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How do I convert an Mp3 file song into a URL for MySpace?

Hey Dave! how do i convert an mp3 or a song to a URL. I need to know so I can upload songs into a music playlist for myspace. plleeeeaseee help me!! Thanks ;)

Dave's Answer:

Your question is a curious one, because I think that you're asking about something based on your not truly understanding how the Internet works, so let me start there...

At its most fundamental, the Web is built upon a very simple communication between two computers that looks like this:

Computer 1: I WANT "file x"
Computer 2: HERE IS "file x"

or, for some queries:

Computer 2: ERROR: DON'T HAVE "file x"

Typically, computer 1 is your PC or Mac on your desk or perhaps your laptop, and computer 2 is a server somewhere else on the Internet. The key point, though, is that everything's just a file. When you look at this page and see the various graphical elements, photos, etc., they're all just separate files, just as the Web page itself, written in the markup language HTML, is just a file too. And they're all sitting on public servers somewhere on the Internet.

Hopefully that makes sense.

Now, when we're talking about audio files in MP3 format, again, they're just files, so for you to include them on your MySpace profile, weblog, or anywhere else online, you need to put the file on a server because your computer isn't publicly viewable by the Internet at large (and that's a good thing). Need to convert them into mp3 from another format? Check out Smart Audio Converter.

Pictures are pretty easy, you can use popular services like Flickr or Photobucket to store those files. Again, the steps are that you identify the picture you want to send to the hosting service, upload it, then take the URL (uniform resource locator) that the service then shows you as the unique descriptor for your photo on their hosting service. (see my article hosting images on Flickr for a more detailed explanation).

The problem with audio content is that, well, it's too darn easy for you to rip a commercial music CD into separate tracks, upload it to a service, then tell 25,000 of your closest friends to grab a copy or even just listen to it there rather than buy their own copy of the CD. In a word, there are way too many legal issues for any major company to offer audio hosting. Which isn't to say that there aren't some services out there you can try, but they're probably running on servers located in Eastern Europe or a small Caribbean island! :-)

As an example, Snapdrive.net offers free data file hosting services, including "Add Music and Videos to your Site! Quickly upload code to display music and videos to your website, Myspace or Xanga profile." Sounds good, but when you read all their terms of service and disclaimers, well, it sounds to me that it would be quite possible that they'll just randomly delete your file if they're worried it's illegal content.

Want to see some other choices? Just Google free music data upload hosting service, for example, and you'll find services like MailboxDrive.com, Mysplayershost.com, MusicV2.com, and on and on. Are they more or less reliable than Snapdrive? I can't say, but perhaps someone else can add a comment who has experience with one or more of these?

Anyway, long answer for a short question. In a nutshell, if it's an MP3 of you singing or your own indie music that you recorded and own the legal rights, then you should be able to use any of these upload services to host your music files and incorporate them into your MySpace profile. However, if that's the case, why not just sign up for a MySpace band account?

If the music is from a commercial CD, well, then you'd be violating the law uploading it without permission and you'd be at risk of being sued by the Recording Industry Association of America, which would be a huge drag, to say the least.

Whatever path you take, good luck to you!

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Categorized: MySpace, Facebook, Twitter and Social Network Help (Article 7285)
Tagged: file hosting, html, myspace, riaa lawsuits, web basics
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Comments

Another pretty good file upload service is File Den (http://fileden.com).

Posted by: Ellord at April 3, 2007 12:34 AM

how to dowmload songs and video clips from the websites to laptop?

Posted by: siddhu at April 5, 2007 3:19 AM

I there a way to use Windows MP3 player to convert wave files?

Posted by: www.linkertinker.com at May 2, 2007 10:01 AM

how do you add a song to your myspace profile that is on your computer but isn't on the myspace music?

Posted by: Crystal at August 7, 2007 9:29 AM

Gotta question for you. Hope you can help. My husband has a myspace music page. He already has his mp3's uploaded on his page, but what I want to do is convert those mp3's into code form so that I can copy and paste and put it into bulletins on myspace page so when people open the bulletins they hear his song playing. Can u tell me how and if it can be done?

