175,000 people will be attended the music festival at Glastonbury this weekend, revelling in the water and mud that will the fields. While listening to their favourite rock bands, drinking large quantities of alcoholic beverages and perhaps indulging in the odd ‘happy pill’, many of the revellers will also have their MP3 players and iPods with them to carry on the music once the live acts have finished for the night.

This is a great idea, but with so many people in attendance and only a tent to secure your possessions, it’s worthwhile ensuring that you have your equipment insured.

Therefore you should ensure you check your home insurance policy documents before you set off, because your home insurance may cover your items while you’re away… then again it may not. Glastonbury, like many other music festivals, is a big attraction for thieves due to the level of technology being left virtually unguarded in nothing more secure than a tent with a zip.

You’re also at risk from pick-pockets during the festival, so if you keep your MP3 player on you the whole time, make sure you secure it in a pocket with a zip or have it attached to your person, either round your wrist or your neck.

The recent decision by high street retailer Woolworths to stop selling CD singles has triggered the doom merchants to sound the death knell of the CD. The reason given for the demise of CD appears to be the boon in music downloading, for use on iPods and MP3 players. Whether the music is being downloaded legally or illegally seems to make no difference, it’s largely responsible for killing off the CD.

Music downloading has been around for some time now, but hasn’t been as prevalent as it is now because of the lack of penetration of broadband. As broadband suppliers have become more competitive in their pricing structures, and have begun to offer cheaper, unlimited download packages, users are beginning to make use of their broadband connections to stock their music libraries.

NME believes it’s the widespread use of broadband that has sounded the end for the CD. Paul Stokes is NME’s music editor; he believes CD singles could become something you’ll only find in specialist shops. He also mentions how the inclusion of music downloads in the top 40 chart has further promoted the download service.

So many people listen to music on iPods and MP3 players anyway then why bother going out buying a CD single ripping it onto the iPod and playing it when you can click on it and have it straight away in your player?

It’s been one of the most publicised divorce cases in the history of divorce, and Heather Mills divorce from Sir Paul McCartney has made her one of the most hated women on the planet.

Now it appears she’s done what most women would do after a bitter divorce, delete all of the music that reminds her of her ex-husband. However when your ex-husband is one of the Beatles, you’ll have to delete an awful lot of music!

Delete his music she has though, as Heather Mills has apparently deleted all of Paul’s music from her iPod.

Heather’s personal fitness trainer, Ben Amigoni, said that Heather would use some of Paul’s up-tempo tracks to dance to for her workout routines. Tracks such as Twist and Shout, Live and Let Die, Lady Madonna and Day Tripper would help Heather keep her figure in the shape it is today, but not anymore according to Ben.

He claims Heather has deleted all of Paul’s music from her iPod. Instead of Paul McCartney’s music, Heather now uses a selection of dance tracks to help her through her workout.

Heather received a whopping £24.3 million in her divorce settlement earlier this year.

Many music artists are angered at the illegal download sites that exist all over the Internet and allow music fans to access copies of their albums without having to pay a penny. Madonna once uploaded fake versions of her albums to music sharing sites with a personally recorded message to people that stealing music is wrong.

Kid Rock on the hand takes the opposite stance to illegal music downloads.

In a bizarre twist, Kid Rock is boycotting sites like iTunes because he feels they should pay him more to offer his music for download. In retaliation, he has urged his fans to steal his music by downloading illegal copies whenever they want. Kid Rock says that because he’s rich, he can afford to let his fans have his music for free.

He’s also urged fans to steal other things too, not just MP3 music tracks from download sites. He’s urged fans to steal electrical items such as MP3 players, and even to steal cars.

Kid Rock says:

The whole debate on downloading music has gone too far. There are record companies suing kids. You can illegally download my music, steal it if you will. Because I’m rich.

How can I bitch about you downloading a song or two. I can’t.

What I would encourage you to do? Let’s level the playing field. Steal everything. If you want a new MP3 player or a computer… Do you know how much money Apple and Microsoft have?

Go in there, get a new laptop and run. You need a new car? Go steal a Toyota.

We of course urge fans of Kid Rock not to steal anything and ignore his advice.

If you’re looking for an alternative to iTunes for your MP3 downloads in the UK, one of the biggest players in online retail may just be about to provide it. Amazon, who originally started out just selling books but branched out to music, DVD, toys, groceries (in fact, just about everything) are planning to offer MP3 music downloads on their UK website.

In fact, it could be available before October, according to the most recent reports.

Amazon’s MP3 store Execs were apparently in London last week discussing the deal with British record firm chiefs.

Amazon’s US service launched last year, and offered MP3 tracks that were DRM free, which meant they could play on a larger range of MP3 players.

This move by Amazon means that Apple’s iTunes will now have another rival for the UK market, along with Tesco and HMV.

With the proposed launch of Amazon’s UK download store approaching, artists such as the Snow Patrol and the Scissor Sisters are believed to be among the first offerings.

After the UK launch, Amazon plans to roll out its MP3 download service worldwide.

You can’t help but have noticed the latest series of Big Brother on channel 4. Love it or hate it, and most of us have an opinion one-way or the other, it’s hard to escape it everywhere you look.

This series even comes with a wealth of merchandise that you can buy, and pretend you’re one of the housemates yourself… if you’re in to that sort of thing.

One particular piece of merchandise is the Big Brother Lanyard, which is a material strap that you can put around your shoulder, neck or wrist and carry things such as ID passes, car keys, or even small MP3 players.

