While we here in the UK are getting ready for tomorrow’s launch (23rd January) of the Nokia 5800 on Regent’s Street, it’s not only us who should be rejoicing as the excellent music service Comes With Music will be spread out across Europe.
This means that you’ll be able to fill your Nok’s boots with good tunes, as long as it’s Comes With Music compatible – the full facts after this little two-step…
The UK has been making the most of Comes With Music since last October, and has you can read here, we’re been making the most of the service but not over-indulging. Now sorting out the licensing agreements for one country is tough enough so getting most of mainland Europe to sing from the same page must have been something of a nightmare.
Anyway, these are the agreements that Nokia has entered into pan European licenses for:
Universal Music Publishing Group, and the national collecting societies SACEM, SDRM, and SESAM (France), SGAE (Spain), and SIAE (Italy).
In addition, Sony/ATV Music Publishing and the Nordic societies STIM (Sweden), TEOSTO (Finland) and TONO (Norway) have also confirmed their participation in the Comes With Music Service across Europe.
Nokia has concluded a pan European license with CELAS/EMI Music Publishing in respect of Nokia’s download service, Nokia Music Store.
The service works by allowing you to download and keep music, as long as you have a Comes With Music compatible device and take out a 12 month contract to the service. OK, that’s reasonable you say but the really deal with this offer is that even if you don’t re-subscribe after the first year, you still get to keep the music. It’s a win-win situation, as Nokia gets to blow the download market apart and we get lovely lovely music wherever we go.
In other news, it’s expected that Singapore and Australia will also get the Comes With Music service within the first half of this year.