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Business News Deals Digital
eMusic sold again
By Chris Cooke | Published on Wednesday 21 October 2015
So eMusic has been sold. You remember eMusic, right? You know, eMusic.
“Give me an ‘e'” they used to chant. “There ain’t no music like the eMusic” they used to sing. “Eeeeeee, I love me music” they used to say. “eMusic, eMusic, ra ra ra” they used to cheer. “Shit, it’s eMusic!” they used to shout. Do you remember all those old TV ads for eMusic.
No, me neither. Perhaps if they’d had some one of you would actually remember eMusic. Anyway, eMusic has been sold to a company called TriPlay.
Those with memories will recall that eMusic was one of the very first download platforms, which enjoyed some success for a time as a subscription-based download service with a focus on indie label content backed up by original editorial.
Then, in a bid to extend its audience, it signed up the majors. But to secure Universal it had to alter its business model. Or fuck up its business model, to be precise. In 2013 it merged with an ebook company and then last year dropped the major label content, returning back to its roots.
TriPlay has its own digital locker service and music store called MyMusicCloud which – the company’s CEO says – is also focused on “advanced indie music lovers”.
The main hope seems to be that, by integrating eMusic with its music store, it will be able to offer users of its digital locker app more competitively priced downloads. The ‘club’ model employed by eMusic enabled cheaper per-download prices, because users were basically bulk-buying.
TriPlay CEO Tamir Koch told Billboard: “Technologically [eMusic is] bringing nothing [to Triplay], but they have the ability, with their label relations, to offer songs at a 25 50% discount over what our users were paying previously”.
Terms of the deal are not known, though eMusic’s team are expected to stay on as part of the revamped business.