Radio giant to offer music downloads
Source: CNet News
A new music subscription service, carried on powerful Clear Channel's network of radio Web sites, is slated to launch Wednesday.
Operated by start-up Full Audio, the long-promised service joins an increasingly crowded field of hopefuls trying to temp Net music fans to trade in their post-Napster file-swapping services for legal music downloads. The small company is betting that distributing alongside the biggest radio corporation in the business will give it enough clout with consumers to compete with major label-backed rivals Pressplay and MusicNet.
Analysts say the Clear Channel radio sites could indeed be a valuable home for music subscription services. But they're not ready to give FullAudio and its giant partner the green light yet.
"It will be interesting to see how the Clear Channel audience reacts to this," said P.J. McNealy, research director with GartnerG2, a division of the Gartner research firm. "Radio has traditionally been free."
FullAudio joins Listen.com in the field of independents seeking consumers' music dollars. Those dollars have to date been scarce, however. While none of the major figures has yet disclosed subscriber figures, analysts have uniformly warned that relatively few people would sign up until at least next year.
At this point, even the major label-backed services are still working out thorny licensing issues. Listen.com is the only service to have gained access to music from four of the big five major labels.
