MPEG-1 Audio Layer 3, more commonly referred to as MP3, it is a common audio format for consumer audio storage. MP3 is an audio-specific format that was designed by the Motion Pictures Expert Group. A several teams of engineers at Fraunhofer IIS in Erlangen, Germany, AT&T-Bell Labs in Murray Hill, NJ, USA, Thomson-Brandt, and CCETT as well as others.

Music is an art form in which the medium is sound organized in time. Common elements of music are pitch, rhythm, dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture. The development of music among humans must have taken place against the backdrop of natural sounds such as birdsong and the sounds other animals use to communicate. To many, music is a way of life, such as it is to the Native Americans, who use their music to pray. Many still use this practice today, who have found their hearts in the melodies. Prehistoric music is the name which is given to all music produced in preliterate cultures.

There a lot of ways to download free mp3 music, but the big question is "is it legal?". With the popularity of peer to peer file sharing programs like Kazaa, Limewire and others getting free downloads of mp3 music has been so easy. But there is a risk for this, there are viruses, worms, trojans and spywares not to mention that it is illegal. Downloading music from this P2P programs is a "piracy" and is hurting the music industry by thus affecting the country as a whole.

A study in the Journal of Political Economy by Felix Oberholzer-Gee and Koleman Strumpf reports that 803 million CDs were sold in 2002, which was a decrease of about 80 million from the previous year. The RIAA has blamed the majority of the decrease on piracy, and has maintained that argument in recent years as music sales have faltered. Yet according to the study, the impact from file sharing could not have been more than 6 million albums total in 2002, leaving 74 million unsold CDs without an excuse for sitting on shelves.