[Cc-hk] Google offers free music to China
Rebecca MacKinnon
rebecca.mackinnon at gmail.com
Thu Aug 7 01:04:54 EDT 2008
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2008/08/google-offers-m.html
Google offers free music to
China<http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2008/08/google-offers-m.html>
5:50
PM, August 6, 2008
[image: top100.cn]<http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/08/06/google.jpg>
In China, Baidu is the powerhouse, the "it" girl, the search engine to beat.
It's a treasure trove of music, most of it illegal. But Google may have
found a way to increase its market share there -- offering free music
legally.
The U.S. search giant launched a beta version of a Chinese music service
called Music Onebox, which is available only in China at www.google.cn.
"We are launching Music Onebox to give users an easy and legal way to find
the music they're looking for, and to give music labels and publishers a new
channel to distribute, promote and make money off of their valuable music
content," said a Google spokesperson.
The way it works: When visitors to Google's home page search for artists or
bands, they are directed to www.top100.cn <http://top100.cn/>, a music site,
to download or stream music. The site has financial backing from basketball
wonder Yao Ming. Yes, the very tall one.
Google said it would not share in the money made off of ads on the music
service. Instead, the ad money would be split between www.top100.cn and the
music labels and publishers.
The new service is a direct challenge to Baidu, at a time when Baidu is
under increasing pressure to pay up for facilitating music piracy, says
ArsTechnica<http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080806-google-china-takes-on-baidu-with-legal-music-search.html>.
At the moment, the selection on top100 is limited, says Music
2.0<http://www.music2dot0.com/archives/121>.
Google's Music Onebox is the YouTube model all over again, said Brian Zisk,
executive producer of the SanFran MusicTech Summit and technologies director
of the Future of Music Coalition: Make itself the center of media and then
try to figure out how to monetize it. Except in this case, Google is using
the lure of free music to draw people to Google.
"They are establishing their presence there," Zisk said. "One way or
another, they can turn it into money."
If Music Onebox works in China, why not here?
In the U.S., such a service is unthinkable right now because the U.S. market
still pays some of the music industry's bills. But in China, not so. The
music industry is willing to gamble there because it says to itself, "
'Well, we're not making money in China anyway,' " Zisk said.
*-- Michelle Quinn*
*Image of the Chinese music site top100.cn *
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Rebecca MacKinnon
Assistant Professor, Journalism & Media Studies Ctr.
University of Hong Kong (http://jmsc.hku.hk)
E-mail: rmack at hku.hk | Tel: +852-2219-4005
Blog: http://RConversation.blogs.com
Co-founder: http://GlobalVoicesOnline.org
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