Anyone with an internet connection for more than a few days has probably come across a parked domain. There are so many parked domains now, legitimate websites are forced to accept ridiculous alternate spellings like Flickr or Digg or whatever else. Today at lunch I went to fun.com to find that, surprise surprise, it was also parked. I decided to perform a little experiment by pretending I was a completely ignorant internet user who was innocently looking for some free music. I clicked the first drop-down and selected "free music". Oh dear.

I eagerly clicked the first result that was presented to me and it brought to FreeMusicConnection.com. I was greeted with a very low bitrate song playing in the background and an animated Flash intro. After clicking "Skip Intro and Take Me to My Music!", I suddenly had a form to fill out. I'm sure they just need a little info and I would be on my way to FREE MUSIC.

So secure.

I guess now everybody knows my password is "Gordon". Please don't tell anyone, guys. Also, at least they're up front with you about how little they respect your privacy!

After filling out the form with fake information, I came to a screen asking to verify my phone number. Rats. I guess they're too smart to let bogus sign-ups get past them. The scary part, though, was in the fine print:

The Service is available to customers of Rogers Wireless, Bell, Fido, Sasktel, Telus, MTS Mobility and Virgin Mobile for a monthly fee of $5.00/week.

Yup. $20/month for FREE MUSIC if you weren't careful enough to read the fine print. Sadly, my relationship with FreeMusicConnection.com was at an end, but I wasn't ready to give up my search.

Back at fun.com, I found another site offering free music, this time it was EZ-Tracks.com. Upon clicking, I had to mute another low bitrate song playing in the background of a flash animation. EZ-Tracks didn't force me to fill out a form before I knew what my options were, which was nice, so clicked a few songs in their "Top Song Downloads" section. Before attempting to download, I checked out some of the comments at the bottom of the page. This was for Snoop Dogg's "Drop It Like It's Hot":

wow i would like to drop it like its hot too. because i am hot and sexy

Sounds reasonable. This one was for Queen's "We Are The Champions":

I think this song is very cool to listening to if you are happy

I was sold. I clicked "Download Now" and I was prompted to enter my email address. I gave them a fake one, and I was brought back to the exact same screen that FreeMusicConnection.com sent me to earlier, asking me to verify my phone number. I guess I wasn't getting any free music today.

Just out of curiosity, I clicked their Terms & Conditions and I found this gem:

Many of the songs available through the Service are performed by their original artists. Notwithstanding the foregoing, you understand and agree that most of the available songs are performed by other musicians in the style of the original artists.

I am pretty certain that the only people that get reeled in by these offers are naive moms that just don't know any better. I weep for them.

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