Software empowers anybody with an Internet connection to create an online music store containing tens of thousands of songs.
Blacksburg, VA (PRWEB) March 28, 2005 -- UTC - Expanding their offering to the digital music industry today, Digital Bazaar announced version 1.0 of their Bitmunk peer-to-peer Sales Server software. Launched earlier this month, Bitmunk file distribution technology ensures that artists can distribute their music via a peer-to-peer based network while ensuring the proper royalties are paid to them by their fans.
According to Jupiter Media Metrix, online music downloads will become a $6.2 billion dollar per year industry by 2006. "The release of our sales server software will allow small companies, such as Internet Radio Stations and specialty music sites, to take part in this rapidly growing market." said Digital Bazaar CEO, Manu Sporny. "It will also allow moderate to large retailers with an online presence to sell digital music without investing in any online music store technology infrastructure." added Mike Johnson, COO of Digital Bazaar.
The Bitmunk Sales Server allows anybody with an Internet connection to sell music from their computer. The songs are provided by Bitmunk's ever expanding catalog of musicians from around the world. "We handle acquiring all of the music rights from the copyright holders," said Sporny, adding "There is no reason that there should only be a handful of online music stores - our technology allows anybody with a great idea for a music store to immediately start selling music. Not only do we support traditional businesses, but fans may support their favorite artists by re-selling any of their digital music with the Bitmunk Sales Server."
Bitmunk is a digital file marketplace - one where artists, labels, distributors and fans set the prices. "The traditional online music store, one size fits all, one download source, 99 cents per song model can be improved. For artists, word-of-mouth advertising is still king and what better way to attract a wider audience than to use a technology that incentivizes any of your fans to take part in promoting you." said Sporny.
Artists and sellers set the prices on Bitmunk: arists set a wholesale price and then the fans can add a fee for distribution costs. Bitmunk is a free market - the average price on the network at the current time hovers between 82 cents to 86 cents for single songs, or $7.40 to $7.54 for albums. The Bitmunk Sales Server software is free to fans, artists, labels, and anybody creating an online music store.
An introduction to selling on Bitmunk is available at: http://www.bitmunk.com/introduction.html
Available albums for sale can be browsed at: http://www.bitmunk.com/mediabrowser.php
The Bitmunk Sales Server Software can be found at: http://www.bitmunk.com/downloads.php
About Digital Bazaar, Inc.
Digital Bazaar's innovative file distribution technology ensures that artists can distribute their work while ensuring the proper royalties are paid to them. Fans enjoy the full rights afforded by owning the song, including the ability to burn the MP3 file to CD, placing it on any MP3-capable device and even the ability to re-sell the song via Bitmunk. Founded in 2003 by Virginia Tech Computer Science graduates Manu Sporny, David Longley, and Mike Johnson, Digital Bazaar strives to be the market leader for the sale of digital files online. Digital Bazaar is headquartered in Blacksburg, Virginia in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center.
Contact Information:
Michael Johnson
Digital Bazaar, Inc.
540-961-4469
http://www.bitmunk.com/
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Bitmunk is a trademark of Digital Bazaar Inc. All other company and product names may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated.
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