Subscription Service Launched
By SIMON AVERY
.c The Associated Press
LOS ANGELES (AP) - Sony Music Entertainment and Vivendi's Universal Music Group will launch an upgraded online music subscription service Thursday, a move that could represent the greatest concession yet by the recording industry to consumers hungry for downloadable music.
Pressplay, the companies' 7-month-old joint online venture, will begin offering paying subscribers the ability to burn major label songs on blank CDs and to transfer the music to a variety of portable devices.
``This is the most significant announcement in the last two years from the music industry,'' said P.J. McNeally, an analyst with the research firm GartnerG2 in San Jose.
Pressplay and MusicNet - a similar service from AOL Time Warner, Bertelsmann, EMI Group and RealNetworks launched last December - have been criticized for failing to offer users a viable alternative to the free, music swapping networks like Morpheus and Kazaa.
Both pressplay and MusicNet stream music files, but have not given users portability or the ability to keep any songs when they unsubscribe. Pressplay has limited the number of tunes that can be burned to a small amount, while MusicNet still doesn't let users burn songs.
Pressplay's upgraded service offers unlimited streaming and unlimited downloading for about $10 a month. For about $18 a month, users will be able to transfer 10 songs a month to various brands of portable devices that use Microsoft software. Additional portable downloads can be bought for an added cost.
``This is a significant stride forward and a significant leap for the industry,'' said Michael Bebel, chief executive of pressplay.
``Our listeners are going to be able to listen to as much music as they want, when they want,'' he said.
Unlike peer to peer music swapping networks, however, pressplay and MusicNet only offer songs from their own respective labels.
In pressplay's case, that amounts to about 100,000 songs.
Listen.com, another music subscription service that is partially owned by the five major record companies, does include music from all the majors. But the company has not offered users the chance to transfer its content to portable music devices.
Pressplay expects to have a deal in place to offer music from Warner Music and Bertelsmann within six months, Bebel said. The joint venture already offers some music from EMI.
Separately, Listen.com will launch partnerships Thursday with two broadband Internet service providers.
Both Roadrunner, the broadband arm of AOL Time Warner, and Hughes DirecTV Broadband service will offer their subscribers access to Listen.com's Rhapsody music service for an additional fee.
07/31/02 22:31 EDT
AI
