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Napster Launches UK Music Service
amichalo writes "Napster just went multi-continent with the surprise announcement of a Napster UK on-line music service. From the website, singles at 1.09 British pounds, albums start at 9.95 pounds. Availability for other European nations not available. Apple has previously announced they would be entering the European market by the end of the year with rumors of singles priced at 1.49 Euro."
You are 100% correct.
I'm posting anonymously because I'd prefer Napster to _not_ know which school I'm from - they're currently in negotiations with us. I saw what happened to the last guy who spoke up on this topic, and I'd prefer to save us the hassle.
Both Napster and Real/Rhapsody said the _same damn thing_ when we were talking to them: basically, that the RIAA was setting pretty much all the terms, and Apple/Real/Napster2 are just middlemen. If they could offer those songs at a cheaper price, _they would_. I don't trust any of them all that much, to be honest, but I really believe that they think the pricing and DRM schemes are bad, too.
There's also a surprisingly large amount of oversight going on by the RIAA. When we were talking about volume pricing, both Real and Napster responded that they could offer us a better deal, but they'd _need to talk to the RIAA first_.
Don't bitch at Apple, Napster2, and Real about the crappy prices and DRM. There's very little they can do about them. The RIAA is the bad actor here. You can get easy concrete proof of this because the academic contracts for Rhapsody and Napster2 both include the same terms about "stopping IP infringement on University networks".
Since I posted as an AC, I understand a fairish number of you won't believe I'm telling the truth. That's fine, and I don't blame you. But for the rest of you: stop blaming Napster2 for being greedy with the prices and DRM. They're definitely not the ones responsible.
It's another thing entirely to go say "this isn't a good value", though - I'm not sure it is.