It’s speculated that this recent acquisition has something to do with Twitter’s acquisition of We Are Hunted. Both companies are trying to drive people to stick with their services, so they are pulling out all of the stops to do so. While the music streaming industry is pretty saturated, many companies are still trying to break into the field in order to generate more revenue. To give you an idea of how much revenue music streaming can generate, Warner Music Group stated that it received 25% of its revenue from music streaming alone.

Tunigo is similar to Songza. It allows users to play and generate music playlists based on their mood. They can choose a playlist for when they’re working out, cooking, dancing, feeling nostalgic, and more. Tunigo piggybacks off of Spotify, generating music, playlists and more through the service. With the help of Spotify, it is able to keep track of all of the latest music additions, user recommendations and more to create specific playlists.

What we’re hoping is for Spotify to integrate Tunigo into its service somehow, instead of being like Yahoo and killing off its acquisition. The music streaming market is getting more and more competitive. Currently, the big dogs are Spotify and Pandora, however Apple plans on launching its own music streaming service called iRadio, which is speculated to launch over the summer. The industry is about to get tumultuous and these services will have to pull out all the stops to stay relevant.

[via AllThingsD]

AOL Music employees were in attendance at the HR meeting where AOL announced that they would be out of a job. Many took to Twitter to express their disappointment. Dan Reilly, a former editor of Spinner.com, a music/entertainment website acquired by AOL, tweeted, “Well, we all just got laid off. AOL Music is finished. Sitting in an HR meeting right now, trying to negotiate keeping our computers for a few more days”

AOL’s new Brand Group CEO, Susan Lyne, had a hand to play in AOL Music’s demise. In some recent interviews, she said that she would be looking at AOL’s current content properties, and decide which of them would get the ax, and which of them would continue to live on. According to AllThingsD, while Lyne may be shutting down AOL Music, she may be bringing other forms of entertainment to AOL.

Lyne has an impressive media background. She was the president and CEO of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia. She spent 8 years at Disney as well as ABC, where she became the president of its entertainment division and oversaw the development of popular ABC shows like Desperate Housewives and Lost. While AOL Music may be dead, Lyne may have an ace up her sleeve to bring AOL back into the entertainment game.

[via AllThingsD]

Currently, Spotify has over 25 million users, where free users can stream up to 40 hours of music per week, while unlimited subscribers obviously don’t have a limit, nor do they have to deal with ads. Currently, Spotify has over 6 million paid subscribers, and we’re sure that number will grow now that more markets have access to the streaming music service.

Spotify says that they aim to be available anywhere, but expanding to that point will take time. The company ultimately wants to be available in Asia completely, with today’s expansion in Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Singapore a good start. The continent is a hotbed for internet users, where many online services report having the most users.

Of course, today’s expansions are merely just stepping stones for Spotify in their quest to become available all around the world, but it seems they’re confident in getting to that point in the foreseeable future. The same features are available to international users, including both free and premium subscription options.

[via The Next Web]

Both Pandora and Microsoft know that you’ve been waiting a long time for a Windows Phone 8 version of the app to come out, and they even announced plans to bring Pandora to WP8 during the platform’s launch event, so as a gift for your patience, they’re giving WP8 users an ad-free experience until the end of this year. This is a feature that only normally comes to premium subscribers of the service.

Furthermore, the app comes with Live Tile support, meaning that you can check out what artist and song is playing right from the home screen, and users can simply tap on the tile to go directly to the app. Microsoft and Pandora claim this as the app’s exclusive features, so if you were expecting anything groundbreaking in the actual app (besides the ad-free experience), you may be disappointed.

Along with the ad-free experience, however, users will also be able to play unlimited music. Pandora recently stuck a 40-hour monthly limit on its service for free users, but Windows Phone 8 users will be able to listen to all of the music that their hearts desire until the end of the year, after which you can spring for the monthly or yearly plans ($3.99 monthly or $36 yearly).

