Help! How Do I Get MP3s to Play on the Server?

[livius drusus]

I have a bunch of rather fab MP3s I want to link to in a post, but I don't want them to be downloadable just to avoid the whole file sharing hornets' nest. Does anyone know how I can make them playable on the FF server? Is there a player we can install or something?

[Corona688]

Techie in server room: *typedtypetypetype*
FF Server: ...
Techie in server room: *typedtypetypetype*
FF Server: ***BLARING DEATHMETAL***
Techie in server room: Aaaaah! *has heart attack, dies*

I don't think playing MP3s on the server is really what you want :D

And as far as I know, there's no way to play an mp3 on your computer without actually having the mp3, and the only way to protect music from copying over the internet involves grabbing the user by the throat and screaming "YOU DO NOT OWN YOUR COMPUTER, I OWN YOUR COMPUTER!" until the user relents to installing your access controls. Also known as "digital rights management".

[livius drusus]

I don't think playing MP3s on the server is really what you want :D

/me giggles
I dunno. Sounds kinda fun to me.

And as far as I know, there's no way to play an mp3 on your computer without actually having the mp3, and the only way to protect music from copying over the internet involves grabbing the user by the throat and screaming "YOU DO NOT OWN YOUR COMPUTER, I OWN YOUR COMPUTER!" until the user relents to installing your access controls. Also known as "digital rights management".

Oh, I have them. Bought them fair and square. But, like, you can see clips and whatnot on sites without being able to download them. Surely there's a way to do the same kind of thing here so that if you click on a link it takes you to an embedded file that just plays or something?

[Corona688]

Well, you could use an audio-editing program to create fair-usage sized clips. But as long as these clips are playable from another computer, the clips are downloadable from another computer, and no amount of ingenuity will change the fact that you can't have one without the other.

[edit] Maybye Itunes online store has them? Could link to them, they've got lots of clips of lots of stuff already.

[livius drusus]

How did these guys (http://www.myhero.com/audio/artist/OldManRiver_C_Hall1958.mp3) do it? There may be some way to download it but I don't see it. Meanwhile, it plays off the site itself.

[JoeP]

When I click your link, a little box pops up inviting me to download the file. Then it says 'estimated time left 51 minutes 20 seconds'. It didn't have to prompt me; it could have downloaded it anyway and played it. There are background sound capabilities in most browsers.

Sure, sound files get downloaded. When an image or an avatar or even a tiny little smilie :mini: gets displayed in your browser window, the relevant image file has been downloaded first. The user can save the image; even if you make it really hard the user can grab the image out of the browser cache. Same with mp3s.

I was a bit generic above ... to get an mp3 file to play automatically in the browser you're going to have the right setup at the users' end. Or use the dreaded <embed> tag. I think.

You might want to browse this (http://www.hitmill.com/html/sound.html) and its "Related Primers and Tutorials".

[Corona688]

The problem is it's still the client computer downloading and playing it, just obfuscated by another layer. I'd still be able to go and grab the files if I knew they were there -- which of course it has to say in the webpage for it to work at all. So it's still not any security at all, and nowhere near what you wanted.

[Corona688]

How did these guys (http://www.myhero.com/audio/artist/OldManRiver_C_Hall1958.mp3) do it? There may be some way to download it but I don't see it. You see that link you just posted? Right-click, save-as. It's just limitations in your browser(s) that wouldn't let you save it without a link like that. Browsers without enabled MP3-playing wouldn't be able to do anything but download it, in fact.