Rhapsody streaming app approved for iPhones

September 10, 2009 By RYAN NAKASHIMA , AP Business Writer
Rhapsody streaming app approved for iPhones (AP)

Enlarge

In this hand out photo released by RealNetworks Inc. showing a screenshot of the new Rhapsody music download service. RealNetworks Inc.'s subscription music service Rhapsody has been approved for use on iPhones and iPod Touches, the first time Apple Inc. has allowed an on-demand streaming program on its devices in the United States. (AP Photo/RealNetworks Inc.)

(AP) -- RealNetworks Inc.'s subscription music service Rhapsody has been approved for use on iPhones and iPod Touches, the first time Apple Inc. has allowed an on-demand music streaming program on its devices in the United States.

The initial download will be free but new subscribers will have to pay $14.99 a month if they want to try it for longer than seven days.

The service will allow users to queue up any of some 8 million songs, and create custom playlists that will stream to the device as long as the user is receiving a cellular signal or is in a WiFi hot spot.

The application is an improvement on Rhapsody To Go, which allows subscribers to load songs onto their Windows Media Player-enabled phones and when connected to a computer for later playback.

Seattle-based RealNetworks is planning to allow subscribers to load songs over the air for later playback in a new version by the end of the year.

Current Rhapsody To Go subscribers will be able to use the new app right away without an extra charge.

"This breaks us out of the non-Apple MP3 player segment and now we can reach the iPod Touch and audience that was unavailable to us before," said Neil Smith, vice president of business management for Rhapsody America.

RealNetworks currently has some 750,000 subscribers of its unlimited song streaming service. Some pay $12.99 a month for computer-only access but others pay $14.99 for the ability to move those songs to mobile devices.

The songs will be streamed at 64 kilobits per second, which is lower quality than the 256 kbps for songs offered on iTunes, but will help prevent interruptions.

Rhapsody app users will also be offered the ability to buy songs from the iTunes store. RealNetworks will share in the revenue from such sales.

"We're giving you the ability to listen to any song you want. The ones you really like, you can plunk down the extra $1.29 and buy," Smith said.

©2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


Rank not rated yet
Related Stories
Relevant PhysicsForums posts
  • Calling function with no input argument
    created13 hours ago
  • Force free body diagram problem on gym equipment
    created14 hours ago
  • Empirical data regarding shower heads and water
    created21 hours ago
  • feed hold button on CNC lathe
    createdFeb 09, 2012
  • RFAC in Fortran
    createdFeb 09, 2012
  • dynamics 2/32
    createdFeb 08, 2012
  • More from Physics Forums - General Engineering

More news stories

Anonymous knocks CIA website offline (Update)

The website of the Central Intelligence Agency was inaccessible on Friday after the hacker group Anonymous claimed to have knocked it offline.

Technology / Internet

created 7 hours ago | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 13

Google users warned of threat to smartphone wallets

Users of Google smartphone wallets were being warned on Friday that there is a way to crack pass codes intended to thwart thieves from going on illicit shopping sprees.

Technology / Internet

created 6 hours ago | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 0

New error-correcting codes guarantee the fastest possible rate of data transmission

Error-correcting codes are one of the triumphs of the digital age. They’re a way of encoding information so that it can be transmitted across a communication channel — such as an optical fiber o ...

Technology / Computer Sciences

created 16 hours ago | popularity 4.9 / 5 (8) | comments 6 | with audio podcast

New power source discovered

(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and RMIT University have made a breakthrough in energy storage and power generation.

Technology / Energy & Green Tech

created 15 hours ago | popularity 4.8 / 5 (25) | comments 8 | with audio podcast

Small modular reactor design could be a 'SUPERSTAR'

(PhysOrg.com) -- Though most of today's nuclear reactors are cooled by water, we've long known that there are alternatives; in fact, the world's first nuclear-powered electricity in 1951 came from a reactor ...

Technology / Energy & Green Tech

created 15 hours ago | popularity 4.3 / 5 (12) | comments 22 | with audio podcast


Humans may have helped the decline of African rainforests 3000 years ago

(PhysOrg.com) -- Large areas of rainforests in Central Africa mysteriously disappeared over three thousand years ago, to be replaced by savannas. The prevailing theory has been that the cause was a change ...

Complex wiring of the nervous system may rely on a just a handful of genes and proteins

Researchers at the Salk Institute have discovered a startling feature of early brain development that helps to explain how complex neuron wiring patterns are programmed using just a handful of critical genes. ...

The power of estrogen -- male snakes attract other males

A new study has shown that boosting the estrogen levels of male garter snakes causes them to secrete the same pheromones that females use to attract suitors, and turned the males into just about the sexiest ...

Putting the squeeze on planets outside our solar system

(PhysOrg.com) -- Using high-powered lasers, scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and collaborators discovered that molten magnesium silicate undergoes a phase change in the liquid state, abruptly ...

Could Venus be shifting gear?

(PhysOrg.com) -- ESA’s Venus Express spacecraft has discovered that our cloud-covered neighbour spins a little slower than previously measured. Peering through the dense atmosphere in the infrared, the ...

Advanced power-grid model finds low-cost, low-carbon future in West

(PhysOrg.com) -- The least expensive way for the Western U.S. to reduce greenhouse gas emissions enough to help prevent the worst consequences of global warming is to replace coal with renewable and other ...