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E's Lil Theorem · 02:58 PM

Yahoo to Buy Musicmatch Web Service for $160 Million (Update4)

Sept. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Yahoo! Inc., owner of the world's most-visited Internet site, will buy Musicmatch Inc. for $160 million to spur sales of music downloads and compete with rivals including Apple Computer Inc. and Microsoft Corp.

Musicmatch allows consumers to play, download and buy songs on the Web and will help Yahoo expand its Launch service, the Sunnyvale, California-based company said in a statement. The purchase will increase the number of people that listen to music using Yahoo by 78 percent to 23 million, the company said.

Chief Executive Terry Semel is adding new subscription services for consumers to diversify revenue and get people to spend more time on Yahoo Web sites. By offering music downloads, Yahoo is moving into a market dominated by Apple Computers' iTunes service and Real Networks Inc.'s Rhapsody. Microsoft also opened an online music store on Sept. 2.

``It's a good deal for both'' Yahoo and Musicmatch, said David Card, an analyst at Jupiter Research in New York. ``Musicmatch is a good company with little chance of being lost in the crowd.''

How long before Google buys one of these?

Full linkage

E's Lil Theorem · Sep 15, 2004, 03:53 PM

Whoa, another one: XM Radio

Satellite radio operator XM Radio on Wednesday announced plans to launch an online music service.

The Washington, D.C.-based company said the service, dubbed XM Radio Online, will launch sometime in early October and operate commercial-free, just as its satellite programming does. XM will charge $7.99 per month for unlimited listening and offer a discount rate of $3.99 to subscribers of its existing radio services. The company's main business is a commercial-free radio service that's used with its portable satellite radio receivers, which are designed for use in homes and cars. The company currently claims about 2.1 million subscribers.

....

As part of its online radio launch, XM is partnering with Dell to offer consumers a trial subscription to the online music service when they purchase the PC maker's Inspiron notebooks and Dimension desktop computers. The promotion, slated to begin in mid-October, will grant buyers of Dell computers 30 days of free XM programming.

It doesn't look like they'll have individual songs for sale, just the subscription service.

Full linkage

Superchicken · Sep 15, 2004, 09:39 PM

Yahoo! died when Google was born... and the last nail's in the coffin with Gmail.
MusicMatch died when iTunes was born...

Maybe the Yahoo! owners are just trying to have a whole portfolio of dying and dead products.

olePigeon · Sep 15, 2004, 11:25 PM

Be neato if Google partnered with Apple. Search iTunes music from Google, or, iTunes music links on the side relating to search criteria.

Truepop · Sep 16, 2004, 12:09 AM

Originally posted by Superchicken:
MusicMatch died when iTunes was born...

to be fair to MusicMatch, it died when iTunes for Windows was born.

demograph68 · Sep 16, 2004, 12:12 AM

ANYONA CH3K OUT ITUNES?!?!!??!! WTF ITS NOW FOR WINDOWS.11!1111!1!1!!1!11!!11 OMG WTF LOL COL!!!! WTF LOL

Truepop · Sep 16, 2004, 12:20 AM

Originally posted by demograph68:
ANYONA CH3K OUT ITUNES?!?!!??!! WTF ITS NOW FOR WINDOWS.11!1111!1!1!!1!11!!11 OMG WTF LOL COL!!!! WTF LOL

I'm just stating the obvious like most replies in the lounge.

E's Lil Theorem · May 11, 2005, 02:54 PM

Well, it's finally here: Yahoo! Music Unlimited.

Yahoo! Music Unlimited Debuts
May 11, 2005

Yahoo!'s long-awaited entry in the world of digital music stores launched today, with the unveiling of Yahoo! Music Unlimited. Taking a different pricing approach than its competitors, the service will cost merely $4.99 a month for an annual subscription (coming to approximately $60 a year), or $6.99 for a monthly subscription. However, songs are "rented" rather than owned by users, much like Napster's service. An extra fee of 79 cents is charged to own a song and for the ability to burn it to a CD. The service already has over a million songs available, which are compatible with most portable devices (though not Apple's iPod). It also works in conjunction with the Yahoo! Messenger service, allowing users' playlists to be shown and listened to.