The app will stream music via SoundCloud. It will feature 4 tabs. The “Suggested” tab recommends you songs based on the musical artists you follow. The “#NowPlaying” tab lists links to songs tweeted by your followers who tweet using the #NowPlaying hashtag. The “Popular” tab lists the songs that are currently trending on the music app, and the “Emerging” tab lists a bunch of up-and-coming artists featured on We Are Hunted.

The app will display artists and songs in a grid design. Clicking on an artist’s panel will cause it to expand displaying a short bio on the artist, as well as links to songs the artist has on SoundCloud, or on iTunes. Users can tap the play button to begin streaming music from the artist. Users will also be able to follow artists directly from Twitter’s “Twitter Music” page.

iOS users are said to have first dibs on the Twitter Music service, just like Twitter’s video sharing app, Vine. The Twitter Music service is speculated to be released to iOS devices by the end of this month. Twitter hopes that by integrating music into its network, it can attract more new users to its service. It will, however, have a hard time prying users away from popular music services like Pandora and Spotify.

[via CNET]

This YouTube music streaming rumor comes only a couple of weeks after it was rumored that Google is planning its own music streaming service. We’re unsure whether or not the Google rumors and the YouTube rumors are the same thing, but according to CNN, Google and YouTube may be setting up their own separate, music streaming services that offer the same features. YouTube is said to have its own negotiating team and own operating unit for its upcoming music streaming service.

Even without the music streaming service, the company is the most widely used medium for listening to music. Most of the top videos viewed on YouTube are music videos, and over 64% of teenagers preferred using YouTube to listen to music compared to any other music platform. Companies are also realizing that music streaming is the new future for gaining revenue. Warner Music Group received 25% of its digital revenue from music streaming services alone.

If Google and YouTube do launch their own subscription-based music streaming services, they have a lot of competition. They’re entering a saturated market. Spotify, Rdio, Pandora and many others already dominate the music streaming space, so Google may have a hard time getting its foot in the door. But considering it’s Google, the name itself may be enough to steal away users from the other services.

A YouTube spokesperson commented on this rumor saying, “While we don’t comment on rumor or speculation, there are some content creators that think they would benefit from a subscription revenue stream in addition to ads, so we’re looking at that.” Considering its YouTube and the amount of influence it has, its most likely going to follow through with a subscription music service.

[via CNN Money]

The Verge reports that “several music industry sources” are saying that Spotify is already in negotiations with Warner Music about lowering fees and changing rights to its music, and Spotify is said to begin similar negotiations with Sony and Universal soon. If such negotiations are successful, Spotify would see a growth in profits, as well as the ability to give more users access to free content.

Spotify’s free offering only gives users access to the desktop app with advertisements, but paying the monthly $9.99 fee will get rid of ads and allow users to access their Spotify library on their mobile devices. Even though, Spotify boasts 20 million users, 5 million of which are paying subscribers, the company is currently breaking even financially.

While free access to Spotify’s mobile offerings would certainly be fantastic, it’s hard to say if the negotiations with the music labels will go well. Streaming music services have a tense relationship with music labels and even individual artists. Several major artists, including Coldplay and Adele, have refused to allow their music to be streamed by Spotify because of extremely low royalty fees and rights to the music.

[via The Verge]

Nokia says that Music+ is “the only smartphone music service out there offering access to millions of songs out of the box without the need to sign up, sign in, or suffer adverts.” Yes, that’s right, Nokia’s music service has never been ad-supported, so you’ll be able to browse in piece for roughly the price of a Starbucks coffee per month.

Currently, Lumia owners are stuck with Nokia’s free Music app, which came to the US back in September. It’s certainly not an awful service by any means, but having the ability to skip songs an unlimited number of times is always fantastic, as well as downloading music and having access to various features like lyrics and desktop use makes it all worth the cheap monthly fee.

Music+ will be available to users sometime “in the next few weeks” according to Nokia, and while they say that pricing wil differ by territory, most customers can expect to pay around €3.99, which is slightly more expensive than Pandora One, but it’s also under half the cost of Spotify Premium, which is a great deal by any means.

