MP3.com Founder Builds Music Service
Michael Robertston could only stay out of the digital music business for so long. The former CEO and founder of MP3.com, as well as the Linspire operating system and SIPphone voice over IP phone company, announced MP3tunes Wednesday. The online music service hopes to attract users with a twist: DRM-free downloadable tunes.
Instead of simply joining an already competitive market, Robertson is targeting music buyers turned off by non-standard audio formats and digital rights management (DRM). In the process, Robertson hopes to rekindle the consumer freedom surrounding MP3.
"Today, certain market forces are trying to drive consumers away from MP3 towards proprietary systems, which lock out some consumers and force everyone to buy a particular company's player or software program," Robertson said. "I wanted consumers to have more options, so I felt compelled to reenter the music space to bring the limelight back to MP3."
Tracks purchased from MP3tunes will come without DRM, meaning users will be free to burn music they purchase on any player or computer, as well as make unlimited copies of songs and burn their music onto CDs.
It's not clear how MP3tunes plans to gain the support of record labels, which have explicitly said they will not allow their music to be distributed digitally without some kind of protection to prevent illicit file sharing. MP3tunes has also not yet announced what music will be featured in its library; MP3.com was largely populated by independent artists.
The service will be formally launched next week at the Desktop Summit in San Diego. MP3tunes plans to eventually sell several products including a hardware device and software, the company said.
Requests for comment from MP3tunes were not returned by press time.