Posted by: Ree at November 2, 2007 10:08 AM

trying to put songs on my myspace that i cant find on myspace music...all the generators i found are asking for urls or a http...is there anything i can do

Posted by: monique at November 21, 2007 10:12 AM

I have copy and pasted the code... the thing is I the music seems to play but without the sound.. help what did I do wrong...

Posted by: lotus at February 26, 2008 4:59 PM

Hi Dave,
Thank you for your response to the question regarding converting an MP3 to a URL. Your answer was extremely easy to understand and got right to the heart of the matter, in other words, clear and concise. I now have a much better understanding of how song URL's work and also why they don't work or are hard to find. Keep up the good work.
Kevin

Posted by: Kevin at April 19, 2008 9:32 PM

I have a playlist however I cannot get the URL off of it please... I am talking about 3 songs

Posted by: dee at May 7, 2008 11:52 PM

why does only part of the song play on the player, not the whole song?

Posted by: carmel at June 12, 2008 6:03 PM

You have to pay $20 to upload music to musicV2.com. = <

Posted by: Rachel at June 13, 2008 6:19 PM

Very informative, thanks.

I'm looking for a service to host MP3's of my own music so that I can embed them in my weblog. Mailboxdrive looks simple and inexpensive at $9.99 per year (They delete free account files after thirty days, which probably saves them too much grief from the RIAA. LOL!).

Posted by: Hucbald at June 19, 2008 2:40 AM

WoW!LOL

Posted by: driton at August 26, 2008 8:20 AM

your q&a is pointless iv done every thing you ppl told me in the steps but i cant get it on my page witch should automatically be in the faq questions what the hell do i do to get it to work?? iv been sitting here for hours tring everything and i got allot of songs loaded and im tired of eveybody thinking like geniuses that make these sights when you know you could make it easier for ppl thats not so great with these things its frusterating but at the same time iv done everything you told me and still i cant get it even on my myspace and that bugs me up there so just by submitting this sight you can just shut me down?? well if you dont want ppl mad at you then help them out a bit all we want is tunes

Posted by: allen at January 25, 2009 2:11 PM

Isn't there a free file sharing service where you can share fies but prevent them from being ripped? A service where you can just listen to the song and not be able to steal it? Trying to start a vintage record blog and want to feature segments of songs people can listen to. Already converted songs to mp3's now not sure what to do...

Posted by: cacti at January 25, 2009 9:41 PM

who do i get the misic player o myyearbook... it wont let me it keps saying that it ha an error... and i relly want iton there pleze help meeee pleze!

Posted by: kanisha at March 27, 2009 2:36 PM

How to import the music to my myspace

Posted by: lovens at March 28, 2009 7:59 PM

i don't know hot to place the player thingy in my myspace!!!

Posted by: ashley at April 8, 2009 8:24 PM

how do I put my playlist onto my url?

Posted by: angelina at April 26, 2009 1:02 AM

Posted by: arantxa at May 12, 2009 10:59 AM

how do i copy the songs from my friendster

Posted by: laila at May 28, 2009 11:54 PM

how do you when you send a text on myspace how do you put a song in the text to

Posted by: micmin at August 23, 2009 3:05 AM

how do i get my playlist on a gaia account?

Posted by: eli at September 3, 2009 3:52 PM

i dont know how to put the player in my friendster account! pls help me now i want to have this player in my friendster. tnx

Posted by: william at September 20, 2009 2:56 AM

goooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooood...............

Posted by: Anonymous at September 30, 2009 7:21 AM

i dont know how to get this on my IMVU i mean i dont need it but i really want it on there.... thanx if you can thanx anyway if you cant

Posted by: ethen at October 9, 2009 2:38 PM

Someone asked about downloading music and video from the web. Music is best from somewhere like itunes, reverbnation etc. If you have to pay it is still the best option. As for web videos, well, I swear by real player with real player downloader. It will, when set up, download 90% of video site videos, youtube, most social network vids and of course pretty much al adult content video sites. IEEEeeethankyo.

Posted by: Colin at October 11, 2009 10:35 PM

I have a lot to say, but ...

I have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but most of all I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a chai!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!