Prick up your ears – you can download music online and keep it legal

The music industry claimed a victory earlier this month when four men behind file-sharing site Pirate Bay were sentenced to a year in jail and ordered to pay £2.5m in damages for helping internet users to download music, films and computer games without paying for them.

But as much as 95% of the music downloaded online is still done illegally.­ Matt Philips of the BPI, which represents the music industry in the UK, says: "Sales through licensed legitimate­ platforms are growing, but unlawful downloading still accounts for 95% of online purchases.

"As the legal market has grown, illegal downloading has increased too."

The Pirate Bay website is used by 25 million people around the world – including millions of Britons. It argues that it does not break the law because no copyright content is hosted on its servers; instead, it hosts "torrent" links to TV, film and music files held on users' computers.

It plans to continue to operate from computers around the world and the four men involved are also planning to appeal against the judgment that they have breached copyright law in Sweden,­ which is less strict than in the UK.

However record companies, which claim that illegal file-sharing has cost them billions of pounds in lost revenue, argue that new music will suffer if people continue to download without paying.

"Some £200m a year is invested by the music industry, the recording industry specifically, in new bands," Philips says. "Artists need that financial support."

How do I download music from the internet?

To get started, you will need a computer with plenty of hard disk space, a sound card and a connection to the internet.

To register and buy songs you will have to give the site your credit card details, so it is important to buy from an established and secure provider. Otherwise, you could be overcharged or have your card details stolen.

The services on offer also vary so it is worth browsing a few sites before signing up.

Sites such as iTunes and 7digital allow you to buy songs individually, without having to subscribe to a service but others, such as Napster, ask you to sign up and pay a set fee per month. It also operates a pre-payment system.

You may need to download software. With Napster, for example, you will need Microsoft Media Player – it comes with most recent PCs and is downloadable for free from Microsoft.

What are the legal alternatives?

Apple's iTunes Music Store, launched in April 2003, sells single tracks for 79p, while albums start at £7.90.

Napster offers new users a free seven-day trial, after which you can choose from Napster Light, which also charges 79p a track, Napster Unlimited at £9.95 a month and Napster To Go for £14.95 a month.

The To Go service is more expensive because it allows users to download an unlimited amount of music on to a compatible MP3 player.

The Unlimited service only lets you download to up to three different computers.­

You do not have to break the law to find cheaper music online, though.

Amazon recently cut the price of many of its top-selling music downloads, such as Lady GaGa's Poker Face, Lily Allen's The Fear and The Prodigy's Omen, to 29p, while albums start from as little as £3.

Other sites worth looking at include 7digital, where singles start at 50p and albums cost from £5, Playlouder, which offers music news and feature content as well as downloads, and the websites of music store groups such as HMV and Virgin.

These sell CDs as well as downloads and HMV is currently offering a range of albums for £2.99 with free delivery.

But beware: content from some of the sites is only compatible with certain MP3 players, so check this first before buying if you plan to listen to your music this way.

What about streaming?

If you are more interested in listening to music online than buying it, you can choose to stream it.

Streaming audio is sound that you listen to "live" over the internet, but which is not downloaded to your hard drive – often for copyright reasons. So, you can listen to the music while you are online, but you cannot download and keep it.

Some sites, such as deezer.com, stream tracks for free, while others charge you a small amount (such as 1p per track) to listen.

Many radio stations also stream their shows over the internet.