New For-Pay Version of Napster Launched by Roxio

Authored by Mark Hefflinger on October 9, 2003 - 4:50am.

New York -- Napster, a unit of CD and DVD burning software maker Roxio, on Thursday launched the anticipated beta test of its Napster 2.0 service, offering over 500,000 tracks as 99-cent downloads. Unlike the previous iteration of Napster, which used peer-to-peer technology to download songs from other users' computers, the new version sends secured tracks from Roxio servers. Napster 2.0 will also offer a $9.95 per month premium service, featuring unlimited listening and downloading, 40 commercial-free interactive radio stations, and community features like the ability to email tracks and share playlists. The company announced partnerships with Samsung, which will release a co-branded digital audio player with Napster; as well as with PC maker Gateway, which will include a free month's trial of the service on all of its desktop and notebook PC; and Microsoft, which will make Napster 2.0 the featured music service for its Windows XP Media Center Edition 2004 software. Due to the Napster service's exclusive use of Microsoft's Windows Media Audio (WMA) format, it will be incompatible with Apple's iPod digital audio player. The official version of the Napster 2.0 service is slated to launch on Oct. 29.
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http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/technology/AP-Napster-Reborn.html
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http://www.napster.com