Continuously Playing Music on Websites

People often ask this in forums and message boards.  "How to build an HTML site with music that plays continuously?"

Unfortunately, this isn't a simple thing. You have the following options, each with their own set of problems.

OPTION #1 - Embed an MP3 player on a plain vanilla page. Invoke it to open in a Pop-Up window from a link on your home page.   The player will remain open while people explore other site pages or until they close the pop-up window or leave your site.  NOTE:  The user must initiate the pop-up window. If you attempt to open a pop-up automatically on page load, it will be defeated by pop-up blockers (98% of browsers).

OPTION #2 - Put your player into a frameset.  NOTE: Framed sites pose many other problems as detailed below.
http://apptools.com/rants/framesevil.php

OPTION #3 - Build your entire site with Flash.  NOTE: Flash sites are not SEO & user friendly. Also Flash isn't supported by many web devices, most notably Apple's iDevices.

OPTION #4 - Build your entire site on one very large page
EXAMPLE:  http://alt-web.com/DEMOS/SmoothScroll.shtml
Depending on content and page size, this could delay your page load quite a bit.

OPTION #5 - Forget about continuous playing music/sound.  Simply embed your media player on the first page and allow people hear it once.