The announcement from Yahoo is exceptionally brief – a single sentence, in fact – but alludes to the company’s reason for shutting down the service. “Dear Yahoo Users: Thank you for your continued support. Due to a shift in product strategy, Yahoo China has decided to discontinue its Yahoo Music service. The change will take effect on January 20, 2013.”

Yahoo has made many changes throughout 2012 as it aims to restructure itself and regain the foothold that has lost over time. Marissa Mayer, the company’s relatively new CEO, arrived after the Alibaba sale; she proposed that the company use the money to target various acquisitions. Back in October, Yahoo hired former Google executive Henrique de Castro.

Thus far, the changes seem to have served the company well, with Yahoo’s third quarter financial report exceeding the expectations of many. The company brought in $1.2 billion in GAAP revenue, a nice figure to close Mayer’s first full quarter with Yahoo. Thus far, Yahoo has not offered a statement about its music service closure in China.

[via TNW]

While 20 million listeners registered on iHeartRadio seems like a lot, Clear Channel says that users don’t need an account to use the service, meaning that millions more people are using the service. iHeartRadio was launched 13 months ago at the inaugural iHeartRadio Music Festival back in September 2011.

Brian Lakamp, President of Digital for Clear Channel Media and Entertainment, says that “iHeartRadio has experienced unprecedented growth,” and the service “truly creates unmatched promotional power that is unique to Clear Channel and allows [them] to be wherever [their] listeners are with the products and services they expect.”

iHeartRadio provides instant access to over 1,500 live broadcast and digital-only radio stations across the US from 150 cities, and by signing up for an account, you can get access to user-created Custom Stations inspired by a variety of favorite artists and songs. The iHeartRadio App is available across multiple platforms including on the web, and on iOS and Android devices.

In fact, left to its own devices, The Infinite Jukebox will continue to play the same song forever, though the track itself will evolve over time. “For beat similarity we look at pitch, timbre, loudness, duration and the position of the beat within a bar” Lamere says, with a colorful, circular representation of the progressing playback and the possible leaps.

You can also use your keyboard to control playback, with space handling play/pause, the left/right arrows for changing play velocity, and the down arrow setting velocity straight to zero. Control freezes playback on the currently playing beat, and shift triggers a bounce from the current beat to all similar sounding beats.

Behind the scenes it’s the Echo Nest analyzer that does the clever work, the same engine that’s behind Nokia Music’s personalized playlists. Some tracks work better than others, Lamere warns, with those that have plenty of self-similarity sounding smoother in the transitions.

You can upload your own MP3 to The Infinite Jukebox, or choose from any of the preloaded tracks that others have tried; that’s a quicker way of getting started, since the Echo Nest analysis can be a little time consuming depending on server load. Karma Police by Radiohead works well, as does Psy’s Gangham Style which is what got Lamere started in the first place.

Microsoft has been in talks with the major record label companies, including Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group, Sony Music, and EMI to secure the necessary music rights. The negotiations may still be in the early stages, although the company plans to launch the service later this year.

Xbox Music’s streaming aspect will work similar to Spotify, charging usrs a monthly or annual fee, while still letting consumers purchase digital music through an online store similar to iTunes. Music may also be stored on an online locker that’s accessible by multiple mobile devices running Windows Phone 8 or Windows 8. It would be similar to Apple’s iCloud, where songs purchased elsewhere can also be stored and accessed for a monthly or annual fee.

[via MacRumors]

Music Unlimited has been available on Android, Walkman PMPs, and PlayStation products as well as on Sony’s home theater products. This new Music Unlimited iOS app is only available for the iPhone at this time, but an iPad-optimized version will likely be on its way.

The service offers a simple selection of two subscription plans. The basic plan is $3.99 per month and is limited to only a selection of channels that you customize by liking and disliking tracks. The premium plan is $9.99 per month and gives you instant on-demand playback of Sony’s entire music catalog. It also offers offline listening, the ability to customize playlists, and access to premium channels.

