Activision to stick to "Guitar Hero" song price
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SANTA MONICA, California  - Activision Inc.   said on Thursday it had sold more than 300,000  downloadable song packs for its hit "Guitar Hero II" music  game, giving it confidence it will not have to lower prices  despite outrage at the cost among some game fans.
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Activision Inc  is set to  launch "Guitar Hero 3" amid expectations that the latest  installment of its music-themed franchise will be a platinum  hit for the second-biggest U.S. video game publisher.
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Blog: Want to make that music track a ringtone? Get ready to spend $.99 all over again.
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An old-fashioned price war is gearing up in the digital music download business, with RealNetworks (Quote, Chart) on the offensive. With rival Apple in its crosshairs, RealNetworks has slashed the price on songs sold from its RealPlayer store by 50 ...
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DENVER (Billboard) - In the two months since MTV Networks  and Harmonix released the music-based videogame "Rock Band,"  players have purchased and downloaded more than 2.5 million  additional songs made available after the game's initial  distribution. Activision, meanwhile, said it has sold more than  5 million new songs via download for "Guitar Hero III: Legends  of Rock" since it began adding downloadable content in early  November.
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(InfoWorld) - Just because three major online music retailers bind their music stores to specific portable players doesn't make it acceptable, a Norwegian consumer group leading the charge against Apple's DRM (digital rights management) policy says. "ITunes Music Store and others are unfair to consumers no matter how many download services follow the proprietary approach," wrote Torgeir Waterhouse, a senior advisor at The Norwegian Consumer Council, in response to a letter written by Apple CEO Steve Jobs andÂ posted on the Apple Web siteÂ on Tuesday. Jobs examined why DRM exists and discusses alternatives to the current set-up in his open response to calls for Apple to allow users to buy songs from the iTunes store and play them on any device. Norway's consumer representative hasÂ threatened legal action against AppleÂ for violating Norwegian law by limiting iTunes customers to playing their music only on iPods. Consumer groups in Denmark, Sweden, Finland, France, and Germany haveÂ joined Norway's complaintÂ against Apple. Jobs points out that Microsoft and Sony also sell music that can only be played on their players, supporting a model that serves customers well with choice and a continuing stream of innovative products. He also suggests that groups like Waterhouse's "redirect their energies" toward convincing the music labels to sell music without DRM, technology that aims to restrict how buyers can copy or use the music. The four biggest record labels forced Apple to employ a proprietary DRM system as a condition of the agreement that allows Apple to sell their music, he said. Ideally, he said, the labels wouldn't require DRM. "This is clearly the best alternative for consumers, and Apple would embrace it in a heartbeat," Jobs wrote. While Waterhouse agrees that the record companies carry some fault for the situation, the iTunes music store and others like it are ultimately responsible. "They're still the company that's selling music to the consumers and are responsible for offering a fair deal according to Norwegian law," he said. Still, with his letter, Jobs' appears to have stirred up some additional pressure on the record labels to change their DRM policies. EMusic.com Inc., which claims to be the second largest music download site, only sells DRM-free music from thousands of independent labels. But the site would like be able to sell music from the four biggest labels. "We are hopeful the remaining four will one day join [the independent labels] by licensing their complete catalogs and reap the benefits of consumer demand," David Pakman, president and CEO of eMusic, wrote in a response to Jobs' letter. Even though Jobs didn't hint that a solution might be impending, Waterhouse appeared to see a glimmer of hope. "If this means that Apple is willing to the kick the lock in technology from the [iTunes/iPod] combination this is really good news -- news that should be put into action as soon as possible to bring us all one important step closer to a well functioning digital society," he wrote.
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The controversial game publisher pulls the plug on a game, for now.
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They didnât make this announcement with quite as much fanfare as when they cut their price per download at their online music store to just 49 cents, but RealNetworks is ending that half-price âFreedom of Choiceâ promotion theyâve been running for
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Sony BMG will start selling music downloads in the copy-protection-free MP3 format later this month in North America, as even the last holdout among the major record labels crumbled to the growing trend.
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RealNetworks Goes After iPod With Price War  RealNetworks on Tuesday halved the prices for downloaded songs to $0.49  to win customers away from Apple Computer's iPod craze. RealNetworks has recently launched its "Harmony" technology which makes its song downloads compatible with Apple's iPod technology. Apple currently has a firm grasp ...
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MTV Games, Activision differ on why GH3 controllers aren't supported in Rock Band for PS3.
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The Wii version of the hit game delivers the music in mono, not Dolby Pro Logic II surround sound, leading some disappointed gamers to file a class-action suit.
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Chris Gorog is convinced people won&#39;t continue to pay $1 a song for online music. By Evan Agostini, Getty Images. That is despite Apple&#39;s (AAPL) record string
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For three weeks, it will sell songs for 49 cents and albums for $4.99--a move that could spark a price war.
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In the UK, iTunes charges consumers STG0.79 per song, or around EUR1.20. In France and Germany, however, the cost of downloads is just EUR0.
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The company ended its temporary promotion that saw it slash the price of its downloadable songs to 49 cents. The company launched the promotion last month to compete with Apple&#39;s iTunes service, the market leader.
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Activision Inc is set to launch  "Guitar Hero 3" amid expectations that the latest installment  of its music-themed franchise will be a platinum hit for the  second-biggest U.S. video game publisher.