“After the successful launch of Apple’s iPhone, AT&T is readying a new wireless service which would allow its customers to download music from eMusic on their mobile phones,” Max Brenn reports for eFluxMedia.
“AT&T’s fee per song of $1.50 is below Verizon’s $1.99 but higher than Sprint’s, which is $0.99,” Brenn reports.
MacDailyNews Note: AT&T customers can subscribe to download five tracks a month for $7.49, with additional packages of five songs available for the same price.
“Bad news though: the craved gadget that has shaken the entire telecom industry, aka the iPhone, will not work with the new services, despite having an iPod incorporated in it,” Brenn reports. “Handsets from Samsung or Nokia however will be compatible.”
“AT&T said eMusic would allow customers to preview selections before they commit to a purchase. As with rival services, users can download a copy of each song purchased to their computer at no extra charge,” Brenn reports.
Full article here.
AT&T’s press release is here.
Sounds like a plan doomed to failure. Should’ve partnered up with Apple and created some sort of branded iTunes experience for their entire mobile line.
Cheeky monkeys, those AT&T’ers.
Why would an iPhone ownre care about this?
“Bad news though: the iPhone will not work with the new service.”
Sounds more like good news to me.
AT&T, I genuflect and fart in your general direction.
I’m sure Stevo was well aware of this development and probably had no interest in it. AT&T wouldn’t risk pissin’ off Apple right now.
and why would I want to pay $1.50 for a track that I can get when I’m home for $.99?….I have more time than money…sorry..
nothing here kids, keep moving.
JadisOne, except that iTunes content is confound so far to Apple designed gadgets, at lest the stuff with DRM.
um…eMusic?
Have you ever tried it?
I don’t recall them having regular releases…more rarities, oddball, etc… not an ordinary music service.
I am glad they exist, have used them
but I am very surprised that this will matter very much to the general public.
I’m sure it excludes the iPhone because there’s some iTunes content purchasing solution in the works for the iPhone. That should be obvious to pretty much everyone.
I don’t need to download songs directly on to my iPhone anyway, especially over EDGE. The current solution with iTunes works just fine.
@Mac-nugget – iTunes music is neither “confound” nor confined to iPods nor has it ever been. All you do is convert the selection to another format or at worst, you need to burn the file to a CD and then re-import to iTunes and it is DRM free.
Amusing this is. Did AT&T’s left hand not know what the right one was doing? Or is this another “executive committee decision?”
At least it’s good for a laugh …
MW: choice as in ‘What a lame choice for AT&T.”
How long would it take to actually download a song? I’ll bet these songs will be 64 kbps versions. The iTunes experience is so easy, I wouldn’t do a wireless download even if I could.
Now, maybe I’ll find that Mongolian sheep-herding song I once heard playing over the radio in Lisbon…
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iPhone is gonna tank – just like the Newton. Fine by me cuz I’m tired of hearing about it…
Can anyone clarify, does that mean each song is a TOTAL of $1.50 or that ATT charges $1.50 to download and then you have to pay eMusic’s charge for the song too?
This is not a big deal. ATT sells a lot of phones besides iPhone. All those others are not compatible with iTunes nor with the music from iTunes. So ATT is just providing its customers with an option to use if they wish. This has nothing to do with Apple.
Well if these people are expecting to use the EDGE network to download these song they’re gonna be waiting an awfully long time… They might as well save themselves 50 cents and wait till they get home and buy it from iTunes, the EDGE download will probably still be going…
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Too bad the iPhone gets exluded, but it is certainly no surprise.It is just about the money.
However, which would I rather have:
a) the ability to wireless download the odd track
b) 7 GB of music on my phone
Tough one.
“….Did AT&T’s left hand not know what the right one was doing? Or is this another “executive committee decision?””
You do realize that AT&T has more than 270,000 (iPhone) customers don’t you? Did you ever think this service might be for the other 25 million subscribers they have on their network? Just a thought.
The iPhone is not excluded. You just download the songs from eMusic on your home computer, put them in iTunes and sync. Much easier that downloading a song on you rphone, then going home and downloading it a second time on your computer.
something isn’t right with this report…
I just got an email on my iPhone from eMusic saying that they’re offering over 2.5 million songs from their catalog. It’s a monthly subscription service – just like the regular website. eMusic Mobile…
So, what’s the deal here??
Does anyone here honestly still believe that there are less than a million activated iPhones out there, thirty days later?
While a million is not much compared to 25M, it should still count.
Remember kids, the Free Market™ always knows what’s best for all you rational actors.