MP3: Overview and Issues

September 1999

MP3 is currently a very popular Internet technology. This easy to use, high quality sound file format has led to an explosion of music being freely shared on the Web.

MP3 has also engendered ongoing controversy as record labels belatedly attempt to take control of online music distribution and protect their revenues. Large technology companies are also entering the fray, working with the recording industry to try to develop secure proprietary standards to control the distribution of music online. In the meanwhile, use of MP3 by the Web community is burgeoning.

There is a wealth of information on the Web about MP3 and the controversy that surrounds it. The intention of this paper is to provide only a brief introduction to the MP3 standard and its uses, a summary of the issues and pointers to some key resources.

MP3 is a compression format for audio files. It was developed by the Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG), a consortium that works under the direction of the International Standards Organization (ISO) and the International Electro-Technical Commission (IEC) to develop open standards for audio and video compression. The name MP3 stands for MPEG 1 Audio Layer 3.

The advantage of the MP3 format over other audio formats, such as WAV files, is that MP3 produces much smaller files with little or no perceptible loss in sound quality. The MP3 compression (encoding) process typically shrinks CD-quality audio files by a factor of 12. For example, a four-minute song recorded in CD-quality sound and saved as a WAV file requires about 40 MB of storage space. The same song in MP3 format requires less than four MB. Download times are also correspondingly faster for MP3 files.

The MP3 compression process works on a model based on the human hearing range. Basically, the MP3 model removes those frequencies that are not audible to the human ear, while keeping all frequencies that we can hear. ¹ Therefore, although the MP3 compression process is essentially destructive, or "lossy", the quality of the sound for the listener remains intact.

MP3 is an open standard, meaning that it is freely available for anyone to use. While there are other proprietary audio file formats available, and more in progress, MP3 is the current de facto audio standard for the Internet.

MP3 is primarily used for creating, downloading, storing and playing music files from the Web.

The ease of use and resultant wide adoption of MP3 has led to an extremely active and, owing to the copyright issue, somewhat controversial online music community. Among users, there is considerable confusion about the legality of using the MP3 format.

Legal uses of MP3 are

• downloading and playing a song when permission has been granted by the copyright holder; and
• making copies from a CD for personal use.

It is illegal to use MP3 to

• distribute, trade or sell copies of songs without the permission of the copyright holder.

There are literally hundreds of thousands of MP3 song files available on the Web, some for sale and some available for free.

Playing MP3 files with acceptable quality requires, at minimum, a Pentium 75 or Mac PowerPC processor, 32 MB of RAM and a sound card and speakers.

The software required is an MP3 "player". There are dozens of MP3 players available on the Web, including both shareware and freeware. Many players include a playlist editor as well as graphic equalizers for sound adjustment. Some players also support "skins", which are tiny files that change the "face" or look and feel of the player’s interface. ²

Until recently, MP3s could only be played from the hard drive of a computer.

Now however, there are portable MP3 players (similar in size to a small radio) that can store up to 70 minutes of music or other audio files in MP3 format. There are also wireless kits available that use the same radio signal used in cordless phones to transmit MP3 songs from the computer to stereos up to 100 feet away.

Driven by consumer demand to be able to play MP3 files on a variety of players, many hardware companies are working on adapting additional devices to support the MP3 format. Potential future products include stereo components that can read both kinds of CDs, boom boxes and car players.

The process of converting music tracks from a CD to MP3 files is known as "CD-ripping". To extract sound files from a CD at reasonable speed with good sound quality a CD-ROM drive that supports digital extraction is required.

The key pieces of software required are a "CD ripper" and an "MP3 encoder". The ripper extracts music tracks from a CD as WAV files, then the encoder coverts them to MP3. Many CD rippers have the MP3 encoder already built in. If not, a separate encoder utility is required.

