Organize Your Music Collection with Audio Tag Tool

One of the "dangers" of downloading music off the Internet (even legal music, so I'm not talking about receiving notice of a lawsuit for file sharing, although that's certainly a concern for people who download music illegally), is in regards to ID3 tags.

What the heck is an ID3 tag, you ask? Let me explain.

When you download a music file, it might be named something like this:

05-Bob_Dylan-Greatest_Hits-Like_A_Rolling_Stone.mp3

Now, humans can likely figure out, simply from reading the file name, that the music is track number five of Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits, titled Like A Rolling Stone.

But does your computer know how to read the same information? It does not. It can't, mainly because not all files are named consistently. For instance, if that song was on my computer, it would simply be named like this:

05-Like_A_Rolling_Stone.mp3

I wouldn't include the artist (Bob Dylan) or the album (Greatest Hits), because I would have all the songs from the album in a folder with the name of the album, which would be inside of another folder (named "Bob Dylan"), which would include all my other Bob Dylan albums.

The computer wouldn't know this (or wouldn't necessarily know what it meant).

Because of this situation, the "tag" was created. Called ID3, the tag is what alerts iTunes (or Windows Media Player or WinAmp or whatever player you choose), to the name of the song, along with Artist, Year, Genre, and whatever else you wish to include.

In spite of this, some people still choose to label their songs differently. For instance, if you have music from Tom Petty, the artist might be called "Tom Petty," but it might also be "Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers," or "Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers." In most music players, those songs would be considered to be by three different artists. And on some compilation albums (such as soundtracks), you may find that each song is by a different artist, which makes it difficult to browse and listen to the entire album all at once.