"We are committed to being at the forefront of the rapidly growing online music segment," said Lloyd Braun, head of Yahoo! Media Group. "Yahoo! Music Unlimited draws on the best of Yahoo! to provide personalization and community features unlike anything else in the marketplace." Adds Yahoo! Music VP/GM Dave Goldberg, "For a great value, users get to listen to as much music as they want, while utilizing superior innovations in playlist generation and community features to enrich and expand their music experience."

Experts are still unsure if music fans, who are used to purchasing and owning songs and albums, will be willing to convert to the sort of rental system that is commonplace in the movie business. "There's not very much demand for it," analyst David Card of Jupiter Research told the Los Angeles Times. On the other hand, EMI SVP Ted Cohen said to the Times, "People who spend a lot of time on subscription services are buying more music," and adds that "the subscription basically creates the appetite, it doesn't fulfill the appetite for music."

Linkage

Randman · May 11, 2005, 03:03 PM

Same problems as faux-Napster. And you don't hear much from them folks these days, do you?

MilkmanDan · May 11, 2005, 10:39 PM

Wow... Napaster dies... Yahoo feels it should burn money on the same idea.

Superchicken · May 12, 2005, 12:23 AM

Yahoo has a slight chance, but they'd do a lot better partnering with Apple than going it alone...

lou91940 · May 12, 2005, 12:02 PM

It irritates me that Yahoo limits it's music service to Windows users only, so this is a message i sent to my SBC provider.

As a Mac user I pay for an SBC/Yahoo connection and premium service. Where's the "premium" if Yahoo limits its services to Mac customers?? It seems to me that SBC needs to reconsider its business relationship with Yahoo, if all of Yahoo's premium services are not to be made available to all of SBC's customers. I'm not happy with Yahoo's decision. Full payment for limited service is not what I expect from SBC or Yahoo. To me this is a breach of my service contract with SBC/Yahoo.

klinux · May 13, 2005, 08:41 PM

First, it's beta.

Second, it cost additional money to Windows user as well. Just because you paid SBC/Yahoo for ISP doesn't mena you get EVERYTHING for free. Go and read your T&C and adjust your sense of entitlement.

By the way, I feel it should be ported for Mac too but that is unlikely until either Apple allows licensing of Fairplay or Microsoft updates its DRM to work on Macs.

ghporter · May 13, 2005, 09:31 PM

The service is limited to Windows because there is no Mac client at this time. Musicmatch is a very good music store in my experience, it competes nicely with Wal-Mart (especially in that no Chinese slave labor is involved in ANYTHING Musicmatch sells), and its DRM is far less intrusive than iTunes' DRM. The Windows client also supports MP3 encoding up to 320kbps. I like it a lot.

The real question is what Yahoo! will do with it once it's been acquired.

E's Lil Theorem · May 13, 2005, 10:18 PM

Originally Posted by ghporter

...

The real question is what Yahoo! will do with it once it's been acquired.

¿Que, que?

Yahoo! just released their version of what once was Musicmatch as Yahoo! Music Unlimited. That's what the article I posted above said.

See this: http://music.yahoo.com/

ghporter · May 13, 2005, 10:31 PM

Originally Posted by E's Lil Theorem

¿Que, que?

Yahoo! just released their version of what once was Musicmatch as Yahoo! Music Unlimited. That's what the article I posted above said.

See this: http://music.yahoo.com/

Yes, of course, and I read that. I'm just curious what direction they'll take the "Unlimited" stuff in the coming months. Musicmatch had kept it pretty straightforward, and it was pretty easy to use (I tried the free trial). What I'm wondering is whether Yahoo! will stay with the basic setup, or taylor it for something, and whether they'll still work at getting the same breadth of content for "Unlimited" that Musicmatch maintained.

klinux · May 14, 2005, 05:13 AM

Originally Posted by ghporter

The service is limited to Windows because there is no Mac client at this time.

