Two of the world's biggest record labels, Japanese Sony and French Vivendi Universal, are about to offer an alternative that music freaks have begged for a long time.
Two companies have finally understood, at least slightly, that they simply must offer a cheap and flexible alternative to P2P tools if they wish to fight Net piracy at all. Universal has announced that it has plans to launch a service in this summer which would offer single music tracks for download for $0.99 each and albums for $9.99 each.
Tracks will be sold through retailers like Amazon and Best Buy and according to Universal, certain tracks and albums will be released on the Net before they become available in CD format.
But definately the most encouraging fact is that the tracks will be in high quality and that Universal will allow users to burn the tracks to CD -- a practice that all the record labels have so far banned.
Sony has also announced that it will offer much more tracks for download and that those tracks can also be burned to CDs and that they will drop the price of one download to $1.49.
This is definately good news, it sounds like the companies have finally understood at least something how people want to get their music -- without stupid restrictions like banning the CD burning. Only problem is still the price; is $0.99 a pop low enough. But at least those -- and I know that there are many of those -- who want to get their music legally, can do so.
Universal's tracks will be delivered in LiquidAudio's format which has relatively wide support among MP3 software players.
Tracks will be sold through retailers like Amazon and Best Buy and according to Universal, certain tracks and albums will be released on the Net before they become available in CD format.
But definately the most encouraging fact is that the tracks will be in high quality and that Universal will allow users to burn the tracks to CD -- a practice that all the record labels have so far banned.
Sony has also announced that it will offer much more tracks for download and that those tracks can also be burned to CDs and that they will drop the price of one download to $1.49.
This is definately good news, it sounds like the companies have finally understood at least something how people want to get their music -- without stupid restrictions like banning the CD burning. Only problem is still the price; is $0.99 a pop low enough. But at least those -- and I know that there are many of those -- who want to get their music legally, can do so.
Universal's tracks will be delivered in LiquidAudio's format which has relatively wide support among MP3 software players.
