Virgin Group to launch US online music service
24683
LOS ANGELES, California, United States of America - Richard Branson&#39;s Virgin Group said Monday it was jumping into online music, with a &quot;Digital Megastore&quot; for US customers offering song downloads for 99 cents.
223847
Microsoft Corp., hoping to take a bite out of Apple Computer Inc.'s highly popular online music service, is gearing up to launch its own Web site for selling songs over the Internet.
364682
(InfoWorld) - Virgin Group Ltd. will shut down its online music subscription and download service in the U.S. and U.K. next month, leaving one less competitor for Apple Inc.'s iTunes Music Store. In the U.K., Virgin Digital stopped selling tracks last Friday, and is no longer accepting new customers. As of Friday, only existing customers will be able to access the service, and the site will shut down for good on Oct. 19. The U.K. version of the site said users with more than one month of outstanding subscriptions will get a refund, but unused credits for song downloads should be used and won't be refunded. U.S. users of Virgin Digital will be able to use their credit on Napster LLC's music download service. The pending demise of Virgin Digital marks another casualty among online music stores, which have generally received lukewarm reception from consumers with the exception of Apple's market-leading iTunes service. Since Virgin Digital used digital rights management (DRM) technology from Microsoft Corp. to manage how songs could be played and transferred to portable devices, the service was not compatible with Apple's iPod line, which uses different DRM technology and file format. The Virgin Digital service allows customers to download tracks up to four more times to replace lost or damaged copies. Since that option will no longer be available when the store closes, the company advised customers who purchased tracks to back them up by burning the songs to a CD . Burning the tracks will let those customers re-import the tracks to the computer as MP3 files. Virgin also offered a subscription service that let people access an entire catalog of songs as long as they continued to pay the monthly fees. Those songs, which used Microsoft's DRM, would be unplayable if the person's subscription expired. Once the club closes, subscribers will also lose access to those songs. As part of the terms of subscription service, users were not allowed to burn those songs to CD. Virgin Digital officials could not immediately be reached for comment on the service's closure. The Virgin Digital store is not the only one to fold in the face of competition from Apple's iTunes -- or from illegal downloads. Last month, MTV Networks, which is owned by Viacom Inc., said it would merge its Urge music service with RealNetworks Inc.'s Rhapsody service. Urge, which was a partnership between MTV and Microsoft launched in May 2006 that failed to effectively compete with iTunes. Â
588861
Richard Branson's Virgin Group said it was jumping into the increasingly crowded market for online music, with a &quot;Digital Megastore&quot; offering US customers song downloads for 99 cents.
318484
TESCO, the UKâs biggest supermarket chain, is launching an online music service that it hopes will rival Appleâs market-leading iTunes.
354178
Online retailer Amazon.com Inc said on  Sunday it will begin an international roll-out this year of its  digital music store that offers songs without copy-protection  technology known as digital rights management.
517494
AOL on Tuesday unveiled a revamped  music product with a Web-based store and subscription service  offering audio and video streaming, programmed radio and  downloads that can be transferred to compatible digital media  players.
424405
Sir Richard Branson has dabbled in everything from music to space tourism, and is now setting his sights on creating the ultimate online music store. Branson's Virgin Digital service capitalizes on the strength of the Virgin record label to offer customers a "virtual Virgin Megastore" stocked with over 1 million songs for download.
739668
LONDON - Virgin Radio is to broadcast weekly chart rundowns using Napster online sales figures from August 29, beating BBC Radio One to the punch.
16193
A digital music download service that  allows consumers to buy songs instantly as they listen to them  on digital radio will start operating across Britain in the  first half of 2007, UBC Media said on Monday.
356663
In the first foray by a US wireless carrier into the online music market, AT&amp;T is launching a service that lets subscribers buy songs using their cell phones and later download them to a computer.
70240
The online digital-music business became a little more crowded as Richard Branson&#39;s Virgin Group launched a music Web site in the US The Virgin Digital service sells songs for 99 cents each
43181
Sci/Tech News, New York - British tycoon Richard Branson&#39;s Virgin Group said on Monday it was jumping into the market for online music, with a &quot;Digital Megastore&quot; offering US customers song downloads for 99 cents.
65286
A new music service that allows  consumers to directly download an unlimited number of tracks to  their cell phones for a small weekly fee from wherever they are  will launch in Europe on Thursday.
520022
A U.K. startup hopes to compete with Apple's new iPhone by offering a flat-rate music service for most mobile phones.
222703
The online retailer said over the weekend that it would begin to roll out its music store worldwide during this year in an effort to more broadly compete with market-leader iTunes.
296301
p2pnet.net News:- Virgin Electronics has joined the mp3 race with a $250, five gig player which also handles Microsoft&#39;s WMA format.