[via 9to5Mac]

For site managers, Spotify has apparently made it particularly straightforward to embed music. “Just grab any song, album or playlist URI from within Spotify” the company says, “and head to our developer website to get the embed link.”

However, unlike existing streaming media systems suitable for embedding, the Spotify Play Button won’t be entirely seamless for visitors. Those who don’t have Spotify installed will have to get the desktop app, which will be loaded in the background.

Another potential limit is that the button will only offer audio to users in countries where Spotify has licensing. Those locations where listening limits are in place – up to 10 hours per month for free accounts, in some countries – will find their playback with the Spotify Play Button counts against that limit, too.

The MOG for Windows app has an interface similar to its browser-based version but with the extra features that have been available to the Mac version. It has built-in support for AirPlay that lets you stream music to any AirPlay-capable speaker and it can play native 320kbps audio, which MOG claims is the highest of any music service. The Windows version doesn’t support the use of a remote control.

Recent reports have suggested a potential acquisition of MOG by Taiwanese phone manufacturer HTC, which has already invested and partnered with Beats Audio for its smartphones. This news has helped MOG steal some of the spotlight from rival music service Spotify and may help it gain more traction. However, no official announcements have been made yet.

[via TechCrunch]

The Verge spoke with Parks at SWSX, where he revealed that family plans are “definitely coming.” Parks had mentioned that he is paying for three separate accounts in his own house, indicating that he understands the desire for a simpler consolidated family subscription package.

The introduction of family plans is also aimed at getting more people in a household to spend on a Spotify subscription, although Parks did not elaborate on the pricing structure or when the new plans might launch. But to get an idea of what Spotify needs to match or beat, we can look at rival Rdio, which currently offers a family plan at $17.99 per month for two users and $22.99 for three. Additional sub-accounts are billed at full price.

[via VentureBeat]

Spotify Premium also allows users to cache tracks on their computer or mobile device for offline playback, handy when they’re outside of internet access. Tracks are also delivered at higher quality, and subscribers can stream them to home A/V kit such as certain Onkyo network-connected receivers.

The German release of Spotify had been anticipated for some time, with the company claiming the time taken to launch had been occupied with trying to get the software and service experience just right. However, industry observers suggest the headache had been more about negotiating deals with GEMA, the German agency responsible for managing royalty payments, a notoriously difficult prospect.

Meanwhile, Spotify has been working hard to expand its service from solely providing streaming music to getting fingers into various other entertainment pies. The company announced Spotify Apps last year, wrapping more information around tracks from partners like Last.fm, Songkick and Rolling Stone. Perhaps more useful to music fans, however, was gapless playback, introduced as part of a service upgrade last month.

The new numbers are a good sign for Spotify and help to reassure the music industry that this model works. Spotify operates as a freemium service that allows both ad-supported free accounts and paid premium accounts, all with unlimited playback, although it recently implemented monthly caps on the free accounts.

The new 20 percent ratio doesn’t include people that have tried Spotify but then trailed off. And Spotify believes that its Facebook integration and month-long free trials for its premium service have helped boost its conversion rate. Currently, Spotify offers an ad-free option for $4.99 per month and an ad-free option that also allows for use on mobile devices for $9.99 per month.

“We have achieved some pretty great results in terms of the ratio of paid users,” said Spotify’s US managing director Ken Parks. “We have an enormous internal effort to drive conversion and engagement with the service. We are very focused on growing in our existing 12 markets as well as expanding in other markets.”

[via Financial Times]

There’s also a speed and performance boost promised, including higher offline music playback quality. Better playlist management tools are also in the pipeline. However the Napster brand will continue in the UK and Germany, as Rhapsody reckons it’s better known there, and the existing Napster staff will keep their jobs.

