With divorce rates at all time high in the US and the UK, saving money on a marriage seems like a good idea. After all, as a third of all marriages end in divorce why waste money that you might need further down the line?

One way couples are saving money on their weddings these days to cut out the $900 (about £500) that is usually spent on a DJ, or even more for a live band, for the wedding reception, and instead using their iPods to provide the entertainment.

Using an iPod, or even a laptop, equipped with a massive play list and some decent speakers, provides free entertainment for the dance.

Rebekah Schwartz is from St. Louis, USA, and she’s getting married on June 6th at St. Pete Beach. She’s planning on avoiding the cost of entertainment and instead using her iPod for the reception.

We thought it would be easy enough to gather a list of songs that we liked and play it ourselves.

It’s not just about saving money though, as using your own play list highlights your own taste, rather than that of the DJ, which adds to a more personal experience.

Anja Winnikka, editor of website theknot.com said:

More and more, couples are taking control and personalizing their day. Whether that’s a special play list or motif they’ve used for their cake, couples are tuning into the fact they can customize the day.

Naturally professional DJs are against the idea, but then they would be.

Recently Apple filed for a patent for a solar powered cell within an iPod, under the screen; prompting speculation that the technology giant was looking at bringing out a solar powered iPod. However, as we look at the practicality of such a device, it does seem that this is unlikely.

The problem is, that although solar powered technology has been around for some time in equipment such as watches and calculators, they require considerably less juice to function than a modern day iPod. In fact, to power an iPod on the same technology you would be looking at the power of approximately one million watches.

Hardly practical.

It is possible however to power an iPod by solar power, but you would require something like Brunton’s Solaris i6, which would give enough power for the job. The problem with this is that it’s larger than an iPod and costs in the region of $210, which is about the same as an iPod.

So doubling an iPod’s price and increasing its size just to make it solar powered? That seems unlikely.

The other problem of course is charging your iPod. How much damage can you expect to do to the storage drive by leaving your iPod baking in the sun?

There are a great many patents filed by companies such as Apple for whenever one of the engineers has an idea; this looks like it could be one such case.

We all know that downloading music illegally can, in some cases, result in court action against you. If you’re unsure about the source of the MP3 downloads, it’s best not to use the site in question. But, what about sites that are based outside of the US and the UK? Every country has it’s own different copyright law, and if you’re actually paying something for the music, does that make it right?

Is paying a little something, even if it’s as little is 10 cents, or 5p per track, enough to protect you from any potential liability from downloading illegal music?

For example, the website AllofMP3.com offers a wide range of tracks to download for just a few pennies each, and because it’s operated out of Russia it claims to be perfectly legit under Russian law. Despite a few attempts to challenge this, the site remains operational and is used by Americans and British alike.

Similarly the websites Weblisten.com and Puretunes.com are operated out of Spain. The latter was sued and shut down as a consequence. But is the fact they do ask you to pay a little any defence against potential criminal investigation?

The answer is definitely what you would call a grey area. The legality of the websites is in dispute, and while they may be legal in their own country they’re definitely questionable in the UK and the US.

You’ll have to make your own call on whether you choose to use sites like this.

In a recent report by computer security firm Symantec; MP3 players and iPods represent one of the top ten security threats to businesses that use computer systems. So much of a threat in fact, that many businesses that rely on their IT systems actually bar employees from bringing MP3 players and iPods into work.

Marc Fossi is the development manager for Symantec’s security response, and he’s said that today businesses face the threat of criminals looking to steal data when they hack into computer systems, to sell on for profit, instead of just doing to prove they can, as used to be the case with ‘script kiddies’.

Along with dangers such as phising websites that represent trusted sites such as eBay and PayPal in order to fool users into entering their details an plugins that users install in their browsers without knowing the results, portable removable hard drives that can be found on MP3 players and iPods are used by employees to steal data.

An MP3 player is basically a massive hard drive, which once plugged into a PC can be used to copy any amount of data from the network, such as logins, customer details and confidential reports.

In addition to this, MP3 players and iPods could also transfer viruses and malware to a businesses’ network without the knowledge of the user.

If you run your own business, do you allow your employees to bring in their own MP3 players and iPods?

David Cook, the latest winner of US show American Idol, actually pulled his album ‘Analog Heart’ from Amazon’s download store at the request of Idol producers. They claimed that him having an album available for potential voters to download and listen to during the recording of American Idol could be considered unfair on the other contestants.

David Cook won the American Idol final, defeating his rival David Archuleta by a massive 12 million votes. The ever-diplomatic Simon Cowell stated during the final that David Archuleta had put in the better performance and would win by a knock out.

David Cook has now signed with 19 Recordings/RCA Records and will be recording his new album soon, in between dates for the American Idol tour.

His debut single ‘The Time of My Life’ is currently number one on iTunes with a huge 236,024 downloads in just four days

Cook says about his success:

Signing this deal is truly a dream come true. I am looking forward to the recording process… The support I have received from America has been overwhelming, and I can’t wait to hopefully do right by them.

If you own an MP3 Player the chances are you’ll have downloaded music from the Internet, whether from an authorised legal source, or otherwise. Everyone knows that downloaded illegal music is wrong, but as there are so many people doing it just what are the consequences?

Is anyone likely to find out or care if you download an album or two from a peer-to-peer site?

Well, yes actually.

The Recording Industry Association of America, RIAA, have public ally and quite forcefully fought the sites and people who they view as having ‘stolen’ music. Representing the music artists themselves, the RIAA went after the websites first. Napster, for instance, were sued for billions of US dollars, forcing them to shut down completely.

Then the RIAA went after individuals they saw as hosting music for others to share, warning them that if they continued to host illegal music they would face similar action.