4.0 The Issues

The key issue surrounding MP3 is copyright piracy. Artists and record companies claim that they are losing money due to pirated music being shared and distributed online. MP3 has no security or copyright protection built in, and illegal copying and distribution of copyrighted songs on the Internet are rampant.

One response has been for individual record companies to take legal action against Web sites or individuals that are posting illegal copies of their copyrighted songs. The U.S. Justice Department is also getting involved. In August 1999, an Oregon college student who had been distributing illegal music, movies and software online became the first person to be convicted of Internet copyright piracy under the American No Electronic Theft Act of 1997.

In a more coordinated response, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), which represents major U.S. record labels, has joined together with large technology companies such as Microsoft and AT&T to form the Secure Digital Music Initiative (SDMI). The purpose of SDMI is to create a secure digital downloading standard that will allow consumers to easily buy and download music tracks online, but prevent them from copying the files or uploading them for further distribution.

To date, SDMI has released standards for portable players that will ultimately allow them to use a watermarking technology to screen for illegal files. For now, players built to the new standard will be able to play unprotected file formats such as MP3. The intention is that when the SDMI secure download standard is in place, the players can then be upgraded to play the new SDMI compliant music files.

The target date for the release of the download standard itself has been set for March 31, 2000. However, there is considerable skepticism in the online community that SDMI will be able to produce the standard in a timely manner, or that it will be readily adopted. Agreement upon a single standard by the large and diverse SDMI coalition will be difficult. Also, although SDMI claims the new standard will be "open format" (i.e., will accommodate existing formats, such as MP3), there is an apprehension among hardware and software producers that the proposed standard will require possibly costly modifications to their technology.

In addition, there are a number of technology companies, most of whom belong to SDMI, who have already successfully developed their own secure digital download processes. In the unpredictable and highly user driven world of the Internet, one of these existing processes may become the new de facto standard. Alternatively, the MP3 standard itself may continue to evolve to potentially provide its own copyright protection mechanism.

The notion of secure downloading of digital files also raises another key issue, the issue of consumer privacy. Any secure downloading process would likely involve the collection of personal user information such as name, credit card number or e-mail address. Consumers may be reluctant to purchase music online knowing that information about their purchases is being recorded.

Finally, there are also concerns that the imposition of a proprietary format such as SDMI, as opposed to an open format like MP3, will limit free expression on the Internet. Once a format such as SDMI is in place, artists may need to purchase licensed software and technology in order to produce SDMI compliant files and sell or distribute their music via the Web. This could potentially block small record companies or independent bands from being able to post their music on the Web. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, an Internet free-expression political action group, has formed the Coalition for Audio Free Expression (CAFE), a loose group of musicians and other interested parties, to develop strategies to protect open digital music standards.

None of the issues that have arisen out of the burgeoning use of MP3 are easily resolved. However, there is general agreement that due to the significant revenues at stake for the record and technology industries, the fight is far from over.

In the meanwhile, music fans continue to unabashedly enjoy the easy access to high quality music files afforded to them by MP3.

These sites are an excellent place to start. Most offer FAQs, MP3 news and updates, software downloads and links to music sites or MP3 search engines.

Daily MP3
www.dailymp3.com

MP3.com
www.mp3.com

MP3now
www.mp3now.com

The MP3 Place
www.mp3place.com

The CNET MP3 Topic Center
http://home.cnet.com/category/0-4004.html

Wired News MP3 Coverage (Ongoing Daily News Updates)
http://www.wired.com/news/news/mpthree/

www.sdmi.org

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Notes

¹ For a more technical, but still accessible, discussion of the MP3 compression process, see the MP3now Technical Details page at http://206.204.104.72/html/technical_details.html. For a highly technical discussion visit the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft site at http://www.iis.fhg.de/amm/techinf/layer3/index.html.

² The player with the most skins currently available is Winamp by Nullsoft. To view the selection of over 3 000 Winamp skins, visit http://www.winamp.com/winamp/skins/index.phtml.