Universal Music Group has settled a lawsuit against XM over a player that records XM programming by extracting a per unit fee from the satellite radio service similar to the per unit charge it gets from every Zune sold.
KOCH Records Now Available in iTunes Plus
KOCH Records, the # 1 Independent Music Label for 6 years running, now offers its catalog in iTunes Plus, which features DRM-free music with audio quality virtually indistinguishable from the original recordings (www.itunes.com).
Cornerworld Debuts 5 Million Song Digital Music Catalog with Napster
Cornerworld Corp. announced today that the Company has launched a new offering with Napster, Inc the pioneer of digital music, that will provide CornerWorld members with full access to Napster’s complete digital music catalog of more than 5 million music files through the Company’s flagship site, www.CornerWorld.com. The new offering is an extension of a distribution agreement with Napster, Inc, signed earlier this year that gives Napster the non-exclusive right to reproduce and distribute to its subscribers original content from Cornerworld members as a part of their digital music store.
Why Dropping DRM Won't Save The Music Business (AAPL)
- We don't think most consumers are aware of any DRM restrictions, because almost everything they buy or own works on iTunes and iPods.
- We have yet to see any concrete numbers from either EMI or Universal Music Group about their DRM-free tracks sold at iTunes and Amazon's new mp3 store. We've been told, unofficially, that sales are "encouraging," but we think if they were truly impressive, we'd have seen the results already.
- The conventional wisdom is that if only consumers had legal opportunities to buy music online, they would do so instead of using P2P filesharing systems, or borrowing and ripping their friends' CDs etc. But there's no shortage of legal places to buy music online these days, and consumers are indeed buying songs: They bought 1 billion tracks at iTunes in the first half of this year, and we assume that rate increased this fall. But the industry's main problem remains unchanged: It used to sell discs at a wholesale price of $10; now it sells individual songs at a wholesale of about 70 cents. If the business is going to survive, it's going to have to figure out a way to do that profitably -- and dropping DRM isn't going to solve that problem.
Amazon partners with fans' online record label
Sellaband, the fledgling music site which allows users to become 'investors' in bands whose music they like, has been given a major fillip by striking a distribution deal with Amazon. From January, a dedicated section of the Amazon store will be devoted to music produced by acts that have been discovered on Sellaband, with albums selling for £8.99. Once the wholesale price Amazon pays for the music has been deducted, remaining profits - understood to be about £6 per album - will be split equally between Sellaband, the artists and their 'investors', otherwise known as fans.
Next for Apple: Lossless iTunes Store
Apple has used its own lossless audio format since 2004 -- Apple Lossless Audio Codec, or ALAC. But why bother developing its own, when patent- and royalty-free options were already available? Firstly, some options weren't Mac-compatible. Others didn't support DRM. FLAC, arguably the most popular lossless codec, actively discourages the use of DRM, and Apple knows better than to anger a mob of hardcore geeks by shoving copy-protection into their open-source format.
But by not using FLAC -- a format rarely supported by players, bar Cowon, for example -- Apple ensures only its devices will work with Apple Lossless, thus a) maintaining the crucial ecosystem, and b) ensuring future sales of iPods, namely the expensive 160GB models.
Sony Reader felled by the classics
he load-up time, I've discovered, depends on the length of the book. At 3,423 pages with the smallest font (4,757 pages in the medium font, and 7,269 in large font), War and Peace takes more time than any other book I've tried. Our Mutual Friend, the Charles Dickens classic at 2,678 pages, comes in at 16 seconds. Pudd'nhead Wilson, at 428 pages, takes only about five seconds. Anything less than 400 pages takes about three seconds.
The Reader apparently insists on loading up the entire book before you can read it. Since most people don't read entire books in one sitting, this seems a bit weird.
No comments:
Post a Comment