The argument from individuals that they didn’t realise they were doing anything wrong didn’t serve as a defence either. This means that if you’re downloading illegal music using applications such as Bit Torrent or Kazaa, you’re facing the very real possibility that you too could be sued for your part in the process.

Many reports recently have highlighted the problems of teens damaging their hearing by listening to their MP3 players too loudly. Concerns from parents and government seem warranted; as many teens readily admit to knowing about the dangers, yet seem unwilling to actually turn their volumes down because it hampers their enjoyment.

They simply think it won’t happen to them.

It’s not just damage to hearing that is faced by teens, they’re also susceptible to injury from accidents as a result of not being able to hear what is around them, especially when out in the street.

CoreMicro, a Canadian company, have an answer though as they’ve just launched what they term ‘ear saving technology’.

The product in question is ‘SafeVolume earbuds’ that will retail for just $19.99, and promise to limit the volume of portable digital music players such as MP3 players and iPods. They’re proven to work as well, winning a 2008 iParenting Media Award.

Dr. Blake Papsin, Cochlear Americas Chair in Auditory Development, stated:

When hearing is damaged or lost, there’s no way to get it back. These earbuds will reduce the numbers of hearing impaired children coming to see us in the future - and we can only imagine how many kids will be grateful to their parents for protecting them against a preventable source of hearing loss.

Hearing loss is a big problem in Canada as 1 in 10 Canadians experience hearing loss, partly attributed to MP3 players.

The earbuds cap the volume at 85 decibels, meaning users will not damage their hearing while using them.

There is a wave of belief spreading around the Internet that instead of buying an MP3 player or iPod for your portable music, you could instead use a mobile phone. Mobiles have reached such a technological high in recent years that they’re more than capable of acting as an MP3 player, and indeed many of them also make excellent digital cameras, video cameras and entertainment systems.

So why not use a mobile phone instead and save the money?

They certainly have a lot going for them. For one thing mobile phones tend to have their memory on an SD card, so if you want to add more tracks to take with you, you could just insert a larger card. Most MP3 players don’t have that functionality.

Mobile phones tend to allow you to add and remove music through a drag and drop system from any computer, or even using bluetooth. With an iPod for example you have to use iTunes, that’s it.

Mobiles have replaceable batteries. Does an iPod?

Then there’s the price. With a mobile phone contract you can often get the phone for free, which is considerably cheaper than an iPod. So where are the drawbacks?

Well, firstly how many times have you lost your mobile phone? If you’re anything like me it’ll be more than twice. Losing an MP3 player or iPod is something you’re less likely to do, so if your mobile was your MP3 player that would be an awful lot of music to lose and then back up when the inevitable happens.

How often do you change your mobile? Most people do it every year, some more so than that. Having to upload all of your music every time you do that could be a real pain.

Then there’s the contract. If you’re not on a mobile phone contract you’ll have to purchase the handset yourself, and the mobiles that make good MP3 players aren’t cheap. You’d be paying a lot of money for something that was a phone first, and an MP3 player second. Until technology manages to seamlessly merge all of the requirements into one unit, without compromise, it’s best to keep them apart.

The debate over DRM-free music has been running for some time. DRM-free means music that you download for your MP3 Player and it is unlocked, so that you can use it on any player, any PC and copy it as much as you like.

However, is DRM-free music really needed anymore? How many people actually find DRM a problem? It’s quite possible that the move to have DRM-free music has come too late, because consumers just don’t care about it and don’t consider it to be an issue.

For example, iPod users don’t need to worry about it because they can copy their music from one Apple product to another without any issues, whether that be a Mac, an iPod or an iPhone. Anything downloaded from iTunes will work on any Apple equipment.

DRM doesn’t come into play for Apple users.

Then there are those people who just copy their own CDs, copy music from friends or download it from file sharing networks. DRM isn’t issue for them either because they’re not buying downloaded music in the first place. So how many people really are affected by DRM? It isn’t that many at all.

This means that music download sites such as Amazon and Napster, who are looking to offer DRM-free music, may have missed the boat with it all. Having music that’s DRM-free isn’t that big a draw for consumers because they don’t really consider it a problem in the first place.

You may not have realised it but the places you can now purchase music are changing drastically. It used to be the case that if you wanted to buy a record you would have to go into town and visit your local record store.

Now that digital music has taken off you can download music via websites. Not content with resting on their laurels, and keen to capitalise on consumers on the go, it was inevitable that you’d then be able to buy music tracks from Internet enabled mobile phones.

Now, as video games are such a prominent part of our culture, and playing them online has become so popular, it perhaps also inevitable that you’d be able to buy music through your games consoles, via video games.

Games such as Rock Band and Guitar Hero for example allow games players to purchase tracks direct through the game, for use within the game. They are becoming hugely popular, even though the music bought cannot be transferred to another device for playback.

Allen Kovac, CEO of Tenth Street, says that video games are a new market that allow music labels to sell their product without fears of privacy, to a new, otherwise untapped market.

We do research on every artist we have, and the research said that the people who bought Motley Crue music and tickets play ‘Rock Band” and video games … (so) it was our inclination to go there. As marketers, it’s our job to find the audience. If our audience tells us they’re sitting at Xbox and PlayStation, that’s our job to do that.

The video game Rock Band has sold a staggering 10 million music tracks in a little over 6 months, whereas the Activision game Guitar Hero has sold more than 15 million tracks.

What is even more interesting to record labels is the fact that over 75% of tracks sold through the video game Rock Band are older catalogue tracks. This means that music labels can sell old music over and over again to a new consumer on a new format.

This makes for very high profits indeed.