MySpace plans to sell you music

Stan Beer
Sunday, 03 September 2006 19:29

Your IT - Home IT

The most popular social networking site in the US, MySpace, has put up its hand to join the growing throng of internet players aiming to take on the might of Apple and its iTunes store in the online music space.

MySpace, which has more than 100 million registered users, intends to start the ball rolling by selling music from unaffiliated bands not restricted by digital rights management (DRM). This means the music, once purchased and downloaded can be played on virtually any portable music player that supports MP3 format - basically all of them.

The money making model for MySpace will be to charge a distribution fee on songs sold, while the artists can set their own price. According to MySpace, it already has nearly 3 million bands ready to go with the store.

However, the news Corporation owned company realizes that to be a real player in the digital music download business, you've also got to have the big name artists signed with music companies like Sony BMG, Warner, Universal and others, all of which will require downloads to be protected by DRM.

MySpace is rumoured to be in discussions with major music companies and, thus, it looks like there may be some announcement in the offing which would probably involve a tie-in with the Microsoft DRM system like other online stores competing with iTunes.

Of particular interest will be what will happen when Microsoft launches its iPod rival Zune before the end of the year. Microsoft is expected to also launch its own online music store. One question is will the music purchased through that store be restricted to Zune or will it be compatible with all MP3 players that license Microsoft's DRM? Another question is will music from online stores that support Microsoft's DRM be compatible with Zune?

We live in interesting online times.