MTV Networks, RealNetworks, music merger
p2pnet news | Music:- If you can’t beat ‘em, amalgamate.
As everyone except the lamescream media knows, the corporate online music business is virtually non-existent with all of the action in the real world of digital music populated by people who scorn the likes of iTunes, the near-dead Napster and RealNetworks, instead flocking in their hundreds of meetings to services such as Russia’s AllofMP3.com.
So closing ranks might be a partial solution for the tiny handful of authorised digital music download businesses to at least stay alive until the Big 4 labels figure out suing people in your own dwindling consumer bases and accusing them of being criminals and thieves isn’t the way to go.
Now Viacom’s MTV Networks and RealNetworks are expected to merge their offerings, says the Wall Street Journal.
RealNetworks’ Rhapsody is what’s corporately known as a ’subscription service’ under which punters rent downloads destined die as soon as they stop paying the monthly rates.
Understandably, this idea hasn’t been greeted with wild enthusiasm by music lovers.
Apple’s iTunes is always held up as the only game in town, and the one cracking the whip as far as ‘official’ downloads are concerned, and the joint venture, “could provide additional leverage against Apple,” says the story, going on:
The move appears to spell the end of MTV’s Urge digital service, launched in partnership with Microsoft Corp. last year. Microsoft has been heavily focused on its own Zune service in recent months, to the apparent detriment of Urge, which had few subscribers. MTV itself no longer invested significant resources in Urge after Zune’s debut, according to a person familiar with Urge.
Teaming up with MTV could give Rhapsody a broader reach, thanks to the music channel’s strong marketing and vast reach in cable television and other media. MTV plans to promote the service heavily on its television channels. A person familiar with the matter said MTV and Seattle-based RealNetworks have been discussing a partnership for months and were eager to complete a deal before MTV’s Video Music Awards ceremony on Sept. 9, during which they hope to promote the partnership.
“A person familiar with the matter said the venture is to be headed by Michael Bloom, who currently heads Urge for MTV Networks,” the Wall Street Journal adds.
Also See:
AllofMP3.com – AllofMP3.com back online, August 20, 2007
Wall Street Journal – MTV, RealNetworks Join to Battle iTunes, August 21, 2007
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August 21st, 2007 at 11:14 am
You people ARE criminals, dumbfuck.
August 21st, 2007 at 1:01 pm
I am GLAD that the legal DRM music services are suffering!
Mabye now, they have a taste of how the public is FED UP with DRM and high prices. Not to menmtion the public lawsuits which have not won them any friends.
They are learning through the school of “hard knocks” that when you start suing your customers, they can hurt you…bad!
August 21st, 2007 at 5:12 pm
MTV and Real. The has-been and the never-been. They go together like herring and twinkies.