snapshot 8/21/07

MTV’s Urge and RealNetwork’s Rhapsody To Merge
http://futuremusic.com/blog/?p=1791
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118765486577703445.html?mod=rss_E-Commerce/Media
Viacom’s Urge will merge it’s download store with RealNetworks’ Rhapsody according to reports. MTV’s Urge has gained very little traction since its debut last year in a partnership with Microsoft. So the real winner here is clearly RealNetworks who will get to use the MTV brand and television reach to their advantage. RealNetworks desperately wants to give Rhapsody, a $12.99 per month subscription service, a boost in its ongoing battle to gain on iTunes. Most subscribers who actually use the service, love the offering, but it just doesn’t have the seamless sex appeal of the iPod/iTunes combo.


Universal and Rhapsody launch DRM-free partnership "test"
http://www.engadget.com/2007/08/21/universal-and-rhapsody-launch-drm-free-partnership-test/
http://news.com.com/8301-10784_3-9763475-7.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-mtv-rnwk-music-venture-the-financial-details-cash-plus-230-million-note/
Rhapsody America (the new Real / MTV partnership) wasn't the only thing that Real had up its sleeve today. Hot on the heels of the Universal snubbing of iTunes, and consequent announcement that the company would begin selling music via other outlets, comes today's news that the Rhapsody / Universal Music partnership has officially launched, at least in a limited "test" form, with the aim of selling UMG's catalog of thousands of tracks -- sans DRM -- via the Real Rhapsody service, charging $.89 per song for subscribers and $.99 for non-subscribers. Currently, only a select group of artists are up for grabs, including 50 Cent, Amy Winehouse, The Pussycat Dolls, The Police and Johnny Cash, though the plan is to make Universal's entire catalog available in the future.


Wal-Mart to Sell Music Online Without Copyright Protections
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118769960754203971.html?mod=rss_E-Commerce/Media
http://www.fool.com/investing/value/2007/08/21/watch-your-back-apple.aspx
http://www.macnn.com/articles/07/08/21/wal.mart.begins.mp3.sales/
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070821-worlds-largest-music-retailer-ditches-drm-not-censorship.html
http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2007/08/21/ap4039181.html
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has begun selling some of its online music catalog without anticopying software, stepping up its competition with Apple Inc.'s iTunes store. Wal-Mart will sell songs without the software -- known as digital rights management, or DRM -- through its walmart.com site for 94 cents a track, or $9.22 an album. The No. 1 seller of recorded music said it will launch the service with songs from two major record labels, Vivendi SA's Universal Music Group and EMI Group PLC.


Audio samples now in Yahoo! Audio Search
Yahoo has brought audio samples into the Yahoo! Audio Search. Adding to song titles, artist names, album titles, and lyrics, millions of samples are now available to play though an instant playback button beside search results. Audio samples can be heard by selecting Audio from the 'more' dropdown at Yahoo!'s main site. Upon clicking the search results 'Play Sample' button, a 30 second clip loads in the same window and plays. Users can then choose to download, aka buy, the track from BuyMusic, iTunes or MusicMatch among other online stores.


gBox: Give The Gift Of DRM-Free Music
gBox is a new take on selling digital content. Instead of emphasizing sales directly to consumers, gBox is encourages you to create wish lists and buy gifts for your friends and family. To kick-start the service, they’ve sealed a pretty big deal with Universal to be the retailer for their new “Open MP3″ experiment into DRM free music. In a move that’s a snub to Apple’s iTunes, Universal will be buying Google AdWords for their music, linking people to the gBox site to buy their artists’ music. gBox will be expanding to other forms of digital content in the future.


Adobe Beefs Up Flash 9 with H.264, AAC and Hardware Support
Adobe's introduced a powerful new component it'll be placing into its Flash Video Player 9, adding support for that red-hot H.264 codec, the video compression routine that's behind Blu-ray, HD DVD and lots of HD goodness all over the videoscape. Adobe's also heightened the efficiency of Flash audio, adding AAC audio compression. Perhaps the most important part of the announcement is the addition of hardware acceleration for playback of all different types of full-screen video.