Nokia Lumia-branded and Windows Phones-powered handsets can now access the Nokia Music service at no-cost in the United States.

Previously only available to European Lumia customers the program has proven to be a success overseas. The platform currently  includes 150 unique playlists created by a Nokia “musicologist.” The playlists includes music from popular artists including Lady Gaga, Rihanna and others.

Users can also choose to listen to music based on genre with such niches as “underground Detroit house” and music from the New York Philharmonic.

If users would prefer the Nokia free music streaming service also allows for a Nokia Music Create function for personal playlist creation based on selected artists.

Unlike Pandora, free Spotify service and other platforms the music is not supported by ads and doesn’t require a subscribe or sign-up function to be utilized.

For customers looking to listen “offline” that feature is also offered when a data signal is not available.

True music fans might most appreciate the “Gig Finder” which provide access to local live concert information, gigs and shows currently taking place near a users location.

Nokia customers purchasing the Nokia Lumia 900 and Nokia Lumia 710 handsets will have automatic and immediate access to the streaming music platform.

It will be interesting to see if Nokia can leverage music capabilities to win over new users. HTC attempted to win over music lovers by purchased Beats Audio, the company recently sold a majority share of its ownership back to Beats Audio after a failed attempt to leverage the business for smartphones.

Nokia Brings Free Music To US Based ‘Lumia’ Handsets is a post from: The Inquisitr

There is a line of thought in the music business that actually giving away a bands music, or rather the albums of their music, can in fact be a good thing. Apparently Lady Gaga and her manager share that sentiment.

Lady Gaga has been known to have no problem with people downloading her music for free because she believes that those are people who will end up going to her concerts; which provide a much bigger revenue stream for musician than album sales. She also seems to think that the prices being charged for albums is way too much.

Now her manager has come out and said that if it was up to him they would give away her next album totally free, the idea being that it would increase the exposure of Lady Gaga.

“If it was up to me, I’d give away the next album and put it on every handset that I can put it on, to get that scale,” he said. “You can’t be scared to fail. Sometimes we’re going to get big results, and sometimes you learn a lesson, make an adjustment and move on.”

While Lady Gaga does have her detractors there isn’t away of getting past the fact that she is an immensely popular singer and such an idea doesn’t sound as strange as you might think.

via TechDirt

Manager for Lady Gaga says they’d give away her next album if they could is a post from: The Inquisitr

The service isn’t limitless, though: You’ll be able to listen to 25 full-length tracks a month. After that, you’ll be prompted to pay for a Rhapsody streaming subscription. If you turn it down, you’ll only be able to listen to 30-second samples until the start of the next month.

On the whole, the service works surprisingly well. Searching for an available artist brings up a box at the top of the results with play buttons for four popular songs and the option to see more songs. Once you click play, a second player box opens at the bottom of the search results. You can still navigate around the page with the box open and the song playing — it’ll stay at the bottom of the window — but once you click to any other page, the box and the song both go away.

I’m reluctant to say it, but this actually isn’t a horrible idea. It may be one of Yahoo’s first moves that does something to add value into its search product — a novel concept. Will it get people to switch over from Google? Likely not. But it might get them to use Yahoo a handful of times a month for music-specific searching, and that’s at least something.

In any event, it reeks far less of desperation than Microsoft’s “we’ll pay you to use our search engine” idea.

Yahoo Offers Streaming Music Within Search is a post from: The Inquisitr

Playing off the same concept, 8tracks lets you upload up to 30 minutes of music into a custom playlist, which can then be publicly shared with other users. You can search for music using artists, genres, or usernames.

So how is this legal while Muxtape ran into trouble? Muxtape was hosting the files without any type of license agreement or royalty plan, according to the Recording Industry Association of America. 8tracks, in contrast, says it has licenses with ASCAP, BMI and SESAC for the “public performance of musical works.” As such, it does pay a set per-play royalty rate — about one-seventh of a cent per track streamed, according to its owners.

8tracks is very transparent about the whole thing, providing a detailed explanation of the cost and how it can afford it:

“At current royalty rates, the hourly cost per user is just over $0.02 per listener per hour in 2008, increasing to nearly $0.03 per listener per hour in 2010. This means that 8tracks must earn a net CPM from advertising of at least $20 in 2008 (i.e., $20 per 1000 ad impressions = $0.02) and nearly $30 in 2010 (i.e., $30 per 1000 ad impressions = $0.03) to cover the cost of streaming sound recordings. In addition, 8tracks pays musical works royalties to ASCAP, BMI and SESAC, which generally comprises 3%-5% of revenues.

8tracks is taking 2 steps to reduce its royalty liability so can sustain itself as a business. First, it is opting into a Small Webcaster license offered by SoundExchange (at the request of Congress). This license provides for royalty payment on the greater of a percentage-of-revenue or percentage-of-expense basis, subject to a minimum fee, which will allow us to grow our user base – and our potential for advertising – before having to pay the more onerous compulsory rates owed on a per song, per listener basis.

Second, 8tracks is seeking direct licenses with independent record labels and artists who generally see greater promotional value in internet radio – given relatively few alternative channels for exposure – and are thus more willing to consider the percentage-of-revenue terms common to all other forms of radio (traditional, satellite, cable).”

8tracks has apparently been around since 2006 — who knew? David Porter, who used to head up online radio network Live365, formed it with six other people. It’s based in both New York City and San Francisco.

8tracks: Muxtape, Without the Legal Muckiness is a post from: The Inquisitr