Rhapsody has over 1m paying subscribers in the US, spending at least $4.99 per month on the streaming music service. That figure was bolstered by acquiring Napster’s US operations from Best Buy last October, leading Rhapsody to go on to claim it had the highest number of US subscribing users of any paid-streaming service.

Financial terms of the deal between Rhapsody and Napster International have not been revealed.

The 19 new countries to get iTunes Match, include Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Estonia, Guatemala, Honduras, Latvia, Lithuania, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, and Venezuela. Most of these countries have just recently received the iTunes Music Store and this brings the total to 37 countries now with access to iTunes Match.

The iTunes Match service lets users access all of their music via the iCloud, including songs not originally purchased from iTunes. The service scans your collection and matches those songs to those existing in Apple’s massive library. If a match is found, it will stream those songs at an upgraded 256kbps quality. The service is optional and costs $24.99 a year in the US.

[via AppleInsider]

You can find the new feature in Facebook’s chat sidebar. A music note icon will show up next to friends who are listening to music. When you hover over a friend’s name a pop-up appears with a “Listen With” button. Clicking on that then lets you listen to what your friend’s listening to and you can even chat with them while you’re at it.

Other friends can join in, turning it into a group chat and group listening party. To avoid certain friends or just to listen in private, Facebook does give you some settings to control that. The new feature will start rolling out over the next few weeks.

Talking to The Verge, Schaaff said that the Music Unlimited iOS app will have all the same features as the Android version and that there are no plans at the moment to make certain features exclusive to any particular platform, although he entertained the idea of device-exclusive features in the future. The app will initially be compatible for the iPad, iPhone, and iPod, but the company intends to launch an iPad-optimized version later on.

Music Unlimited currently offers around 15 million songs on demand without annoying ads. However, it’s also only available via paid subscription with two service plans: Basic for $3.99 per month and Premium for $9.99 per month. Premium subscribers using the Music Unlimited iOS app will be able to enjoy offline caching of up to 5GB or 5GB of music so that you can continue to listen even when your device is not connected. The iOS app will be launched sometime this quarter.

The last update to iTunes 10.5.1 brought the iTunes Match feature, which lets you store your entire music collection in the iCloud, whether or not all the music was purchased through iTunes. Songs that matched those already in Apple’s libraries are streamed from 256kbps master copies, while songs that cannot be matched are uploaded for streaming.

iTunes 10.5.2 brings some improvements to iTunes Match, but mainly addresses the audio distortion problem that several users have experienced while trying to play or import certain CDs. The update for Mac computers requires OS X 10.5 or above, while the Windows version of the update comes in either 32-bit or 64-bit.

[via 9to5Mac]

“This deal will further extend Rhapsody’s lead over our competitors in the growing on-demand music market,” said Rhapsody president Jon Irwin in a statement. “There’s substantial value in bringing Napster’s subscribers and robust IP portfolio to Rhapsody as we execute on our strategy to expand our business via direct acquisition of members and distribution deals.”

When Napster was acquired by Best Buy in 2008 for $121 million, it had about 700,000 subscribers but then faced a large decline. The current Napster subscriber base hasn’t been revealed, but it will add to Rhapsody’s subscriber base of 800,000.

Although both companies were among the earliest music service providers, they have struggled in recent years to gain more users and especially so with newcomers like Spotify that offer a significant amount of music for free. Spotify is also now tightly integrated with Facebook, giving it even greater access to a large pool of potential subscribers. Its been reported recently that since its integration with Facebook, the service adds about 250,000 new subscribers each day and has already hit over 4 million users.

[via PCMag]

We’ve seen a preview of the Ticker before, which will appear at the top right corner of your screen, showing real-time status updates from your friends. Now with music integration, you’ll also be able to see what you’re friends are currently listening to on Facebook and you’ll be able to access that music from the Ticker to listen along. When you do so, your friend or friend of your friend, who is listening to that song, will get a notification.

