Wal-Mart Stores is bringing cut-rate prices to the ever-more-crowded world of online music.

CNET ^ | March 23, 2004, 11:01 AM PST | Dinesh C. Sharma

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

   http://www.news.com/

Watch for falling music download prices

By Dinesh C. Sharma
Special to CNET News.com
http://news.com.com/2100-1027-5177937.html

Story last modified March 23, 2004, 11:01 AM PST

Wal-Mart Stores is bringing cut-rate prices to the ever-more-crowded world of online music.

On Tuesday, the mammoth chain retailer formally opened its online music store, from which customers can download music at 88 cents per song. That's 11 cents less than Apple Computer charges at its iTunes music store, which has been the pacesetter on this e-commerce track.

The Wal-Mart service allows customers to play downloaded music on Windows PCs, to burn songs to a CD or to transfer music to portable devices. Usage rights are uniform across the company's catalog of music. The retailer began testing the service in December and is working in partnership with Liquid Digital Media, formerly Liquid Audio.

The service includes a "download manager" designed to help customers retrieve full albums and groups of songs.

There's no shortage of companies that want to be the outlet for consumers looking to acquire songs online. Besides Apple, which last month said it was selling approximately 2.5 million downloads per week, the competition includes MusicMatch and the reborn Napster. Microsoft plans to enter the fray in the second half of the year.

Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal-Mart said it has an exclusive two-month deal with Curb Records, whose country music stars include Tim McGraw, LeAnn Rimes and Jodee Messina.

Related News
• Microsoft cues up Net music store  March 19, 2004
  http://news.com.com/2100-1027-5176411.html

• Apple's iTunes sales hit 50 million  March 15, 2004
  http://news.com.com/2100-1027-5173115.html

• Wal-Mart, Amazon fine-tune online music plans  December 18, 2003
  http://news.com.com/2100-1027-5128810.html

• Get this story's "Big Picture"
  http://news.com.com/2104-1027-5177937.html

[general_re]

Oh, no - it's the death of all those quaint mom-n-pop online music stores. Damn you, Wal Mart!

[Adam36]

So its 10 songs for like 10 dollars.
Give Walmart credit. I'v thought music stores should do this for a long time. Let people chose the songs they want. Now when they download the songs, is this MP3 or your getting CD quality.

[Adam36]

I read something that Walmart made 259 billion in sales last year. Can you believe that. 259 billion.
No one can compete with them.

[PRND21]

I wonder if the tunes will be "sanitized" like their movies.

[kcvl]

Wal-Mart's annual sales quadrupled from $55.5 billion in its Fiscal Year 1993, to $244.5 billion in FY 2003 (which ended Jan. 1, 2003).

Walmart says its sales yesterday(day after Thanksgiving-2003) set a single day record at just over 1.5 billion dollars.

Five members of Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton's family tied for the fourth spot(richest people), each with a net worth of $20.5 billion.

[zip]

ping

[Conservative4Ever]

Wal-Mart has seen the graffiti on the wall. The music industry is changing fast and looks like Wal-Mart is staying ahead of the curve.

Red

[Fledermaus]

No one?

Then I guess I'm hallucinating when I see Target, Kohl's, Lowe's, Home Depot, Costco, K-Mart, Sears, JCPenney, Dollar General, Fred's, Circuit City, Best Buy, The Gap, Heicht's, Dillard's, etc. open for business and full of customers.

[dennisw]

25¢ per tune is more like it.

[kcvl]

Oh yeah, I forget this part. At least, two of the "children," of the Waltons, are either alcoholics and/or drug users (as in cocaine)

1998-05-30
Springdale, AR

The 48 year old daughter of Sam Walton was found guilty on May 29th. of driving while impaired, failure to wear a seatbelt, and failure to maintain control of her car, and refusing to take a blood alcohol test.

Alice Walton, whom the media refer to as "the second richest woman in the nation" (her mother, Helen Walton is the richest), was charged with traffic violations in late January, when her late model SUV "careened off a road and destroyed a gas meter and telephone box," according to the Associated Press. Walton broke her nose in the accident.

A police report indicated that Walton told police: "You know who I am, don't you? You know my last name?"

Springfield city attorneys offered Walton a plea offer of $350 in fines, $300 in court costs, and two days of community service. Instead, Walton hired a public relations expert, at least two lawyers, and lined up 16 witnesses to testify at her trial. City Attorney Jeff Harper questioned Walton's decision to go to trial. "If she wins," he said, "she loses from a public relations standpoint."

Walton hired Arkansas lawyer Woody Bassett, a friend of President Bill Clinton. Walton claimed to be innocent of the DWI charge. Police at the scene gave Walton "an eye gazing test" that showed six signs of illegal intoxication. Alice Walton is scheduled to be sentence on July 2, and could face a year in jail and a fine of $1,000.

IIRC, she ended up paying the fine. She is a "horse enthusiast" who lives on a ranch in Texas (she is divorced).

[kcvl]

Their Sam's stores are already doing that. They teamed up with Murphy Oil in Arkansas (coming soon to a Wal-Mart near you).

[Diddle E. Squat]

LOL

[WhiteyAppleseed]

In 1935, Congress was trying to do something about the evils of the chain stores (Sears Roebuck, Montgomery Wards) that people saw as a threat to the smaller stores. I found a stack of old Congressional Records in an old house that my wife and I purchased to remodel. They had some legislation that had to do with enabling the small stores to band together and buy in bulk, enabling them to compete, the theory went, with the large stores.

Congress was also hearing from some homeowners who were trying to be compensated for fires that got out of control, set by government controlled railroads in 1918.

The more things change, the more they stay the same?

[greasepaint]

I love it when Walmart puts dopey little retail businesses,
out of business.
Perhaps the former owners of those places can become
contributing members of society by working at some
company doing something useful, such as Walmart.

[Boxsford]

did you see this?

[LanPB01]

I'm wondering where this idea that Wal-Mart "sanitizes" their movies came from. I've heard others say this, but as far as I know, Wal-Mart has NEVER altered the contents of the movies they sell in any way. The MPAA won't permit it. They do, however, offer clean versions of music.

[JasonC]

This is the first of these I've ever actually used - just now. All the others were too complicated, had all kinds of rules and requirements, or return addresses in Russia, etc. Here, I got exactly what I wanted and nothing I didn't, in minutes, for a good price, without any worries about who has my CC number or any other fiddly bits. Good for WMT.