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VirginDigital.com to launch download music service

updated 06:50 pm EDT, Sun September 26, 2004

Virgin digital music


VirginDigital.com on Monday will become the first major music retailer to and is expected to also launch a similar service in other countries starting with Britain in the future, according to The New York Times: "Virgin is putting its biggest emphasis on its subscription service, rather than on selling songs one at a time for 99 cents a track as Apple and Microsoft do. It is betting that new customers will instead join its Virgin Music Club for a $7.99 monthly fee to listen to an unlimited amount of music from Virgin's one-million-track library on their computers. A premium subscription service that will allow those tracks to be moved to a portable music player, for a slightly higher monthly fee, will be offered soon."


by MacNN Staff

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  1. svencito

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Dec 1999

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    09/26, 11:44pm | report spam | Reply |

    Support for iPod?

    I wonder if the premium service will allow you to transfer the music to the iPod. That obviously requires a supported format (MP3) but chances are big that Virgin will use a Microsoft format (WMP).

    Anyhow, I think competition is helpful in this business.

  1. z10n

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    Joined: Oct 2003

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    09/26, 11:59pm | report spam | Reply |

    zzzzz

    When will companies understand that people want to OWN their music?

  1. VadersCape

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    Joined: Mar 2004

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    09/27, 01:11am | report spam | Reply |

    Great Bet, Virgin!

    If you can pass along the name of the guy at Virgin who made that decision, Caesars Palace is interested in bringing him in to Las Vegas for a 30-day gambling trip with his first class airfare, room, food and beverages on the house.

  1. ZackZalon

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    Joined: Sep 2004

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    09/27, 01:34am | report spam | Reply |

    Virgin Digital Response

    Hi – I run Virgin Digital, and I want to jump in before the flames start. For starters, I’ve been reading the postings on this board for quite some time, and for the most part we agree with them. Apple does a fantastic job of selling music. And consumers DO want to own the music that they listen to. In fact, these opinions are proven by the research that we’ve done by speaking directly with the Virgin Megastore customers that we worked with when developing our Virgin Digital service.

    The difference is that we want to be able to offer a whole variety of digital music services to our customers, not just 99 cent downloads. Yes, we have them. And, in fact, we’re working closely with our Megastore teammates to ensure that their incredible passion for music is reflected in our approach. We have over 1 million tracks, but we’re really focused on under-the-radar bands, as well as under-represented genres like jazz, blues, classical, and R&B. All of these tracks are available for 99 cents each, all in CD-quality, and with the same ownership rights that you’d find at other online music stores. No, they don’t work on the iPod (we wish that Apple would license us their technology), but they do work on over 50 WMA-compatible devices, and hopefully many more in the near-future.

    We think that other services (including iTunes) do a great job, but we just have a slightly different view of things. That’s why we also offer a complete subscription music service we call the Virgin Digital Music Club, available for $7.99 a month. In this club, you have access to all 1 million tracks, all in CD-quality, to listen or download to your heart’s content. Make playlists, stream full albums, have a great time. No, you can’t burn them to CD without buying them, but think of it as a rent-with-an-option-to-buy. You listen as you want to. Your choice.

    We add a pretty amazing digital radio option to this (Radio Free Virgin), and then add really great media-management tools. Finally, we add live access to music and technology experts with our ‘Ask The Expert’ feature.

    Is it perfect? Probably not. We’ve worked really hard to get the service where we it is. But we know we’ve got miles to go At some point we’d like to think that this is the most powerful, fun, intuitive, and flexible tool for accessing and managing digital music. But we know we’re not going to get there without your help.

    All we ask is that you give it a shot. It’s free to download at virgindigital.com. You can use it for free, or sign up for a 14-day free trial for the Music Club. We hope that you have as much fun using it as we had building it. And we want to hear what you think. We’re a really big brand but a really small company, and we do this because we love it. I hope that comes through.

    Thanks – we look forward to hearing from you…

    ZACK ZALON




  1. ddukes

    Junior Member

    Joined: Aug 2000

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    09/27, 01:45am | report spam | Reply |

    RE: Virgin Digital Respon

    Don't post bull like this. That whole comment was bogus.

  1. Getoverit

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    Joined: Nov 2001

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    09/27, 02:23am | report spam | Reply |

    subscription service may

    be a neat idea for businesses. As a former Rhapsody user i got tired of the 8 bucks a month and being at the mercy of a good internet connection for streaming audio

  1. schwachs

    Forum Regular

    Joined: Oct 2002

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    09/27, 04:19am | report spam | Reply |

    Er, Not that bogus.

    http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1027570,00030010.htm

    Let's try to welcome generally intelligent banter, versus shutting it down.

  1. radii_22

    Junior Member

    Joined: Feb 2003

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    09/27, 04:54am | report spam | Reply |

    Fnac Music in France

    Fnac, the bigger music, video and electronics retailer in France, and one of the biggest in Europe, has lauched a music store also the last week. Hope Apple could analyse correctly the mouvement in the market (the explosion of music stores) and consolidate his position.

  1. Captain Mutant

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Apr 2002

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    09/27, 05:43am | report spam | Reply |

    re: Virgin Digital Respon

    Thank you Mr Zack Zalon for your post

    As soon as I read it, I thought I'd give you a chance, but guess what: your idea of choice regretfully doesn't include my choice of platform: your service is Windows only.

    Why would you post on a Mac news site about a service which is useless to us?

    Contrary to what you suggest, I do not think you do enough research.

  1. beyere

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Jun 2002

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    09/27, 09:25am | report spam | Reply |

    Left out..

    I'd love to try your subscription service, but I can't because I only have Mac-type computers. Broaden your support and I may take a look.

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