Ruckus - A Music Lover's Best Friend
Last year, Babson actually helped us out by partnering with Ruckus, a free online music subscription service for college students. These days Ruckus is free for all college students (anyone with a .edu email) so even if you aren't at Babson, you can probably get this.
I shouldn't have to say too much. I mean, it's totally free music and it downloads super fast, much faster than Lime Wire or any other illegal downloading service. Also, if you're on Babson's network, you don't have much access to the peer-to-peer software to begin with.
What you might not expect is that there's actually a very good selection. It doesn't have everyone, but it has a lot of semi-popular stuff I wasn't expecting to find.
They also offer video downloads of popular TV shows and movies, but you have to pay for that.
Here is what you get from Ruckus:
- Unlimited downloads from their library of over 2 million songs.
- Full album downloads in under one minute!
- Ability to create playlists and share them with your friends.
- And... it's FREE!
All good things.
One minor problem is that the music is protected, so you have to renew the license every month. But that's not so bad because the Ruckus software makes it simple. What you might run into is where you download a song, but it's not available a month later. I think the record companies do that (offer good songs then take them away) to entice you to buy the CD later.
That used to piss me off, but then I found out... there is a way to convert the unprotected files to MP3s!
So now I don't have any trouble, and I have a huge MP3 collection. I'm not advocating anything illegal, just making some copies for personal use.
So head on over to Ruckus if you haven't yet, and signup today!
And don't forget about Tunebite.
With all this there is no excuse for illegal downloading, and remember, the RIAA will sue your ass if you get caught! It happened at Babson before, it could happen again.
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