Da_Taxman used our newssubmit to tell us:
First Bertelsmann buys Napster hoping to turn it into a legal swapping service and make money out of it too, now Sony tries to create their own legal competitor on this high profile market with Vivendi.
Vivendi, Sony Team Up for Online Music Site |
Jean-Marie Messier, Chairman of French media giant Vivendi Universal (EAUG.PA) confirmed in an interview on Thursday that Vivendi had formed a joint venture with Sony Corp's (6758.T) Sony Music Entertainment to create an online music site.
The new venture named Duet, which already operates through a team in San Francisco, would compete with the U.S. song-swapping service Napster.
The new site, which will license the music of the world's leading music groups Sony and Vivendi (NYSE:V - news), plans to buy licensing rights from other music companies.
``We hope to license 50 percent of the world's music,'' Messier said in the interview.
The news came just a day after rival Napster, which earlier this month was found guilty of copyright infringement by a U.S. appeals court, presented the record industry a five-year $1 billion offer for the right to use their music.
Messier said that it was not pursuing an alliance with Napster but was in advanced discussions with other partners, although they were still too early too discuss.
``We often thought that an alliance with Napster would be the only possibility but I don't believe it is right to give the advantage to pirates,'' he said.
Sony and Vivendi will have equal ownership of Duet and will offer both a subscription service and a pay-per-listen option.
Why isn't it fair to give the advantage to pirates...because their advantage is already too large to catch up to?
Source: dailynews.yahoo.com
