support and general information
Q: What are Royalties?
A: A Royalty is a revenue share of the sale or performance of a work. It is paid to the composer, author, performer, or any other legal person that maintains a proprietary interest in that work.
Q: What is the difference between Royalty free music and Buyout music?
A: It's essentially the same. Royalty Free Music is obtained on a non-exclusive basis from a Royalty Free Music library. This music may be used by the user in a way that has been agreed upon with the supplier. Check our terms and conditions here. We offer our music and sounds for free, but remain owner of the copyrights.
Q: In what formats is your music available? Can I use your music with Flash?
A: We offer our music, sounds and loops in 320 kbps compressed mp3 format. This is the highest mp3 quality available. We've also added Flash .swf versions to our Flash music and loops section. A clear explanation of using audio in a Flash project can be found here.
Q: Can I edit or convert your sound files
A: Yes. For Windows, Mac OS X and Unix/Linux there is a free audio editor, called Audacity. You can use Audacity to record, convert, edit, cut, copy, slice and mix sounds.
Q: I can't loop your mp3 files! There's always a little space in between. What's wrong?
A: This is due to the nature of mp3 files, sorry. If you want a perfect music loop, we recommend either using a Flash .swf version, or a .wav / .aif version. However, using full quality .wav and .aif files will lead to big file sizes and thus an increased loading time.
Q: What is Podcasting?
A: Podcasting is a technology that enables anyone to deliver his or her own syndicated audio content to the world. This differs from traditional means of downloading audio off of the web because this technology can automatically update the content on the computer of someone who subscribes to your Podcast. Apples iTunes is the most popular program for finding and downloading Podcasts. After all, half of the term comes from the name of Apple's iPod MP3 player, and the other half of course comes from the term broadcasting
Q: Where do your sounds and music come from?
A: Virtual Soundtracks provides 100% original music and sounds, created by a team of enthousiastic professionals. We do not resell, redistribute or re-purpose other sound effect libraries or music. Our music and sounds are of high quality, made using only the latest techniques and digital technologies. All of our sounds are ready to 'plug and play'.
Q: Why do you compress your music downloads?
A: Our sound files come as compressed Zip files to make the download as quick as possible. This type of compression doesn't affect sound quality or file format, but does require decompression. If you have trouble opening any of the sound files:
Mac users: Aladdin's Stuffit software will open Zip files. You can download a free decompression utility at Stuffit.Com.
Windows users: Any Zip decompression utility will work. WinZip is a popular one. You can download a free copy at Winzip.Com.