According to an early report in The Wall Street Journal, today Viacom-owned MTV will announce a partnership with RealNetworks, the parent company of the Rhapsody music service.
A full-length national conference call is planned for later this morning that should reveal all the details, but the leaked information is tantalizing. The report also claims Verizon Wireless and Vodafone will handle the wireless distribution component of the new initiative.
The early intel on the announcement includes no mention of Apple’s iTunes, so this move can reasonably looked at as the latest salvo from the music industry to break the stranglehold Apple has had on digital music distribution in the last few years. Just a couple of weeks ago we reported Universal Music’s decision to roll out its own DRM-free digital music challenge to iTunes. We’ll have to wait until later today to find out if the MTV/RealNetworks marriage will produce DRM-free tunes as well, but the anti-iTunes trend is something Apple CEO Steve Jobs will have to confront head on in the coming months.
Although the MTV/RealNetworks pairing “seems” like it would make sense, the cable network—now mostly programmed with reality shows, sitcoms and event broadcasts—stopped being a “music channel” years ago, so the supposed synergy of the venture is not as obvious as it might seem. MTV’s last stab at offering music was the failed Urge service, so while the partnership will momentarily boost RealNetworks’ profile versus Apple’s iTunes, there no reason at this point to expect a significantly different, more successful result from MTV when it comes to paving the way for digital music.