The Big Brother Lanyard comes adorned with the BB logo, showing all of your friends just how much you love the show. With some MP3 players being so small these days, it makes sense to have something to attach to them so you don’t lose them.

The BB Lanyard is available from the official Big Brother website.

It’s becoming more and more common now for libraries to move into the digital age and offer books on MP3 format for patrons to access and download via their websites. It’s a great way of reaching more people who would otherwise not consider using the library, and introducing more children and teens to books they would otherwise never have experienced.

The Baxter County Library in the US is the latest library to offer its books as MP3 files. The Baxter County Library has introduced something it calls ‘Playaway’, which is an MP3 player ready loaded with a digital audio book.

Fourteen-year-old Alex Anderson for example experienced Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare through the new Playaway system. Alex says that by reading the book while listening to the MP3 reading he is better able to understand the meaning of the play.

If I was just reading the book it would have taken me a week to get through Act 1.

It gets your imagination going more. If I was just reading it, I would have thought of Romeo as a normal lovesick boy but he sounds more life-like as Shakespeare intended.

Even the merging of Shakespeare with the technology of MP3 however can’t make your average fourteen-year-old enjoy the bard:

I wouldn’t say I like Shakespeare, but I can handle Shakespeare better.

The Playaway system itself is very small, about half of the size of a pack of playing cards.

There are two types of people in the world, dog people and cat people. There should of course be a third type, MP3 player people. For this, you’ll need to know how an MP3 compares with a cat, if you’re thinking of getting one instead of a cat of course.

So, let’s look at some of the ways that an MP3 player is better than a kitten.

MP3 players are more loyal
You’ll never come home to wonder where you’re MP3 player is, where it’s disappeared to. It’ll always be where you’ve left it, unless of course you have a wife/girlfriend/brother who might have borrowed it; but that’s not the MP3 player’s fault. Kittens and cats however have a nasty habit of finding other families to take care of them. They could be out having dinner, playing with balls of string and being petted by someone completely different.

There’s just no loyalty with kittens.

Better run time
MP3 players have varied run times based on the models you buy, but they can, if fully charged, last for hours providing you with a whole evening’s entertainment before needing a charge. Kittens on the other hand only run for a few minutes before needing a sleep. This means if you’re planning to spend the day being entertained by your kitten, you’ll need a back-up plan. Try a dog.

MP3 players don’t leave any mess
This one seems obvious, but you’ll never have to clean up after your MP3 player. Your kitten however will be a constant source of clean up jobs on your behalf.

Indeed, the only way we can see that a kitten is better than an MP3 player is on price. MP3 players start at around £10 up to a few hundred pounds, whereas kittens tend to be free. However, kittens are expensive to run from then on, whereas an MP3 player just needs the occasional charge, which costs pennies on your electric bill.

Thinking of getting a kitten? Get an MP3 player instead.

Recently it was reported that a large proportion of fourteen to twenty-four year olds have illegal music on their iPods and MP3 players; in fact more than half of their tracks were reported to have come from illegal sources such as download sites, file sharers and peer-to-peer networks.

It’s believed however that this doesn’t necessarily mean bad news for the music industry.

The results were discovered this week in a survey by the British Music Rights (BMR). They discovered that some music fans were downloading thousands of music tracks each month via the Internet for their iPods and MP3 players.

However, a spokesman for HMV, one of the leading music retailers in the UK, talked about downloading music via the Internet was:

part of the landscape of how people discover music now.

Downloading happens, we accept it and adapt. It’s the serial downloading that everyone gets upset about and is really taking bread out of the mouth of the artists and labels.

The survey found that although music fans were downloading illegal music online, they were actually willing to pay for the service should it be legalised.

In answer to this, HMV plans to roll out download kiosks in their stores to take advantage of the consumer’s wish to access instant music.

Gennaro Castaldo of HMV stated:

From retail’s point of view, the model we have is that people like to mix and match between physical and digital music forms. If you’re a fan of an artist you’ll want to go and see them and buy the t-shirt, so money will still be made that way.

Of course, the anti-establishment nature of downloading is part of its appeal, but in terms of most consumers, the vast majority will engage via a mix of physical and downloads, some legal, some not. As a retailer we acknowledge and are prepared for that.

The download kiosks have already been trialled in a store in Dudley, and they created a 25% uplift in sales. The future of music sales seems to be via downloads, so rather than marking the end for the music industry, it’s just the beginning.

With the impending release of the new second generation iPhone, the current market leader in business phone technology, BlackBerry, is starting to look a little worried. While the launch of the iPhone may have reignited the spark in the mobile industry, the power and dominance that Apple enjoys with the MP3 player market and the music download market has BlackBerry starting to wonder how much longer it’ll be the brand of choice for high end mobile phone buers.

The first iPhone may have been a beautiful piece of technology that offered a lot of features, but it didn’t lend itself to business use and wasn’t really adopted by the average BlackBerry user. Despite its great web access and brilliant design, the lack of push email meant that business users couldn’t rely on it to keep in touch with what was happening in their schedules.

However, the recent announcement by Steve Jobs about the 2nd generation iPhone revealed that the biggest player in the business technology game, Microsoft, was getting involved with their greatest rival, Apple. Microsoft Exchange will now be available for the new iPhone, meaning that it will have all of the power of email, contacts and calendar that other Microsoft products enjoy.

This puts the new iPhone directly up against the BlackBerry, and the plans to open it up to different networks means that BlackBerry’s dominance of the market could be about to end.