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Posts with tag rhapsody

Rhapsody, Verizon Finally Selling DRM-Free MP3s

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jul 1st 2008 at 10:01AM



In the past, Rhapsody has put all of its efforts behind an all-you-can-eat, subscription-based music service, which is great for the insatiable music enthusiast who never leaves his or her desktop, but bad for the always on-the-go iPod addict. Now, Rhapsody is preparing to launch a downloadable MP3 store so it can directly compete with iTunes and hopefully attract more customers with its new iPod friendly format. These MP3s will be without DRM, which means they are free of the digital rights management (DRM) layer that prevents music files from being played on different types of players (like iPods).

Rhapsody's catalog of four million songs will also be available through partners like Yahoo! Music and Verizon Wireless' VCAST Music service, which will be selling DRM-free MP3s for $1.99 over-the-air (or 99 cents on your PC). This will certainly be a boon to Verizon VCAST Music customers, who heretofore were stuck with heavily-DRM-laden WMA files that were hard to move from one player or computer to another.

While the move from competing with Apple to embracing MP3s and the iPod may sound good on paper, the Web is scattered with the remains of those who tried to take on Apple's store and its iconic media player. Wal-Mart, Amazon, Napster, E-Music, and now Rhapsody, are all stuck fighting for the table scraps left over from iTunes' more than 70 percent market share. [Source: Reuters]

Yahoo to Close Subscription Music Service

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Feb 4th 2008 at 4:44PM

Yahoo Exits the Music Biz
Yahoo! is obviously having a tough week. First, Microsoft made a hostile bid to purchase the company; then, over the weekend, the Web pioneer announced it was closing down its popular Yahoo! Music service. Mid this year, Yahoo! Music Unlimited subscription service will officially close its doors and offer customers the opportunity to move their subscription over to Real's Rhapsody. Rhapsody struck a deal with Yahoo! that will allow Yahoo! Music customers to continue to pay, for a limited time, the $8.99 a month that Yahoo! charges, though eventually they'll hav to decide on whether to continue their subscription with Rhapsody for $12.99 a month.

Oddly enough, just as Yahoo! was announcing the closing of its music subscription service, it also announced the acquisition of FoxyTunes, an extension for Firefox that allows you to control your music library from your browser's status bar.

After jettisoning its music service, Yahoo! hasn't said anything out its plans to leverage its in-browser music player, but we're sure the company has something surprising up its sleeve.

Presumably all those Sansa Connects that work exclusively with the Yahoo! Music Service will now work with Rhapsody -- or so we hope.

From Cnet

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Rhapsody Comes to Philips Audio Devices

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Jan 7th 2008 at 1:51PM



Sure Rhapsody isn't iTunes, but the online music store/serviceis still a massively popular source for digital music, and it has a rather impressive catalog available to purchase or "rent" (via subscription). Yesterday, at CES, Matt Rowlen, Vice President of Real Networks, joined the head of the new Philips Consumer Lifestyle division, Andrea Ragnetti, on stage at a press conference to announce that Rhapsody downloads and steamed media would be made available on Phlips GoGear MP3 players and Streamium home audio devices (pictured above).

Users will be able to browse and download from the Rhapsody subscription based catalog via Wi-Fi. Take that Zune and iPod!

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TiVo Adding Rhapsody Music Service

by Terrence O'Brien, posted Oct 10th 2007 at 8:29AM

TiVo Adding Music Through Rhapsody

TiVo and Real announced a partnership yesterday that brings the popular Rhapsody service and its over four million songs to your TV (or, preferably, your TV that's connected to a home theater system). For $13 - $15 a month, you get access to the award-winning Rhapsody subscription service, which lets you "rent" any of its four million songs as long as you keep paying the monthly fee.

TiVo has been losing subscribers to the DVRs (Digital Video Recorders) offered by cable and satellite companies. TiVo is trying to convince consumers that its recorders are more than just DVRs, by offering extras like music from Rhapsody and downloadable movies from Amazon's Unbox movie service. These are cool services and extras, but unless you've got a sweet home theater setup with multiple speakers, do you really wants to listen to music on your TV?

From USA Today

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