This new form of sharing is what Facebook is calling “real-time serendipity.” This opens up many new opportunities for music sharing and discovery. Spotify will also be powering music in posts with play buttons in the revamped News Feed area. Simply clicking on the play button lets you listen and share free music and lets you help your friends discover new music.

Google struggled with securing licensing deals with major record label companies, causing several delays, and ultimately decided to launch it without much music industry support. Hence, Google Music operates similar to Amazon’s Cloud Player as a digital locker for mp3s rather than a fully integrated music sales and streaming service. It is still in a fairly limited invitation-only beta.

And although the service now works on iOS devices, it is accessed through a redesigned web site rather than a native app. It does allow it to work on both iPhones and iPads, whereas Amazon’s CloudPlayer only works on iPads. But with the recent fanfare around music streaming services like Spotify plus Apple’s imminent launch of the iCloud, it will certainly be a tough road ahead for Google Music.

[via AllThingsD]

This major rebranding will consolidate all the services into one portal and will also eliminate the Qriocity brand, although the PlayStation Network brand will remain intact. The original “Video On Demand powered by Qriocity” will now simply be called “Video Unlimited” and the same goes for its music on demand service, which will now be called “Music Unlimited.”

The PlayStation Network online games will now be accessed through SEN with all the content providing partners remaining the same. SEN will be accessible across multiple channels, including PCs, Bravia TVs, the PS3, PSP, and Android devices, of which Sony has recently launched the Tablet S and Tablet P.

[via Sony]

Rumors first pegged Facebook to be partnering with Spotify, but sources later suggested that the partnership would not be exclusive. Instead, the platform would integrate many partners, possibly including MOG, Rdio, Pandora, Last.fm, and other popular music streaming services. In this way, users can listen to music through any one of the multiple partner services while logged in via Facebook Connect.

It’s also believed that Facebook will use a “Music Dashboard” that will work with a persistent play/pause music control button that will appear at the bottom of the screen near the Facebook Chat icon. The Music Dashboard will keep a summary of all the songs you listened to on each service and fill flag up any songs that your friends have recently listened to.

A persistent “happening now” ticker is also a possible feature of Facebook’s music service. The ticker will appear in the upper right corner of the screen and displays current playback information for you and your friends as well as other status updates.

Facebook has become more aggressive in pushing out new features after Google+ hit the scene. The social network announced an integrated Skype video chatting feature back in July and more recently launched a standalone app called Facebook Messenger.

The addition of MOG means access to the millions of songs through the service, which is similar to Spotify and Rdio. MOG emphasizes that songs are streamed in high-fidelity at 320Kbps, which they claim is higher audio quality than any other music streaming service. Boxee Box owners will now get to use this service to stream music to their TVs and home theater sound systems while album art is displayed with 1080p HD image quality.

MOG boasts a collection of 11 million songs and costs $4.99 per month for an unlimited plan and can be accessed from any mobile device with a web browser. And now its available through the Boxee Box, which costs $199.99 and offers many video and music streaming options through services including Netflix and VUDU.

[via Boxee]

The iTunes Match feature differentiates Apple’s iCloud music service from competitors because it saves time from uploading your entire music collection and lets you stream songs not purchased from iTunes. The service scans your music collection and uploads only the songs that do not exist in Apple’s music library. For the songs that can be found in Apple’s music library, the service will stream directly from the Apple master copy at 256kbps to your Mac or iOS device.

However, the service is optional and will cost $25 a year. If you don’t want to pay that amount, you can still manually upload the songs you did not purchase from iTunes, although this limit is set to 25,000 songs. And even better is that the 25,000 songs are in addition to your free 5GB of iCloud storage space.

Below are two videos from Insanely Great Mac that walkthrough the iCloud and iTunes Match service on both the Mac and iOS.

[via MacRumors]

RIM’s rumored BlackBerry music streaming service has officially launched. The details are much like we suspected last week, when insiders revealed that RIM was near signing all four major record label companies. The service offers an odd twist on music sharing and discovery that could either help spread usage or make it a huge flop.

