"Where do you get the music from though?"

I personally download actual mp3 files from Amazon (not amazon "music" but just purchase actual tracks). In fact, I continue to be pleasantly surprised that in 2018 one of the big providers is doing something as simple and friendly as this: selling me unprotected, plain old mp3 files.

However, they are compressed mp3 files and not suitable for future transformation so if there is an album that I want, I will still purchase the actual CD and rip it to the full WAV/PCM.

My system is a mac pro (2009) which still has an optical drive. I use the (excellent) 'abcde'[1] tool to rip the CDs. I particularly like the fact that it pops up a 'vi' session with the gracenote/cddb/metadata so I can quickly "fix" the usually braindead cddb entry right in the workflow.

[1] http://www.andrews-corner.org/linux/abcde/index.html

The files you get from iTunes are also unprotected. Artists can choose to offer lossless format, in which case iTunes will give you the files in their proprietary format ALAC, but there is still no DRM and you can easily convert to FLAC/WAV.

At the moment it imports from the Music.app (so whatever you've synced with iTunes). Adding more providers in the next few months

I didn't realise you could have standalone music files in the Music any more! I thought it was all streaming Apple Music now. I wouldn't even know where to get standalone music files from.

Just drag the music files from your library to your plugged-in iDevice in iFumes on the Mac. You can also buy and download them on-device with the iTunes Store app.

You can still buy them from Bandcamp, Qobuz or even buy it on iTunes. What are you trying to imply?

> What are you trying to imply?

That I didn't know about any of those services? I thought everything was streaming these days. What are you trying to imply that I'm trying to imply?

I thought you were implying that the only way to get music files (after disregarding CDs as you don't have a drive) these days was to download them from unofficial sources. Not streaming music files was the standard for a long time so I was a bit surprised about the question.

That's usually a point that comes up for products like Plex etc.

I don't think they were implying anything. I think so many people today stream that the idea of downloading mp3s is rather foreign.

Google play music allows downloading the mp3, but only twice.

The old way?

CDs? I don't own a CD drive any more and doubt many people do either.

You can still buy and download music files.