Subscribe-to-own music sevice launches

FreshTracksMusic today launched a subscription-based digital music download service boasting unrestricted, unlimited downloads of digital music for a flat monthly fee. Music enthusiasts can locate and download thousands of songs from independent bands for free, and pay $5 per month to own unlimited downloads of unencrypted, iPod-compatible MP3s. FreshTracksMusic allows and encourages users to burn and play music on any Mac, PC, or MP3 player, including Apple's iPod -- and share them with their friends. "We have created an innovative approach to digital downloading in FreshTracksMusic.com that will fill the gap between today's music industry and its most valuable audience, music fans," said John Wanzung, President of FreshTracksMusic. "Our digital downloading hub provides music fans with a diverse selection of music and offers a way for them to discover and download as many iPod-compatible MP3s as they wish for one low, flat fee."

Filed under: industry

, 4

4 comments

Reader Reactions (Please use <i></i> for italic text)

subscribe to comments
for this article

Expand All

Global Settings

dlindsay17

done before?

04/20, 11:11am, EDT

emusic.com already does this sort of thing to an extent - pay monthly fee for download credits, download MP3s of indie artists, repeat.

Junior Member

Joined Dec 1999

User is offline

vasic

What about big labels?

04/20, 11:41am, EDT

While this is an excellent model in general, and probably works very well for indie artists, the big five will never get on board. It is clear that the only way to buy (and own) a digital song by, let's say, Madonna, will continue to be through iTMS. Big labels want much more money out of a sale/download than what these services can offer. More importantly, they want to lock up those files in DRM. That's the dealbreaker for them.

Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined May 2005

User is offline

jhorvatic

No name artists

04/20, 12:31pm, EDT

You could probably get most of these for free. There are no known artists here worth paying $5 a month for. Emusic and others already do this. Nothing exciting and definately not worth paying for.

Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined Apr 2005

User is offline

NOT emusic

04/21, 8:21am, EDT

Emusic limits to 40 downloads per month- if you think that's enough for an online subscription designed to help you explore indie titles, then more power to you. You're probably also the same person that goes to an all you can eat buffet is happy with half a sandwich. Some might remember that emusic used to be unlimited buffet style, but I took them up on the possibility to download as much as I wanted- ended up being 18GB over 2 weeks before they told me I must be using scripts to cheat, and cancelled my account (but refunded my money) and subsequently changed their policy. If you want unlimited music from freshtracks- get them before they change too.

Joined

User is

Your Comments

Not a member of the MacNN forums? Register now for free.

Default Comment View
External Page Links
Comment Threading View