David Hyman, who is well known in the online music business, kicked off the week by announcing a new on-demand music service designed for Apple iPhone and Google Android smartphone owners.
The MOG All Access Mobile service is expected to launch sometime in mid-2010 for $10 per month.
"Music has to be portable," said David Hyman, MOG CEO, who compared having a music subscription service without a mobile feature to "being told you can't take a book out of your house to read it."
Hyman was CEO of Gracenote in 2008, but sold the company to Sony for $260 million. He also co-founded Addicted to Noise in 1995.
It won't be a problem to get an Android app on the marketplace, but MOG is still unsure if Apple will approve the MOG Mobile iPhone app. Apple has been hesitant to approve apps that rival iTunes and other Apple-created services, keeping a tight fist their walled garden app ecosystem.
Rhapsody, Napster and other monthly subscription music services have been available for a few years now -- and have had varying levels of success among music listeners – while MOG All Access has been available for just $5 per month. According to Hyman, 17% of users who gave the service a try during a free three-day trial eventually signed up.
The company's current music service has 16 million subscribers listening to seven million songs that can be streamed to PCs.
I agree that music must be made portable to listeners, especially now that many people use their smartphones to listen to music. Pandora and other online radio stations have created custom apps for the iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, and other mobile platforms – although some PC-based online music companies have been hesitant to go mobile.
Are you interested in paying $10 per month to have streaming music to your iPhone or Android-powered device?
