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Google Launches Free, Legal Music Downloads in China

Wired is reporting that Google has a launched a new music download service in China to better compete with the leading search company there, Baidu.com. Offering some 350,000 songs, a number set to rise to somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.1 million in the coming months, the library includes both Chinese and foreign artists signed by Sony Music, EMI, and Universal Music. Proponents of the new service are also hoping it will combat illegal music downloads simply by offering higher quality songs for download. There are no immediate plans to expand this service beyond China.

5 of 141 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Link? by sakdoctor · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Ok, there's also a flash based youtube/winamp-like player so you can preview very quickly.

    Then there is a right click context menu for downloading mp3s. The ones I got were all 192kbps.

    Best fucking music download site ever! Roll out world wide please.

  2. Re:New business plan by Locke2005 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Not new at all. Google's business plan has always been:
    1) Create content that people want online.
    2) Give content away for free.
    3) Charge advertisers for ads delivered alongside content.
    4) Profit!
    As their profit is measured in the billions, offhand I would say this is a pretty good business plan.

    --
    I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
  3. Offtopic baidu test by danking · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This is off topic, but I have a little experiment for anyone who wants to give it a try. 1. goto baidu.com 2. search for anything or click on the page 3. Does it work? 4. go back to baidu.com 5. now search for falun gong 6. Did it work? 7. If not try going back to baidu.com, make sure you reference the page and don't just click back I did this and after I searched falun gong I seem to have been temporarily blocked from using the webpage. My connection seems to be getting interrupted.

  4. Again, I compete with people who pay less by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I pay $5 for a pill, they pay the same company .10 for the same pill.
    I pay $15 for a CD (well actually not directly for 8 years), they pay nothing.
    I pay $50k for a college education, they come here to the same school and get massively subsidized.

    It really seems like the world economy exists to pump the wealth out of my environment.

    While I don't pay $15 for a CD, others pay that and so they have to charge prices for their products and labors that will cover that.

    I keep telling myself it will even out at some point- but then they get laws passed that say they can sell a product in another country for $1 and it is illegal to import/resale that product in my country for $1.10 instead of the $15 I pay.

    It is anti-capitalist. I could handle my wages going down 10% a year if the prices I pay for goods were going down at the same rate.

    --
    She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
  5. Not really legal by realwhz · · Score: 2, Interesting

    If it is really legal, who not provide the similar service out of China?