Nokia's 'free' music download service coming to Australia

Stuart Corner
Monday, 19 January 2009 07:51

Your IT - Home IT

On 13 January Carphone cut the price of the 5310 from £127.10 ($A278) to £82.18 ($A180). The International Herald Tribune quoted a Carphone spokeswoman saying the price cut was "part of normal price changes after the Christmas sales period." But Paolo Pescatore, analyst with CCS Insight, was reported saying: "Nokia is experiencing lacklustre sales of its 'Comes with Music' in the United Kingdom."

Part of the blame was laid on the handset described as "relatively old" and by one analyst as "a dumpy little Honda, not the exotic Maserati it should have been." Comes With Music is, however, also supported on the 5800 announced in October 2008 .

The non-CWM version of the 5800 - Nokia's first S60 touch device, also known colloquially as the 'Tube' - is due to go on sale in the UK on 23 January and the price cut on the 5310 could well be simply to clear inventory of the older device before the CWM version of the 5800 is introduced.

Nokia announced plans for Comes With Music in December 2007 at the annual Nokia World conference in Amsterdam. Describing it as "a revolutionary program that enables people to buy a Nokia device with a year of unlimited access to millions of tracks from a range of great artists - past, present and future." Once the year is complete, customers can keep all their music. Tracks can be downloaded to the mobile and to a single PC.