Music industry likes mobile charging

25 Nov 2001 at 19:37 GMT Timo Poropudas

Cross promotion is the key for future cooperation between music and mobile industries. Barney Wragg, Vice President Of Advanced Technology for eLabs of the Universal Music Group, hopes to enlist the help of wireless industry in protecting the rights of music owners.

In his presentation to Nokia Mobile Internet Conference in Barcelona Mr. Wragg came out strongly for the protection of artists rights. According to him the music industry suffers from collective ignorance that leads to stealing music by people who think that it does not matter. He says that digital value chain models disregard part of the true value chain of music, but it will not work in the long run. Only those who contribute value will be paid and whose who insert themselves into the chain without contribution, like Napster, will fade away.

Wragg points out that in the mobile industry customers are used to paying for their services unlike in the Internet environment. He is hoping that mobile industry will be a strong support pillar artist’s right with digital rights management technology.

Music industry can offer mobile operators and content aggregators huge cross collateral potential. “Music is more than music”, he says meaning that music and its creators and performers have tremendous brand value that can be exploited by the mobile industry.

Online music can be delivered via wireless devices or, in case of hi fidelity music, managed by mobile networks. There is split demand for music, Wragg says. On the one hand there is increasing demand for easy access, low quality music such as ringtones. At the same time consumers are willing to pay for extremely high quality music delivered, for instance, via DVD.

Wragg expects that future will bring to mobile networks both ala carte music and subscription based music services. Setting up micro payment system is a common task for both industries. The goal is to set up music delivery in ubiquitous manner so that consumers can have their music delivered the same way via any network.