Flat-rate mobile phone music service to compete with iPhone
520407
InfoWorld - A U.K. startup hopes to compete with&#160;Apple&#39;s new iPhone by offering a flat-rate music service that can run on most of today&#39;s mobile phones.
722649
Omnifone wants to put a new face on mobile phone music downloads with its MusicStation service.
9965
Mobile operator teams with European record label for service that lets consumers watch music videos on cell phones.
394234
The mobile carrier aims to compete against Apple with its own music downloading service
694354
The music download service plans to battle Apple with an unlimited-tune subscription deal.
92019
The ability to download complete tracks directly over cell-phone networks to mobile phones is becoming a reality in Europe.
262982
The long wait is over. People in Canada can now use Apple&#39;s iTunes service to download songs at a flat rate of 99 cents a song.
317684
A new music service that allows  consumers to directly download an unlimited number of tracks to  their mobile phones for a small weekly fee from wherever they  are will launch in Europe on Thursday.
97200
Nokia Corp. unveiled services and cellphones yesterday that customers can use to download music and play games, a bid by the world's largest mobile phone maker to challenge Apple Inc.'s higher-end iPhone, as well as iTunes and the iPod.
64858
(InfoWorld) - Even before Apple's much anticipatedÂ iPhone hits the shelves later this month, users of many different kinds of phones can listen to their iTunes music, via a new service from Seattle company Melodeo. Anyone can use the beta version of NuTsie, launched on Tuesday, by signing up and then exporting their iTunes playlists to NuTsie. Users don't actually upload their music files, only the metadata of the files which identifies the songs. After receiving an application via text message to their phones, they can start listening to their playlists. On the backend, Melodeo is assembling a library of music so it can stream the songs to users. When a user chooses to listen to music from their playlist, Melodeo streams it from its own library. The company adheres to "radio rules," the same guidelines that govern how broadcast radio and online stations play music and then pay artists and record companies for the right to play the songs. Because Melodeo follows radio rules, NuTsie has a few quirks. For instance, users can't pick individual songs from their libraries, they can only listen to their playlists. Also, playlists don't play in the order that the user made them -- NuTsie shuffles the order. If a user's playlist includes a full album, Melodeo must insert random songs into its playback in order to comply with the rules. For now, NuTsie supports 15 phones, although the Java application may work on other phones. Melodeo is developing a Brew version and a Windows Mobile client. Most users will want to subscribe to an unlimited data plan from their mobile operator before using the service, otherwise the cost to stream the music could be high. Melodeo is recommending that users have third generation service, even though the stream uses just 24Kbps, in order to get a high quality service, said Dave Dederer, vice president of music content at Melodeo. So far, Melodeo has a library of 500,000 songs, and is adding around 10,000 songs every couple days, he said. That means that some songs users might have from iTunes, which has a library 5 million strong, might not play. The service shouldn't anger Apple and that wasn't Melodeo's intent, Dederer said. "People have invested time and energy into their libraries and we're trying to embrace and extend that universe," he said. "It's an extension of the value you're already getting out of the iTunes universe." There's another plus to the service. "We monetize music that's illegally stored in an iTunes library," said Dederer, who is himself a songwriter, record label owner and member of the band The Presidents of the United States of America. That's because when NuTsie streams a song from a playlist that a user may have illegally downloaded, Melodeo pays the artist and record company for streaming the song. Melodeo hopes to launch NuTsie commercially in six to eight weeks and hopes to also soon launch with a carrier partner that could decide to offer a subscription to the service. The company hasn't yet decided how to charge for the service. It could offer it via a monthly subscription or with a one time fee for downloading the application. Melodeo is also looking into visual and audio advertising so that users could access it for free, Dederer said.
428701
It's one musical performance where your   cell phone can -- and should -- ring.
294409
Apple may have thrown down the first gauntlet with the iPhone but the UK's Omnifone is responding with what it claims will be the first handset with unlimited free music downloads wherever you are Â no computer necessary.
696085
The mobile phone and music industries are hoping to kick-start mass-market consumption of music over mobile handsets by unveiling on Monday a new, low-priced flat-rate service intended to challenge Apple's plans to offer music on its iPhone device.
124929
(InfoWorld) - A U.K. startup hopes to compete withÂ Apple's new iPhone by offering a flat-rate music service that can run on most of today's mobile phones. Omnifone Ltd. launched on Thursday its MusicStation service that allows mobile phone users to download as many music tracks as they want for â¬2.99 (US$3.97) per week. The company previewed MusicStation in February at the 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona. The Swedish mobile phone subsidiary of Norwegian telco Telenor ASA is the first to offer the MusicStation service. More than 30 operators in Europe, Asia and South Africa have signed up to offer the service. To use MusicStation, users must have handsets preinstalled with the application. "MusicStation runs on any Java and music-enabled device," said Omnifone spokesman Tim Hadley. "We're talking about 75 percent of the phones currently available on the market." The company plans to have more than 100 million MusicStation-enabled handsets within the next 12 months. Omnifone has developed software that allows its application to be ported to the many different types of Java used on mobile phones, according to Hadley. One of the main benefits of MusicStation is quick and easy navigating and downloading -- unlike many of the carrier music portals, based on WAP (Wireless Access Protocol) technology, which can be time-consuming and difficult to browse, according to the spokesman. "The application is very comparable to an MP3 player user experience," he said. Downloads to mobile phones over 3G (third-generation) mobile phone networks can take between 30 seconds and one minute, all of which can happen in the background. The service also runs on GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) networks. Omnifone has signed licensing deal with several large music companies, including EMI Music, Sony BMG, Universal Music Group and Warner Music International. "We're starting with over 1 million tracks," Hadley said. DRM (digital rights management) technology protects all of the music. The mobile MusicStation service includes several features, such as messaging and the ability to share playlists and tracks. Over the next few months, the company plans to offer a MusicStation desktop application. For an additional â¬1 per month, customers can have all of the tracks downloaded to their mobile phones automatically download to their PCs when they log on to the portal service, according to Hadley. Operators, music companies and Omnifone will split revenue generated by MusicStation. Apple announced this week that iPhone users will need an account for its iTunes Store music service before activating the device. The iPhone debuts in the U.S. on June 29. Â
467674
Carlos Gomez could be the recording industry's ideal mobile music customer.
485978
The outlook for mobile music in 2005 can be summed up in one word: more.
533146
Music Choice and Sprint are launching a music service that allows mobile phone users to view short videoclips and listen to radio-like programming on their handsets.