@Em0nM4stodon *agrees in modded iPod Video running Rockbox*

@Em0nM4stodon *When* the online service shuts down. It's always a matter of time. Even if the company doesn't go out of business/merge/whatever, they'll switch to a new system at some point and your library will be lost or damaged.

@Em0nM4stodon
Some of the other folx already mentioned FLAC files, albeit for archival purposes. It's also a really good argument for the audiophiles in your life, as Bandcamp is one of the few sources of truly lossless music (incl. versions with higher bitrate etc.). Oh, and some bands offer phono-mixes, so with significantly expanded dynamic range.

@Em0nM4stodon love this... In theory. A lot (~95%) of the artists I'm listening to are not on these platforms. My only option then is Qobuz and I cannot afford 20€ for each album. So I basically ytdlp/soulseek my way and if it works it's not convenient at all. I'll still do it because fuck this not owning shit world but come on this situation reallyyyyyyyyyy sucks.

@Em0nM4stodon and the beauty of having a bandcamp account is you can take part in album release parties, chat to the band while listening to their music days before its release date.

@Em0nM4stodon
I am litteraly doing that (e.g.: right now building a kids music collection for making our road trip more bearable to the small one)
I'm using Qobuz as a fall back for when it's not available from the artists' website, or bandcamp, etc. (I am open to better suggestions).
Ripping from Youtube is the 2nd level fallback after that for stuff I can't really find.

@Em0nM4stodon Alternatively you could also put the music on the phone. And then you don't need to manage an extra device to carry around.

@Em0nM4stodon I got all my music except one album on CDs and never used streaming services.

@Em0nM4stodon@infosec.exchange Have been doing this for quite a while and I have a rather large library as a result 😁 It's all in Opus instead of MP3 for space efficiency, but that's just another way of expressing control as you said 😊

@Em0nM4stodon
- All music but also ratings/favorites, playlists and listening history are in one place.
- Metadata is editable, for example you can add synced lyrics after the fact.
- Many local media players have in-built EQ as opposed to a lot of streaming services out there.
- Potentially better audio quality than on streaming services.
- It is another gadget to tinker with! There are custom software like RockBox. And even entirely open-source mp3 players like the Tangara.

@Em0nM4stodon Yes absolutely. I get more money from one person buying a track or two than I do from a few thousand streams.

Streaming is killing independent music. Please stop streaming and pay people for the music they create and not the middleman.

@Em0nM4stodon
Old phones also work great for this.

I have all my music on an SD card that i stick in the phone. It's easy to move / copy it from device to device.

I play the tunes with VLC and Bluetooth it.

#TinyOfflineTip #Bandcamp #Music

@Em0nM4stodon I always find it strangely depressing when people claim they need Spotify and/or some streaming service to listen to music.

And that so many people don't realise you can own offline copies of music and listen to it how you want without a smartphone and a constant internet connection.