RIM set to launch BlackBerry music service: report

Aug 19, 2011
The BlackBerry smartphone is facing tough competition from Apple's iPhone and others Enlarge
A new model BlackBerry mobile phone is seen at an event in New Delhi. The Canadian firm is developing a new service that would allow subscribers to play music on their smartphones, the Wall Street Journal has reported.

Canada's Research in Motion (RIM) is developing a new service that would allow subscribers to play music on their BlackBerry smartphones, the Wall Street Journal has reported.

The option is "designed to work with RIM's BlackBerry Messenger," the newspaper reported, citing unnamed sources who had discussed the service with RIM executives.

The new service, to be known as BBM Music, could be launched "as soon as next week," and allow subscribers to access around 50 songs at one time for an as-yet unspecified price, the report said.

According to the paper, the company has already signed, or are preparing to sign, agreements with four music power houses -- Vivendi Universal Music, , Warner and EMI.

The move is aimed at attracting younger consumers to the product, which is facing tough competition from Apple's and others.

According to a study by ComScore published in July, the iPhone is now more widely used than the BlackBerry in the US market.

Explore further: A year on, Assange stays put in Ecuadorean Embassy

add to favorites email to friend print save as pdf

Related Stories

Apple nears music deal with labels

May 21, 2011

Apple Inc. is close to securing deals with all four major recording companies on a music service that will allow users to stream songs stored on remote computer servers, presumably to an array of portable ...

Sony Music back catalog comes to eMusic

Jun 01, 2009

Sony Music Entertainment and eMusic announced on Monday that songs from Sony's back catalog would be available later this year through the online music store.

Recommended for you

Kim Dotcom slams Megaupload 'data massacre'

5 hours ago

Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom Thursday condemned a Dutch company's decision to delete million of files belonging to users of his defunct website, calling it "the largest data massacre in the history of the ...

States scramble to attract suddenly hot cybersecurity firms

13 hours ago

As data dragnets and information breaches dominate the news, states are scrambling to cash in on a rapidly expanding business sector by offering tax incentives to firms that protect sensitive information from outside attacks.

A year on, Assange stays put in Ecuadorean Embassy

20 hours ago

A year ago, Julian Assange skipped out on a date with Swedish justice. Rather than comply with a British order that he go to the Scandinavian country for questioning about sex crimes allegations, the WikiLeaks ...

Google asks US secret court to lift gag order (Update)

Jun 18, 2013

Google on Tuesday sharply challenged the U.S. government's gag order on its Internet surveillance program, citing what it described as a constitutional free speech right to divulge how many requests it receives ...

User comments : 1

Adjust slider to filter visible comments by rank

Display comments: newest first

COCO
not rated yet Aug 22, 2011
you want younger customers RIM? Get a cameo for big Mike on Big Bang Theory and offer Howard an honoury PhD.

More news stories

Multiview 3-D photography made simple

Computational photography is the use of clever light-gathering tricks and sophisticated algorithms to extract more information from the visual environment than traditional cameras can.

Microsoft mulled buying Nokia unit

Microsoft was in talks to boost its position in the mobile phone market by buying the devices business from Nokia but failed to seal a deal, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.

LA to give every student an iPad; $30M order

Los Angeles' school system, the second largest in the United States, is ordering iPads for all its students, handing Apple a major success in its quest to make the tablet computer a replacement for textbooks.