“They say that imitation is the greatest form of flattery, but somehow Apple may not end up seeing it that way… Following the success of Apple?s digital music download service, iTunes, which to date has sold more than 3.5m tracks and achieved the even more phenomenal feat of securing the support of the record industry, AOL Time Warner has announced it plans to launch its own music download service in the US later this year, based on exactly the same pricing structure as Apple,” reports David Minto for Europemedia.net.

Minto continues, “‘We have experimented with digital downloads and 99-cent singles on a trial basis so we’re building on that and the success with music generally,’ an AOL Time Warner spokesman said. Not only this, but AOL Time Warner has revealed that it also plans to move directly into competition with online retailers such as Amazon by selling CDs and DVDs through its website.”

Full article here.