“Online auction giant eBay Inc. will allow some customers to buy and sell digital music files as part of a pilot program that could piggyback on the success of Apple Computer Inc.’s iTunes service. San Jose, Calif.-based eBay said an unspecified number of ‘preapproved’ users could conduct digital music transactions in eBay’s new ‘Digital Downloads’ category for the next 180 days. Executives will then determine whether to formally enter the market,” Rachel Konrad reports for The Associated Press.
“‘We don’t want to blow this out of proportion — this is a pilot program to see if there’s even any demand,’ said eBay spokesman Hani Durzy,” Konrad reports.
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Formats? Presumably determined by the seller. As of this article’s post time, eBay shows zero items found in Digital Downloads.
Smart way to do that. This way, if it’s a total flop, they won’t have to exit the market with their tails between their legs, like buymusic.com.
thing is.. THERE IS NO/LITTLE PROFIT FOR ONLINE MUSIC… THe only guys raking it in are Apple(iPod) and MS(codec)
is ebay going to allow people to hawk ‘used’ files?! what? I’m confused..
anyway.. the reason eBay, arguably the 2nd most successful online venture (to Google.. Amazon isnt’ extremely profitable) isn’t doing this for the money..in the short term.. they’re doing it for relevancy
if there is demand for people’s old songs that they’re sick of.. (what a great idea..) that people are willing to sell for about $.50..
woah, this is such a weird concept.. i have so many questions about this
I think there are more important things closer to home that eBay should concentrate on, but they seem to be blind to their own shortcomings. I wish them strong competition.
What makes eBay think they can move away very easily from their “world’s largest online garage sale” image?
I rarely, if ever, look to buy at used music stores or buy used music at garage sales in the first place, since one very rarely finds anything worthy of purchasing. The odds of that happening are just way too low, so I don’t bother.