfers with quality legal MP3s for free. The philosophy behind the site is “sharing the sharing.” Record labels and artists post full-length MP3s on the site to increase their publicity and fan base. 3hive directly links to these artists’ official Web sites so listeners can learn more about the music and potentially purchase a full CD.

“Artists or the labels that represent them make certain songs available for free. We only link to songs that have been released to the general public as free and legal downloads,” said Armstrong.

3hive has a variety of more obscure music and new artists. A new artist is showcased on the site each day, so 3hive.com is a great place to discover new talent, like Spizter, a group of French brothers who say “We want you to dance while listening to our music.”

“There is an incentive for-up-and coming or lesser-known artists to provide free tracks to the public to spark interest and grow a larger fan base. At 3hive, we try to find good music and share the tracks that artists are sharing in a way that helps guide someone interested in certain kinds of music,” said Armstrong.

eMusic.com is another site with new music from independent labels. eMusic sells mainly indie music. Even if listeners are unfamiliar with its music the site provides a message board so viewers can see what other eMusic users recommend.

eMusic offers various plans for downloading, but the most basic plan is 30 downloads for $9.99 a month. Compared to the prices of iTunes, eMusic.com will definitely save cash.
Since eMusic charges a monthly subscription fee, the site can offer much lower prices, said employee Nicole Laster.

“Most other digital music services only promote today’s mainstream hits (Beyonce, Justin Timberlake, Britney Spears) and neglect the thousands of great independent albums that are released each year. eMusic offers tracks from classic independent artists like Johnny Cash and Miles Davis, as well as up-and-coming artists like Arcade Fire, Cat Power and Spoon,” said Laster.

Laster believes eMusic is unique.“The site is designed to help people discover new music through personalized recommendations, editorial features and reviews written by award-winning columnists, and a passionate online community,” he says.

Not only will 3hive and eMusic save money, but listeners can be sure they are legally protected.