Remember Napster, the totally illegal file-sharing program turned legal music subscription site? Yeah, neither did we (or at least we chose not to), until today, when it it launched a music store with 6 million DRM-free tracks for sale at competitive prices (i.e. MP3s at $1 per song). Previously, Napster had been selling songs in the outrageously misnamed PlaysForSure format.
Apple's iTunes music store only sells 2 million songs that will work on players other than an iPod, and it sells them at a 30-cent premium over protected files. Amazon, which is known for selling DRM-free music, has only 5 million songs for sale in MP3 format. We're not sure exactly what, if any, great artists are represented in those million extra songs that Napster has over Amazon, but we do believe that more choice and less DRM can only be a good thing. Thank you, Napster. Based on this move, we might actually start visiting your website again.
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