Why do people use mp3? The quality is not as good as WAV/flac files. The mp3 files have the highs and lows shaved off to make the files smaller. Music should have the best sound possible.

Yep even we share here bootlegs.

1) iPods (or any other mp3 player) played through those little 'bud' earpieces. Wavs are a complete waste of space.

2) As a quick download to see if you want/need a particular recording in your collection. Bandwidth is a serious problem here in Australia & I have to be very choosy as to what I obtain in the best quality.

3) Some recordings are only available in mp3 format or source. The latest Scorpio Little Boy Blue & Bigger Bang outtakes for instance.

That's why FLAC was developed.

If you demand lossy compressed audio,even OGG beats mp3.

And than there also is WMA.
How does that compair to flac or mp3 ?

wma is windows own mp3 format

Everything I've read states that, at a similar bitrate, wma is superior to mp3. It is a lossy format but cuts out around 19kHz whereas mp3 cuts out at about 16kHz. How well people can hear at these high freqeuncies I don't know.