MP3

MP3 (known in Geek as MPeG Layer III) is a popular (but slightly controversial) sound format. Like WAV, but unlike MIDI, an MP3 is a recording of sound. This allows for high quality sound or music, one of the complaints about MIDI music. Further, as it is a digital recording, lyrics are possible. Unlike WAV however, MP3 has a compression algorithm which allows a sound file to be a fraction of the size of the equivalent WAV (about 90% of the smaller).

MP3, however, has many drawbacks. First and formost is the size of the sound. A MIDI of a song is guaranteed to be much smaller (5-100kb) than an MP3 of the same song (anywhere from 500kb-10mb). Another issue is that the MP3 algorithm is patented, and is protected by licensing agreements. Anyone who makes more than a negligable amount of revenue using MP3s is required to license the compression algorithm.

An alternative is the OGG format, which uses a similar, but more efficent, compression algorithm. This algorithm is not patented, and is free for anyone to use.

See Also

• wikipedia:MP3
• OGG, WAV and MIDI