Wrong. There would be no point for Yahoo! to develop a Mac client at this time because DRM WMA does not work on any platform except Windows. So two parties are to blame for Y! Music Unlimited not available for: Mac Microsoft for not developing DRM WMA on OS X and/or Apple for not licensing Fairplay to anyone else.

Originally Posted by E's Lil Theorem

Yahoo! just released their version of what once was Musicmatch as Yahoo! Music Unlimited.

Wrong again. Y! Music Unlimited used the Yahoo! Music Engine which is written from the ground up and support things like MP3, AAC, OGG, and FLAC encoding out of box with podcasting and tons of other plugins all in a less than 7 MB executable.

E's Lil Theorem · May 14, 2005, 10:13 AM

Originally Posted by klinux

...

Wrong again. Y! Music Unlimited used the Yahoo! Music Engine which is written from the ground up and support things like MP3, AAC, OGG, and FLAC encoding out of box with podcasting and tons of other plugins all in a less than 7 MB executable.

Wrong again? When was I wrong first? Pfft. Anyway, even if they wrote the engine from the ground up, how does that negate the point that it's their version of what once was Musicmatch? Musicmatch was not just an engine. Somehow I doubt Yahoo! paid $160MM for the hell of it.

budster101 · May 14, 2005, 10:40 AM

Goodbye Yahoo... hello Google.

klinux · May 15, 2005, 05:28 PM

Originally Posted by E's Lil Theorem

Wrong again? When was I wrong first? Pfft. Anyway, even if they wrote the engine from the ground up, how does that negate the point that it's their version of what once was Musicmatch? Musicmatch was not just an engine. Somehow I doubt Yahoo! paid $160MM for the hell of it.

You were not wrong again but it is one of several wrongs in the thread. The only similarities Yahoo! Music Engine and MusicMatch is that they are both owned by Yahoo! and they music-oriented. Under the hood they are completely different products.

mitchell_pgh · May 15, 2005, 05:40 PM

Considering Apple is #1 and still bleeding money with iTMS... I wonder why everyone is jumping on? I realize online legal music is the future, I just don't see Yahoo being a leader.

Also, regarding "Yahoo joining Apple" it would never happen or Apple wouldn't be serious about it. Apple doesn't mind partnering when it's clearly to their advantage. If it's not... the other guy pays through the nose.

ghporter · May 15, 2005, 05:46 PM

klinux, there still is no MusicMatch Mac client. Whether nobody's written one because of WMA, or because they don't have enough coders to write Mac code really doesn't matter. Somebody decided to support Windows and only Windows. I don't think there's a Linux client either, for that matter.

I still think that the WMA DRM is less intrusive than what iTunes uses...

And if the Yahoo! music engine is so cool, why'd they buy MusicMatch? What's this beta they're offering?

I think I'm going to keep visiting the used CD stores and just ignore all the online music sales... I really hate getting into someone else's issues.

macintologist · May 15, 2005, 05:55 PM

Why are there so many music stores?? Don't they realize that they have no chance to make an impact?? Only Microsoft has a chance to become big, along with Apple's store.

willed · May 15, 2005, 06:10 PM

Originally Posted by mitchell_pgh

Considering Apple is #1 and still bleeding money with iTMS... I wonder why everyone is jumping on? I realize online legal music is the future, I just don't see Yahoo being a leader.

Also, regarding "Yahoo joining Apple" it would never happen or Apple wouldn't be serious about it. Apple doesn't mind partnering when it's clearly to their advantage. If it's not... the other guy pays through the nose.

I believe Apple makes a small profit on iTMS - certainly not 'bleeding money'

E's Lil Theorem · May 15, 2005, 08:33 PM

Originally Posted by willed

I believe Apple makes a small profit on iTMS - certainly not 'bleeding money'

Yup, Apple talked about it after releasing their annual numbers a few months back. Considering the purpose of the iTMS is to be the iPod's sidekick, making a little extra cash from it is a blessing for Apple.

bwahahax · May 15, 2005, 09:15 PM

I was searching the net for a full length version of the Primus music video, Southbound Pachyderm, and stumbled across it on the Yahoo! Music website.