The music service utilizes RIM’s BlackBerry Messenger to help spread the word and to create shared music networks. You can build a personal music profile with 50 of your favorite songs and then invite your BBM friends to join your music network. Each additional user can contribute up to 50 of their favorite songs to the shared pool of music and thereby increase the amount of music accessible to everyone on the network.

In this way, the music experiencing becomes truly social, as the more friends you have the more songs you have access to. You can comment on your friends’ songs and playlists and you can create multiple playlists from music in your own profile as well as from those on your friends’ profiles. You can also see who contributed a song while it plays. Another social element is a visual timeline showing recent updates of all your BBM music network friends such as who added new friends, which songs were added or removed, which playlists were created, and recent comments.

Additionally, you can keep track of how many friends are listening to the songs that you’ve shared, to perhaps gauge your taste and influence. And if you expect to be without wireless coverage, you can save songs to your smartphone ahead of time to listen while offline.

However, after a free trial period, the service costs $4.99 a month and you can only swap out about 25 songs each month. This is an interesting model, but it has plenty of competition from other services that offer unlimited selection such as Spotify, Rhapsody, and MOG. What do you guys think?

The BlackBerry music streaming service was said to involve the BlackBerry Messenger, but other than that there were few details. However, Crackberry was able to dig up more information on the BlackBerry music service and reveals that it will cost $5 per month after the free trial expires. The service will be offered in a standalone app that can be downloaded from the BlackBerry App World and will only allow you to install up to 50 songs.

And how does the service integrate with BBM? Well, it lets you use BBM to invite your contacts to join your music sharing network. And since each person can store up to 50 songs, you could potentially access 1,000 additional songs if you have 20 contacts invited on your network. It’s an interesting concept because it means essentially that the more people you have on your network the more music you’ll be able to access.

Whether or not you’re a BlackBerry user, what do you think about the concept? Is it going to work and is it worth $5 per month?

The four major record label companies that RIM has been in talks with include Universal Music Group, Sony Music, Warner Music Group, and EMI. It’s said that RIM has already signed at least one of the top four record label companies and is close to sealing the deal on two more. A test version of the service could roll out within the next few weeks.

Additionally, the sources reveal that the music service will be integrated with BlackBerry Messenger, which is RIM’s standout feature, which could soon get eclipsed by competing messaging services from Apple, Google, and Facebook. Integrating a music streaming service may be a way for the BBM to remain competitive, although details on how it would be integrated have not been revealed.

The company is currently in transition from its BlackBerry OS to a new QNX platform. However, it recently launched several BlackBerry 7 OS smartphones including the BlackBerry Bold 9930, BlackBerry Torch 9850, and the BlackBerry Torch 9810.

[via CNET]

According to the latest figures leaked, Spotify has signed up 1.4 million users total in the U.S. That may be impressive, but what’s more amazing is that the company has also more than doubled their paid subscriber base within the last two weeks.

The majority of these paying customers are subscribed to the $10 per month plan that allows for ad-free streaming as well as the ability to stream to both iPhones and Android handsets. The latest count reveals that Spotify currently has 175,000 paying customers in the US.

This is a huge difference from rivals such as MOG and Rdio, which have each yet to reach 100,000 users after a year. Longstanding Rhapsody took several years to reach its current number of 800,000 paying customers.

However, this conversion rate is still less than what Spotify is used to in Europe. Here in the US only about 12.5 percent of free subscribers convert to a premium plan, while in Europe that number is 15 percent.

[via AllThingsD]

The number is an estimate leaked out by music industry execs, but has not been officially confirmed by Spotify. CEO Daniel Ek said it was too early to confirm the data, but did find it to far exceeded their expectations. The 70,000 figure accounts for only the premium $10 per month subscriptions, meaning actual signups are far greater.

Additionally, this number sets Spotify as the fastest growing music streaming service in the U.S., where competitors like MOG and Rdio have each yet to reach 100,000 users after a year. The more established music service, Rhapsody, has attained more than 800,000 paying customers, but took several years to achieve that number.

