Free Song Promotion Is Expected From Amazon
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At the Super Bowl next month, the music industry will be switching teams â from Apple to Amazon.com.
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The world's largest music company will sell restriction-free music downloads at Amazon.com and other online vendors. But not at Apple's iTunes store.
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Amazon.com has begun a new chapter in its battle for customers&#39; ears: it has agreed to pay $300 million for Audible, a seller of audio books that has a close relationship with Apple.Ten-year-old Audible sells spoken-word content such as audio books, magazines, and radio programs through a number of channels, including its Web sites in the U.S. and U.K. It has 80,000 titles in its catalog, and a further 20,000 through partner sites in France and Germany.Amazon began reselling Audible&#39;s content in 2000, and since 2002, Audible has also distributed audio books through Apple&#39;s iTunes Store, when it became Apple&#39;s exclusive supplier of spoken-word content. Apple modified the software in its iPods to allow &quot;bookmarking&quot; of Audible audio files.This chapter in the battle for listeners may yet have a happy ending for Apple, as the Audible team plans to continue and grow its relationship with the iTunes Store, according to Amazon spokesman Drew Herdener. But that goes for Audible&#39;s many other channel partnerships too: &quot;We plan to continue and grow all these relationships,&quot; Herdener said.Apple declined to comment on the deal.The main battle front between Apple and Amazon remains the sale of digital music free of the restrictions imposed by DRM (digital rights management) systems, where Amazon has been competing with Apple in the U.S. since September.When Apple opened its iTunes Store, the music it sold was wrapped in a layer of DRM to prevent copying, which incidentally tied the music to Apple&#39;s iPod players and iTunes software.Some record companies were unhappy that Apple limited the sales to its players in this way, and last May&#160;Apple began offering tracks from EMI without DRM&#160;for a small premium, later bringing the price down to the same $0.99 it charges for other tracks with DRM.&#160;Amazon joined the fray&#160;in September, selling music from EMI and Universal in MP3 format, without DRM,&#160;adding tracks from Warner to its catalog&#160;in December. It now offers 2.9 million DRM-free tracks, compared to 2 million DRM-free tracks in Apple&#39;s iTunes Store. Apple offers millions more tracks with DRM.Audible&#39;s audio books are wrapped in a layer of DRM, which Amazon does not plan to remove unless customers start to complain, Herdener said.&quot;Each media marketplace has its own business dynamics,&quot; he said.Amazon recently moved into the electronic book market with the launch of its Kindle e-reader, a device for downloading and displaying electronic books. Kindle also plays audio files, including those sold by Audible, making it a (much bulkier) competitor to the iPod.The $300 million price tag for Audible includes the assumption of outstanding stock option obligations. The companies expect to close the deal by April.
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Amazon.com  has signed on  Warner Music Group  to its music download service, which  aims to compete with Apple's  industry-dominating  iTunes online store.
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Amazon.com Inc. is testing a new paid advertising program that will drive shoppers away from products on its own Web site.
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Come Super Bowl Sunday, Amazon.com will get a leg up in the digital music race it's running against Apple Inc.'s iTunes Store. And not just any leg: Justin Timberlake's leg.
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Ticketmaster.com and Apple's iTunes Music Store will offer ticket buyers one free song for each ticket purchased.
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Joining the fight against   Apple's dominance over the portable music market, Universal Music Group   announced Tuesday that it will be making its entire catalog available   for free downloading via the ad-supported Website SpiralFrog.com.
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New Ignition feature will focus on promoting up-and-coming acts through free music and video downloads.
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To reach iPod owners, music companies have been forced to choose between Apple's copy-protection scheme, or no copy protection at all. With the launch of Amazon's download service Tuesday, the choice is clearer than ever.
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Amazon.com has added songs from Warner Music Group to the range it sells as MP3 files without DRM (digital rights management), the companies said Friday.
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Universal Music, home to artists such as U2, The Killers , and Audioslave, will make its catalog of recordings and music videos available for free on an ad-supported web site launching later this year, the site's operator said yesterday.
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TechWeb - Amazon.com launches a video and movie download service that could eventually present a challenge to Apple Computer's iTunes.
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DRM-free MP3s from music label to be sold on US website Warner Music Group is making its music available for download from Amazon in MP3 format without Digital Rights Management (DRM) copy protection, enabling the free sharing of music.â¦
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Fans of U2, Eminem, B.B. King, and Elton John will soon be able to get free songs from those artists, and many more, with the launch of SpiralFrog, a new Web site for music downloads. But there is a catch -- you have to sit through a message from the site's sponsors.
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SEATTLE -- Amazon.com Inc. launched a digital video downloading service Thursday, ending months of speculation that the Internet retailer would be getting into the online TV and movie business.
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Amazon.com Inc  on Tuesday  launched an early version of its highly anticipated digital  music download store, which is seen as a potential rival to  Apple Inc's  dominant iTunes service.