By Your Android Phone is about to get 6.5 million killer tunes. A company called Omnifone is bringing their MusicStation service to Android and will launch at Mobile World Congress 2010 with a demonstration on the Nexus One.
“Omnifone is delighted to be able to deliver the richest and most sophisticated music capability on mobile, and one that will work effortlessly on any manufacturer’s Android device,” Omnifone Chief Executive Rob Lewis said.
What exactly IS MusicStation? An awesome music service that both HP and Vodafone are getting behind as an iTunes challenger that seems to have a chance. More specifically:
Traditional digital music services offer the consumer the ability to purchase individual tracks in a DRM-free or DRM-protected format. Meanwhile, a consumer’s existing music collection, which may be on CD, vinyl and/or cassette, has to be side-loaded or the music repurchased. New music tracks must be purchased before they can be played, hampering the process of music discovery, and playlist sharing.
You pay a weekly/monthly fee and you get all the goods in unlimited fashion. That’s right – 6.5 million songs. There are LOTS of music apps out there that are free and paid, downloadable and streaming, but I have to say I’m definitely excited about MusicStation. I’m especially hoping it’ll come with a free trial and I wouldn’t be surprised if it did – they’ve done that before.
I can’t wait to hear the details tomorrow. Oh wait, look at the time… I mean TODAY!
[Via Reuters]
My previous experience of using the musicstation service on other mobile phones has not been great. I found the service to be slow and the range of tracks to be limited in some genres. Hopefully it has improved in the past year or so.
Why would anyone use MusicStation instead of Spotify? Which is already available on our android phones.
I imagine you’re so excited because you’re in the US and have no access to Spotify? I can’t see what’s new about MusicStation.
So is this not available at all yet, or what? On their site, I went to Desktop, and can’t find any sort of download or anything…
@ColinScatt
The musicstation service has been around from a couple of years now. They have partnered heavily with Vodafone here in the UK to offer the service on particular phones. I’m pretty sure the desktop client is available to download once you have a subscription (probably download via the carriers website – vodafone UK for example) and cannot be used without the mobile subscription service.
Also would like to add that they are the people behind the “Skysongs” service in the UK. One of my customers is a shareholder and asked me what I thought about them a year or so ago.
coolish man coolish