Universal unveils misguided 99¢ music download effort

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Today Universal Music Group (UMG) accounced 99¢ music downloads for more than 43,000 tracks. In Liquid Audio and Windows Media formats.

I could go get those tracks, right now, and without UMG getting a cent if that whole “stealing is bad” thing wasn’t ingrained in me as deeply as it is. But I’d gladly give them 99¢s a track if they provided them in the obvious, standards-based and universal format for doing so — MP3. Why won’t they let me? Because they don’t get it. They don’t understand their customers.

Either showing off his ignorance of the marketplace or his capacity for spin, UMG ELabs President Larry Kenswil declared:

This is a watershed moment. Universal is committed to making every recording it controls available for Internet distribution.

Yeah, but in formats that early adopters won’t buy because they don’t work with anything. Larry is counting his watershed before it’s hatched. PC World story