- Oddly There’s No Napster in Sight
And the latest name in cloud music plans is not an unfamiliar sight, but the Best BuyNapster. Music Cloud does seem to oddly lack any connection to its existing digital music service.
The Best Buy service looks to be part of an offering developed by Catch Media, a London-based firm that has already launched a cloud music service for Best Buy in the UK. The service has crossed the sea and is now hitting US shores to fight Apple, et al., with a service similar to the iCloud and Amazon’s Cloud Drive.
According to Catch Media, the full US launch will happen this summer which, as of this week, could be any day now. It is said to have the full support of the major labels.
In the UK, Best Buy’s “My Music Anywhere” service just expanded its reach to Android devices, and was already available on iOS and BlackBerry devices. Oddly enough, its apps — including the new Android app named “Music Cloud” — are available for download to US consumers and can even be run with minimal effort and tweaking. These apps have content from all four major labels and a few independents, so it is likely that the US version is fully stocked.
“This is the only scan-and-match, cloud-streaming platform compatible across so many devices and all major mobile operating systems supported by the music industry,” Catch said in a statement. The service is available in the UK at both Best Buy UK and Carphone Warehouse, which is owned by Best Buy.
Yaacov Ben-Yaacov, CEO of Catch Media, said “With 400,000 new Android devices activated everyday, increasing ‘My Music Anywhere’ compatibility to all Android phones and tablets opens up the service to thousands of new users as well as allows established customers to access their music on even more of their devices. We look forward to launching a similar service across the US over summer.”
A Catch spokesperson was very eager to confirm that the service had all the right licensing in place for its US launch. While refusing to give any solid details, the spokesperson did say that the majors were on board and their big content will be available on day one.
The Votes Are In
Reviews of the service as it hit the US came through pretty quickly — well a few reviews and mostly a major panning of the service.
Right off the bat it turned consumers away since the free version only allows users to listen to the first 30 seconds of their songs. Paying $4 per month gives the user full access to all the songs and playlists they upload.
The big thing to take away from a quick trial of the software is that it doesn’t feel finished. It really makes you wish Napster were more involved.
For now, the best thing to do would be to skip the service. If Best Buy turns it around, it may be worth going back to, but for now it’s among the worst entrants into the cloud-music space.
Napster Taking a Dirt Nap?
Napster hasn’t been included in any of the rollout plans or leaks and no one seems to be able to explain why. Best Buy was mum on the issue.
Back in September 2008 Best Buy bought Napster for $121 million but has never seemingly done as much as it could with the service that came with a user-based and massive name recognition.
Napster was already as much of a cloud music service as could be imagined, and its offering isn’t that far from matching iCloud with only a few tweaks, typically around syncing.
Best Buy hasn’t done much to promote Napster, so it’s not too big of a surprise, though it is something of a disappointment that the service isn’t getting folded into the Music Cloud.
Perhaps there’s more to come in the final announcements.
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