Items tagged with music
There's a new non-profit lobbying group in town, the Download Fairness Coalition, and it wants to stop double or triple taxation practices that states charge on digitally downloaded purchases, like music, movies or books. The group has pushed for, and gotten, a new bill dubbed the Digital Goods and Services Tax...
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Will Google's Music Beta change the music industry? That remains to be seen, but having room for 20,000 tracks in the cloud is certainly interesting. And free? Yeah, free. For now, but still, it's free. Google is now sending out Beta invites to the general public, just a week after giving them out to Google I/O attendees and a day after providing...
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Google revealed a startling amount of new information at Google I/O this week, but there was no bigger announcement than the one everyone expected: Music. The company's new Music Beta has beaten Apple's rumored iCloud service to the punch, but unlike many streaming services, there's no actual way to buy music via this method. The labels were...
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Luxury audio has always demanded a hefty price premium, and Harman Kardon has consistently been a major audio player in the upper-end of the conventional mid-range. For the average consumer H/K equipment is rather expensive, but there's obviously far more expensive gear out there if you go searching. At any rate, the...
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Cricket recently made Muve Music service available to new Cricket markets across the nation. With the new additions, Muve Music is now available to 85 percent of the company's customers. For $55 per month, Muve Music provides unlimited voice, text, Web, video, unlimited music downloads to the mobile phone, and more. The new Muve Music markets...
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Apple's AirPlay service is definitely becoming one of the more popular protocols in the A/V space, and while it's certainly a long ways from being as mainstream as something like Bluetooth, the simple fact that Apple's name is on it is giving it serious mindshare. Harman Audio has just introduced a new JBL product...
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Does the mobile realm really need another way to download music? Competition is almost always a good thing for consumers, but we're guessing that Sprint's new service will have a tough time rivaling the likes of iTunes. Sprint Music Plus is the new service, powered by RealNetworks and capable of delivering ringtones and songs. All of the content...
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Convergence is the name of the game this year. While tablets are becoming computers and media players, Sony's PlayStation Portable is becoming more than just a gaming device. Qriocity is a service that has been touted by Sony for some time now, but in the past, it was only on non-mobile devices. But now, it's coming to PSP, and with that comes...
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Over the past few years, Google has seriously been on a roll of late. On a roll when it comes to acquisitions, that is. The company's latest acquisition is PushLife, a Canadian company that just so happens to be tightly linked with digital downloads on music. It's interesting timing to say the least; rumors have been furious of late regarding...
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Companies are still trying to sort out this whole living in the cloud thing and how it fits in with their business plans, but in the meantime, there's an immediate benefit to home users: Streaming music. We're not talking about online radio stations or services like Pandora, but YOUR music, stored in the cloud, and accessible from wherever...
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Earlier this week, we covered Amazon's announcement of its new 5GB Cloud Drive service. Amazon is pushing the free service as a "upload once, access anywhere" option that allows users to play the music they want, wherever they are. When questions of licensing were raised, Amazon spokesperson Cat Griffin told Ars Technica: "Cloud Player is...
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Amazon launched Amazon Cloud Drive, Amazon Cloud Player for Web, and Amazon Cloud Player for Android. These new will services enable customers to securely store music in the cloud and play it on any Android phone, Android tablet, Mac or PC, regardless of where they are. Customers can upload their own music library to Amazon Cloud Drive and...
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If you're against pop culture, you should turn your nose up and dash away as soon as possible. Virgin Mobile has just debuted a new free music app in the Android Market, but it probably won't appeal to those who aren't in tune with the Top 40. At least not yet. Virgin Mobile Live 2.0 is the app's name, and it will...
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Google Music is inching closer to becoming less of a rumor and more of a reality. Based on a quote by Sanjay Jha, chief executive of Motorola Mobility at Mobile World Congress, there's not much left to doubt. Here's the golden nugget: "If you look at Google Mobile services [via Android] today, there's a video service, there's a music service...
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Nokia's "Comes With Music" obviously saw its fair share of problems at launch, but there's clearly a market for subscription-based music. Rhapsody, Napster and even Apple have managed to get it right, and now Cricket is taking the next step by expanding their own music service to 13 new markets. The company's Muve...
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It's something that was once reserved for only the highest of the high-end home cinema setups, and the average Joe simply never considered wiring his home for whole home audio. But these days, as technology has improved, blossomed, and become cheaper and easier to install, having whole home audio isn't the chore that it once was. Largely due...
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It's hard to compete against Apple. A few years back, SanDisk's CEO stated that no one could "out iPod the iPod," and to this day, everyone that has tried hasn't succeeded. Even Microsoft has let the Zune family die down, despite spending tons of cash marketing it as a major iPod competitor. Apple has just been on fire over the last decade,...
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Apple's AirPlay is definitely taking off in a big way. The concept of streaming music and media over the air from device to device is very appealing, and while the concept isn't new, Apple has once again taken an older concept and delivered it to the mainstream, but that also gives opportunity to rival companies to...
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The British Recorded Music Industry (BPI) released figures for music sales in 2010, sparking a debate over whether or not piracy is playing a role, or at least a significant one. According to BPI, combined 2010 digital and physical album sales declined 7 percent overall in volume to 119.9 million. This, the organization says, is due to illegal...
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The online music business is booming. The success of iTunes is proof of that. Companies are flocking to get a piece of the pie, particularly subscription-based services. Sony is no different, with the company's Qriocity hoping to grab the attention of those who have previously relied on iTunes, Napster or Rhapsody. First announced earlier...
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Cricket apparently has a fetish for firsts. The wireless carrier claims it was the first one to introduce an unlimited wireless rate plan, and now the company is announcing the first wireless rate plan with unlimited music included. It's part of an "innovative new digital music service called Muve Music," and was designed specifically with...
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Judging by the success of iTunes, which has leaped past Walmart as being the largest seller of music in the United States now, it's pretty clear that the future of music buying is online, or at least not the traditional CD. But now companies are emerging to challenge iTunes and other online sales outlets, like MOD Systems. This company has...
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