Gservo
20th June 2002, 02:33 PM
Two of the largest recording companies have set prices for the online music services that they're rolling out. Universal Music Group will price individual songs at 99 cents each, while an entire CD's worth of digital music will cost $9.99. Sony Music Entertainment will charge between $1.49 and $1.99 per song. Each service will let users copy downloaded music onto custom audio-mix CDs but won't let buyers share music in other ways. Interestingly, Universal and Sony are working together on a separate online music service called pressplay, but these new online music plans are separate from pressplay and will use technologies from existing digital audio firms. Universal is working with Liquid Audio, and Sony will use technology from RioPort. We're interested to see major recording companies finally come around to online digital distribution, and Universal is arguably using the correct price point. Will these efforts succeed? Only time will tell.