Sky guns for iTunes market with new music download service
Sky is to join the digital music marketplace when it launches a subscription download service that it hopes will persuade millions more consumers to switch to buying albums digitally and threaten the dominance of Apple's iTunes.
Subscribers to the new "Sky Songs" service – who will not have to be existing Sky customers – will pay a fixed fee of up to £7.99 a month, entitling them to download one album or up to 10 songs, and to stream as much music as they like. Downloading more songs will cost extra.
Unlike iTunes, which is only compatible with Apple's iPod music players, the new site, which will be launched next Monday, will allow users to download albums for use on any MP3 player.
Neil Martin, Sky's business development director, said he hoped the easy-to-use site would make online music available to a much wider audience. "We want millions of homes using this regularly," he said. "We're looking at a lot of the things out there, and you need to know a hell of a lot about music, or a hell of a lot about technology. For a mainstream audience, it needs to be pulled back a notch."
He predicted that the streaming element of the service – where users can listen to music without downloading it – will become increasingly important as more households start playing music on computers. Sky also hopes to bring the service to mobile phones and set-top boxes.
Apple's iTunes is still the market leader in online music sales, although a clutch of rivals, including Amazon, offer alternatives. Download services, which allow users to save tracks, are also facing competition from streaming websites such as Spotify, which is partly funded by advertising. Sky has reached agreements with the major music labels – EMI, Sony, Universal and Warner – as well as smaller independents, to make available new releases and artists' back catalogues, a total of more than 4m tracks.
The growth of low-cost, paid-for music services will strengthen the government's hand in cracking down on illegal downloading. Lord Mandelson has proposed to cut off broadband access for offenders, a plan that has divided the music industry.
Heather Stewart
Sunday 11 October 2009 21.36 BST
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2009
Sky is to join the digital music marketplace when it launches a subscription download service that it hopes will persuade millions more consumers to switch to buying albums digitally and threaten the dominance of Apple's iTunes.
Subscribers to the new "Sky Songs" service – who will not have to be existing Sky customers – will pay a fixed fee of up to £7.99 a month, entitling them to download one album or up to 10 songs, and to stream as much music as they like. Downloading more songs will cost extra.
Unlike iTunes, which is only compatible with Apple's iPod music players, the new site, which will be launched next Monday, will allow users to download albums for use on any MP3 player.
Neil Martin, Sky's business development director, said he hoped the easy-to-use site would make online music available to a much wider audience. "We want millions of homes using this regularly," he said. "We're looking at a lot of the things out there, and you need to know a hell of a lot about music, or a hell of a lot about technology. For a mainstream audience, it needs to be pulled back a notch."
He predicted that the streaming element of the service – where users can listen to music without downloading it – will become increasingly important as more households start playing music on computers. Sky also hopes to bring the service to mobile phones and set-top boxes.
Apple's iTunes is still the market leader in online music sales, although a clutch of rivals, including Amazon, offer alternatives. Download services, which allow users to save tracks, are also facing competition from streaming websites such as Spotify, which is partly funded by advertising. Sky has reached agreements with the major music labels – EMI, Sony, Universal and Warner – as well as smaller independents, to make available new releases and artists' back catalogues, a total of more than 4m tracks.
The growth of low-cost, paid-for music services will strengthen the government's hand in cracking down on illegal downloading. Lord Mandelson has proposed to cut off broadband access for offenders, a plan that has divided the music industry.
Heather Stewart
Sunday 11 October 2009 21.36 BST
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2009
