More and more music services are opening up all over the world to cater to legal downloads. This could be partly due to the (major!) efforts of the recording industry to curb illegal downloading but it could also be due to more people seeing the benefits of legal downloading. Of course, we cannot discount the possibility of companies trying to gain some benefit (monetary and otherwise) from opening legal paid download services.
In any case, there is another service that’s opening in Europe. Bigwig Hewlett-Packard is joining the fray and is opening up a music service in some European countries. Dubbed the MusicStation, this will be preloaded on some of HP’s personal computers. They will be released in the following countries:
• Austria
• Belgium
• Britain
• Italy
• France
• Germany
• The Netherlands
• Spain
• Sweden
• Switzerland
More from Reuters:
The service has been developed and is managed by British digital music firm Omnifone. HP runs a similar service in United States with RealNetworks’ Rhapsody.
Such new subscription services helped to lift sales of digital music 12 percent last year to $4.2 billion, industry trade body IFPI said last week.
“As the world’s biggest PC vendor, HP has huge opportunity to create a viable competitor to iTunes due to its scale,” said Rob Lewis, chief executive of Omnifone. Apple’s iTunes — with a pay-per-download business model — is the leading digital music distributor.
How much is this going to cost? 10 euros for a month for unlimited access. Not too bad.
Tags: Europe, HP, music service, Paid Service
Categories: Downloading Legally, Music, Paid Service
Everyone knows what happened in Haiti recently. The earthquake that hit them ruined the country and has brought so much suffering to the people. Even today as I write this post, countless Haitians are on the streets and still suffering.
The international community has been quick to do what it could to help out but it seems that there can never be enough help doled out. The infrastructure of the capital was torn down by the strong quake and a lot of Haitians are not being reached quick enough. Worse, there is a lack of medicine, water, food, and other basic necessities.
While many have already given what they can, we can still help in other ways. One of these ways is by downloading the music from the recently concluded production Hope For Haiti Now. I don’t know if you got to watch the telethon but I did and it was very touching how it was all put together.
I have to admit, the musical performances were one of the main reasons I watched it and they were all great! The songs were perfect for the theme and the artists gave their best when performing. It really is worth getting that music. Even better, when you buy the album, you will be giving directly to Haiti.
Hope For Haiti Now can be downloaded from Amazon at 0.99 cents per song. You may opt to get music song by song or download the whole album. The latter option will save you a bit of money.
Tags: Amazon, charity, Haiti, MP3, Music
Categories: Downloading Legally, Music, Paid Service
The music industry is really trying to crack down hard on illegal downloading. Many things have been tried but there really does not seem to be a conclusive solution on the horizon yet. Virgin Media is now stepping in and is going to try its hand at it. The Daily Record has the story:
VIRGIN Media and Universal Music are to launch an unlimited legal download subscription service.
As part of the deal, Virgin have vowed to aggressively police usage to stop the MP3 tracks turning up on file-sharing networks.
The service, which will start later this year, will allow music lovers to stream and download as many music tracks as they want from the entire Universal Music catalogue in return for a monthly fee.
Subscribers will be able to download music to keep permanently and store on any MP3-compatible device.
The Virgin Media broadband service will allow one subscription per household.
I think that this just might work. After all, the biggest reason for downloading illegally is that people do not have to pay for the material that they are acquiring. We know that this is virtually impossible unless artists start giving away their work without charging for it. The closest thing that we can get then, is to have a paid service for a relatively low price for UNLIMITED downloads. Makes perfect sense.
More good news, artists such as U2, The Rolling Stones, Amy Winehouse, Duffy, and Elton John who are signed by Universal Music will be included in the roster. Currently, Virgin is still negotiating with other labels.
Categories: Downloading Legally, Music, Paid Service
YouTube has risen to the top of streaming video; this and the fact that anyone can make a video and publish it on YouTube. I am sure there are so many other reasons for YouTube’s success but I am sure that one of them is because people do NOT have to pay to use the service.
But what of this piece of news that has been making people go “really?” I heard from so many people from different places that YouTube is NOT going to be free anymore. YouTube is going to be a paid service. Oh no, it’s the end of the world!
Of course, the untrusting person in me just would not take these people’s words for the truth – I had to look it up myself and voila, I was right. They were all overreacting.
There is indeed truth to the news that YouTube will have a paid service but this is not the entirety. In fact, YouTube is currently only TESTING the paid service. The idea is for users to be able to download content in high resolution MP4 format for a fee. Part of this fee will go to the creator of the video. And since YouTube is part of Google now, you can pay for the downloads through Google Checkout.
Again, take note that this does NOT mean that you cannot watch videos for free anymore. It just means that if you want a copy for yourself, you have to pay for it. Fair enough, don’t you think?
Categories: Downloading Legally, Music, Paid Service, Site News, Videos
In my quest for legal downloads I stumbled on Legal Sounds. The website offers a legal way of getting music files from the internet. At this point, only iTunes has been the most popular and consistently used music download service.
Legal Sounds requires users to download its proprietary Downloader and load up the application with the preferred balance using credit card payment options. It also accepts e-Gold.
Legal Sounds has the makings of being a good contender in the legal music download service market because of its no-fuss way of providing its service.
Tags: iTunes, Legal Sounds
Categories: Applications, Downloading Legally, Paid Service
The site is hailed as one of the fastest growing legal download sites on the internet to date which charges minimal fees. Imagine $35.00 for unlimited access to all the songs, TV shows and Movies of your choice through partnerships with media giants such as MSN Music, Napster, Yahoo Music, Real Rhapsody and Wal-Mart. The total amount of downloadable content is at 12 million and they continuously add to their inventory each day. The membership gives you access to the largest online collection of music, movies games and utilities all free for you to choose and get onto your desktop. The fee mostly goes to the maintenance and operations of the web site and the massive internet library collection. You get a free software which you can use to burn cd’s that you can play on your car stereo. There is also access for easy to follow guides or if your problems don’t end there, you can get in tough with live agents who are there all the time to answer all your questions and requests. They have a 30-day money back guarantee on their subscription.
There are many legal download sites available on the internet to date and these are taking over the previously dark area of P2P download sites. Problems associated with malware and other bugs that tend to wreak havoc from P2P sites have dissuaded many from them who have turned to legal music sites such as these. MyMusicInc, for some of the fastest and best paid legal downloads on the market and in the world.
Tags: DRM_Free_Music, Free_MP3_Music_Downloads, Free_Music_Downloads, Free_Music_for_your_Ipod
Categories: Downloading Legally, Music, Paid Service, Providers, Videos
