NEW YORK CITY (Reuters) Published: September 2, 2006 — MySpace, the popular online community site, said yesterday that it would make its first move into the digital music business by selling songs from nearly three million unsigned bands.

MySpace is the latest company to try to challenge Apple Computer’s iTunes Music Store, but unlike many fledgling rivals, it already has 106 million users, as well as the backing of its parent company, the News Corporation.

“The goal is to be one of the biggest digital music stores out there,” the co-founder of MySpace, Chris DeWolfe, said. “Everyone we’ve spoken to definitely wants an alternative to iTunes and the iPod. MySpace could be that alternative.”

In the last year, MySpace.com has become the most-visited Internet address among Web users in the United States, according to Hitwise, which monitors Web traffic, with mainly teenagers and young adults using the site to socialize and to share music and photographs.

By the end of the year, Mr. DeWolfe said, MySpace will offer independent bands that have not signed with a record label a chance to sell their music on the site. MySpace says it has nearly three million bands showcasing their music.

Songs can be sold on the bands’ MySpace pages and on fan pages, in MP3 digital file format, which works on most digital players including Apple’s market-dominating iPod.

The bands will decide how much to charge for each song after accounting for MySpace’s distribution fee, said Rusty Rueff, the chief executive of Snocap, which will manage the service.

Snocap provides digital licensing and copyright management services and was started by the founder of Napster, Shawn Fanning. Mr. Rueff said the “small” distribution fee was not yet fixed.

EMI, the Universal Music Group, the Warner Music Group and Sony BMG own about 75 percent of mainstream popular music. Most of this music is available only on MySpace for live streaming as a promotion.

Samsung Plans Rival to iTunes

SAN JOSE, Calif., Sept. 1 (AP) — Samsung Electronics plans to introduce its own online music service to challenge Apple Computer’s iTunes-iPod franchise and Microsoft’s upcoming Zune music products.

Samsung, based in Seoul, South Korea, said Friday that it would work with the Web company MusicNet to introduce a music subscription and download service later this year in Britain, Germany and France. Samsung said it planned to later expand the service throughout Europe and Asia.

Samsung said the online music service would be compatible with its upcoming line of portable MP3 and media players, but did not disclose further details about the service, pricing or fees. Samsung representatives were not immediately available for comment.

 

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