MP3 in Jail

Wow. I remember when the MP3 file was verboten.

When we started MP34U in 1999, there was so much misinformation about this file format, we were advised to change the name and lose the “MP3”.

Now 13 years later the “MP3” experience is so mainstream, it has made it to prisons in the USA.

Believe it or not, The U.S. Bureau of Prisons is unveiling a program that will allow many of its more than 200,000 inmates to carry MP3 players, with personalized music lists, so they can pass the time.

An inmate will be able to purchase a MP3 player in the prison commissary, and they can create his/her own playlist.

The inmates can choose from a song list of about 1 million titles,

the list will be monitored to exclude “explicit” tracks, including material such as obscene or racially charged language.

The program will be managed within an internal computer system, allowing prisoners to scan the available titles, listen to samples and download them to their devices. Seems time they are a changing.