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Napster’s coming back. This time the music swapping site, the former music industry scourge that shut down two years ago, will be relaunched as a legal site by Roxio, the company that bought it out of bankruptcy late last year. During its 2000 peak, the free Napster boasted more than 60 million users. But enraged record companies sued the company for copyright infringement, and the site went idle after it lost. CD-burning software company Roxio is co-operating with the sites that sued Napster, including Sony Music, EMI Group and Universal Music Group, in hopes of licensing their songs. Bertelsmann, whose BMG arm was also one of the Napster plaintiffs, had tried to establish a legal Napster site back in 2000, but the plan failed. The Roxio strategy calls for a monthly subscription fee, as well as a per-song charge. Napster founder Shawn Fanning has been hired as a start-up consultant.
AOL to spammers: Prepare to be slammed
Finally, an America Online cause that everyone can support. The recently PR-challenged company said last week that it will assemble a task force to lobby for anti-spamming legislation. It’s a smart public display of anger toward the marketers who pepper AOL and other internet service providers’ customers with unsolicited ads for credit cards, weight loss pills and more. America Online has taken several spammers to court over the past few years, but no national and very little local legislation has been passed to limit spamming. In a letter to its 27 million subscribers, AOL said that it is trying to address problems brought to its attention in the past year, including spam, popup ads and connection problems. New devices will be unveiled soon to fight spam, the company says. AOL recently recorded its first-ever decline in dial-up subscribers, although its high-speed branch has registered some growth.
Lovegate virus worms way through Europe, Asia
The Lovegate has been closed. The internet email worm that began spreading Monday seems to be under control after slicing through Asian and European systems, then hitting a U.S. blockade. The worm, which popped up first in Asia, leaves a back door for future attacks on infected computers, sending an email to two Beijing addresses once it’s achieved infection. Experts say this enables the virus’ author to access confidential information from infected machines. If the message attachment is opened, the virus then sends to everyone in the recipient’s address book, and to every incoming email, if the recipient uses Microsoft’s Outlook or Outlook Express. U.S. antivirus vendors quickly updated their software when they heard about the outbreak in Europe and Asia, slowing Lovegate’s American progress. About 10,000 worldwide infections have been reported.
Sony still tops in games console market
Sony continues to rule the advanced games console market, but Nintendo and Microsoft are both capable of financial challenges. A new study from Strategy Analytics’ broadband entertainment strategies service finds that sales of advanced games consoles rose by 128 percent last year, hitting 56.3 million total sold worldwide. Seventy-five percent of those sold have been Sony Playstation2 systems, compared to 13 percent Nintendo GameCube and 12 percent Microsoft XBox. But Strategy Analytics analysts say GameCube sales will drop by 4 percent in 2003, and suggest that Nintendo’s best strategy would be to concentrate its efforts on the $12 billion software market, where it is already a leader. Analysts also say that XBox’s sales will grow by 12 percent in 2003, sparked in part by the new online option XBox Live.
February 26, 2003© 2003 Media Life
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