If you haven’t tried out Spotify yet, make sure to grab an invite from us on SlashGear’s Spotify page. And if you have tried it already, let us know what you think and whether you’re upgrading to the premium membership.

[via BillBoard]

Spotify is believed to be launching this week but insider sources have revealed to Mashable that the company could be implementing a “slow launch.” Instead of opening up the service to everyone, it will go the invitation-only route, giving existing members a certain number of invites to distribute to friends.

This type of introduction helps to fuel demand as it creates an air of exclusivity and we’ve seen its effectiveness with many product launches in the past, including the recent Google+. Are you excited for the Spotify launch?

[via Mashable]

Spotify already has Facebook integration in Europe in the sense of allowing users to share playlists and see what friends are listening to, which is different from the recent rumors of a new partnership. The new rumors suggest that Spotify could get deeply integrated into Facebook to allow users to stream music directly in the social network. Whether or not true, Spotify plans to milk Facebook for marketing as much as possible.

On why Spotify will succeed in the US, the company points out several reasons that mention Facebook as a catalyst. They include being the only music service of its kind to have radio, MP3 retail, Facebook and iPod integration and subscription. They point out that 150 million Facebook users will start to see music on their feeds leading them one click away from signing up for Spotify. They also say that integration of Facebook makes “viral seeding” easier and that businesses can wrap music around their brands using the Spotify API such as for custom websites and Facebook pages.

Just yesterday, we reported that Facebook’s video calling code revealed an upcoming new music feature possibly called Vibes. It will be interesting to see whether Spotify is involved with this and how the two companies plan to implement the service.

[via AllThingsDigital]

Rose got curious about whether the new Facebook video chat used the Skype he already had installed on his computer of if it installed a second copy of Skype. So, he started investigating and found a file called FacebookVideoCalling.jar. The file is used to grab a Facebook user ID as well as an application ID and produce a signed request to download the application.

What Rose then noticed, was that there were two applications supported in the installer. The first one is called “peep” and is for downloading the video chat plugin, while the second one is called “vibes” and is meant to fetch a music download dialog in the page. However, this doesn’t mean that the imminent music service will necessarily be called Vibes.

Facebook has been rumored to be working with Spotify to integrate a “Music Dashboard” with the social platform while Spotify has recently confirmed an imminent U.S. launch.

[via Engadget]

Today’s announcement from Amazon revealed three major enhancements that include unlimited space for music, free storage for all Amazon mp3 purchases, and Cloud Player for Web for the iPad. For a limited time, customers who purchase a Cloud Drive storage plan, even the lowest-priced plan of $20 per year for 20GB will get unlimited space for music. The Cloud Drive stores a variety of digital files besides music files, but now any additional music files won’t count against the quota.

Any mp3 purchases made through Amazon will be stored for free in the Cloud Drive, including purchases made before the launch of the Cloud Drive and Cloud Player. Additionally, the Cloud Player for Web, which allows customers to play music stored in their Cloud Drive on any Android device, Mac, and PC, will now be available on the iPad as well.

[via BGR]

The service is reportedly going through testing at the moment and could be available two weeks from now. When launched, it will be an integrated feature that you’ll find on the left side of your newsfeed right below your usual photos and events icons. When you click on the Spotify icon, the service will install on your desktop in the background and give you access to its library of millions of songs.

You would then be able to access the music via Facebook, and even listen to the same music simultaneously with your friends. It’s not certain yet whether it will be called “Facebook Music” or “Spotify on Facebook” but either way it’s only available to those in countries where Spotify is supported. Currently, that excludes folks in the United States.

Spotify is still in the process of negotiating with labels here in the U.S., but as we’ve seen how unsuccessful Google has been with label negotiations for their Music Beta, it could certainly be a long road ahead. It also makes sense that the once rumored Google and Spotify deal didn’t pan out.

[via Forbes]