I know Mac users can't use the music download service, but I figured I'd be able to watch the video.

Turns out it's not so easy. Yahoo! seems to think Mac users are stuck in the 90s.

Same message for both Safari and Firefox. Guess I'll have to fire up VPC.

I am simply amazed.

Ricky · May 15, 2005, 09:25 PM

Considering how Yahoo has barely updated Messenger for OS X, this shouldn't come as a surprise at all.

ManOfSteal · May 15, 2005, 09:38 PM

Xeo · May 15, 2005, 09:46 PM

Merged the two Yahoo music threads together.

Zimphire · May 15, 2005, 09:58 PM

Originally Posted by Xeo

Merged the two Yahoo music threads together.

And in the process, freaked me out a bit. Congratulations.

klinux · May 16, 2005, 02:52 AM

Originally Posted by ghporter

klinux, there still is no MusicMatch Mac client. Whether nobody's written one because of WMA, or because they don't have enough coders to write Mac code really doesn't matter. Somebody decided to support Windows and only Windows. I don't think there's a Linux client either, for that matter.

I still think that the WMA DRM is less intrusive than what iTunes uses...

And if the Yahoo! music engine is so cool, why'd they buy MusicMatch? What's this beta they're offering?

I think I'm going to keep visiting the used CD stores and just ignore all the online music sales... I really hate getting into someone else's issues.

I can tell you there is no Mac or Linux client is because of the Microsoft.

Y! have a few choices: it can 1) support DRM WMA because that works on 90%+ of the computers, 2) beg and hope Apple licenses FairPlay (we all know what's the likelihood of that happening) and compete with an entrenched audience loyal to Apple and ITMS, or 3) invent its own DRM system. If you were run the Yahoo! business, what would you do?

Y! is making an effort to be more non-Microsoft friendly, for example, it was one of the first to release a toolbar for FireFox. The music engine also supports AAC, OGG, and FLAC. While I would like every company to be Mac friendly, I can understand why they spend 90%+ of their resources to support the OS of their customers.

To your #2 point, I do not know why the exact reasons why Y! bought MusicMatch but I can venture a few reasons: MusicMatch is not a bad softwar; iPod Windows used to be bundled with MM, MM was a leading audio player on Windows, it brings with it a quater million of subscribers, it may have technologies or patents that Y! wants, etc. You get the point.

And yes, my preferred source of music are old CD stores and the library!

ghporter · May 16, 2005, 09:07 AM

k, I agree with you on almost everything except saying that Microsoft has prevented a Mac client for MusicMatch from being written. My personal opinion on this is that the Mac market has been ceeded to iTunes and they're just not bothering. It's only an opinion, of course, but that's all anyone except maybe (and that's a big maybe) a few people at Microsoft can provide on this issue.

bwahahax · May 16, 2005, 09:45 AM

Yahoo! Music videos can't even be viewed using Firefox on a PC:

"To use this application with Netscape, you must use a 4.7x or 7.1 version. Download now.

Please use the following error code when writing to Yahoo! Help. (Error Code: 12)"

bwahahax · May 16, 2005, 09:52 AM

LOL.

Just tried to view the video using IE 6 in Windows XP.

First it says it's testing your connection speed. How does it do this?

It starts loading a sorta Yahoo! Music promo video and tells you to press a button when you see the video start playing. Seems Yahoo! can't even program a webapp to auto detect your detection speed. Funny thing is, I had left the video to load in the background so I didn't see the message until 5 minutes later. It must think I'm running on a 14.4 connection.

When the window finally refreshed I laughed in resignation as I read the following:

"This video is not available in your area. Please choose another video. Thank you.

Please use the following error code when writing to Yahoo! Help. (Error Code: 21) "

I tried a number of other videos and I either got the same message or I was forwarded to a page saying I'd have to sign in to view the selected video.