Sony unveiling iTunes rival tonight?

By Tom Bramwell Published 1 September, 2010

Hour-long conference at IFA 2010.

Sony Europe is hosting a press conference at the IFA 2010 technology show in Berlin this evening where it may unveil a new music and video subscription service.

That's according to the Financial Times (thanks Kotaku), which yesterday claimed that the new service would replace Sony's Connect music store and start life on PlayStation platforms before graduating to Bravias, Vaios and so on.

Sony boss Howard Stringer has made it clear that he sees PlayStation Network as key to the company's future, describing it as the firm's "not-so-secret weapon" during a speech in February.

The IFA event is a trade show for consumer electronics and home appliances, and according to Sony's press website its hour-long conference will be held tonight at 5pm CET. Attendees are invited to "Re-discover entertainment experiences from Sony" during the event.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000. Follow him on Twitter.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (38) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • photoboy #1 2 years ago

    Well that won't be hard. iTunes has to be the absolute worst piece of software I have ever seen. It's sluggish, unresponsive, hides messages in that stupid faux-dot matrix screen at the top and is almost impossible to easily migrate from one Windows install to another (and I've tried several times). It's no wonder I still use Winamp...

    I've got a quad-core overclocked to 4GHz and it's still often unresponsive. I reckon Apple just shove a bunch of NOP loops in the code to make the Mac version look better.

  • uzivatel #2 2 years ago

    Sounds bit like Zune.

    edit: -6? I guess it does not sound like Zune to many people here on EG.
    Edited by uzivatel at 01/09/10 @ 14:18

  • d00dl #3 2 years ago

    Hope Sony actually put some effort into this one then people might actually take it seriously. I'm all for taking on iTunes but Sony really need to go for it. Come on Sony! I remember when everyone use to want a Walkman and then they lost the plot quite a bit by trying to push ATRAC for digital audio.

  • linksdad #4 2 years ago

    Cant wait to see what rootkits and other unsolubrious features sony's software includes.

  • coolbritannia #5 2 years ago

    Sony software. No thanks, was burned by minidisc.

  • StooMonster #6 2 years ago

    Sony are obviously trying to steal Apple's thunder.

    However, the last minute nature of this announcement makes me wonder how complete an offering they will demonstrate.

  • jack_klugman #7 2 years ago

    photoboy: +1

    Isn't it Apple's iPod / iTunes refresh announcement tonight? Talk about timing.

  • Lee_Morris #8 2 years ago

    This is the exact thing Pacter said he could see coming to the 360 along with a $100 premium version of live. If this is true it wll almost certainly be a PSN+ service and I'll probably end up dropping the cash. Especially after getting £60 worth of PSN cards for £45 from Zavvi.

  • jonbwfc #9 2 years ago

    Stoomonster - Sony are obviously trying to steal Apple's thunder.

    Yup, undoubtedly so. However, showing Sony management's usual fine grasp of PR, they're going to be announcing another music sales shop/Something that's not as good as Spotify at the same time Apple (if you believe the rumours) are going to launch a whole new range of iPods, .99 movie rentals and Apple TV as an IOS compatible device for your TV for 75 quid.

    I'd imagine the best word to describe Sony's press conference would be 'tumbleweed', unless they manage to get the Beatles to reform or something.

    Edited by jonbwfc at 01/09/10 @ 09:18

  • Dizzy #10 2 years ago

    Oh noes... not *another* competitor to iTunes?

  • bad09 #11 2 years ago

    I'd be extremely interested if they offered DRM free video that I could use as I wished on whatever hardware I wished, no one is offering that yet (well except the torrent sites of course).

  • nuanimal #12 2 years ago

    More competition in digital distributipn please!

  • Toothball #13 2 years ago

    Well, I'm curious to see what they do with it. I've been considering getting on board an mp3 download store but have yet to find one that appeals to me. If they DRM it up though I'm not interested.

  • StooMonster #14 2 years ago

    @bad09: if the rumours are to be believed ... Apple, Sony, Google, et al are going down the streaming video route. i.e. worse than DRMed video as you'll have to pay-per-view.

    And what's new is that it's streaming television shows for $0.99 per episode per view (everyone and his dog has had some kind of streaming movie service before, as well as downloads). From the news today it looks like Apple will kick off with ABC and Fox on board.

    Edit: for clarity
    Edited by StooMonster at 01/09/10 @ 09:48

  • bad09 #15 2 years ago

    @StooMonster

    Oh that's pretty rubbish whatever happened to giving the customers what they want eh?

    Guess I'll just continue buying Blurays and torrenting my digital copies then, not paying for streaming!
    Edited by bad09 at 01/09/10 @ 09:49

  • StooMonster #16 2 years ago

    Aye, Sony's iTunes rival offering is apparently about streaming music, television, and movies ... DRM is so naughties.

  • drxym #17 2 years ago

    Ho hum, Sony relaunches yet another music / video / book service, probably to see it crash and burn like all the others. I think if they are to succeed I hope they have recognized that people don't just want to purchase music / videos / books from a Sony store to play on just a Sony device. Their service had better use industry standard formats (and where applicable) industry standard DRMs. If I buy a video from a Sony store I may well wish to take it and play it on some other device. The reverse holds true as well and that's how a platform grows. The likes of DIVX springs to mind as a decent cross platform format with DRM. For ebooks, then EPUB with Adobe Digital Editions is also well established.

    Keep things simple. Proprietary formats suck. Keep things as device agnostic as possible. Allow people using Sony devices to play content purchased from other participating stores. Allow people to take their content with them. That's the way to grow. There is no way Sony on its own can steal the cake from Amazon & Apple. It has to share with others and hopefully it will be to the benefit of consumers too when they recognize there is no reason they are locked into one service and one manufacturer for content.

    It's also worth mentioning that iTunes is a bloated slug piece of crap software. Once upon a time it was a neat music ripper with store on the side. Now its pure bloatware. The difference in speed between iTunes and the similarly designed Songbird shows how bloated and slow it has become. If Sony's store is to survive they've got to learn that people don't like crapware and iTunes has become crapware and something of an albatross around Apple's neck.
    Edited by drxym at 01/09/10 @ 10:17

  • Chazmeister #18 2 years ago

    Well I still use iTunes for ripping my CD's to MP3 and listening to music on my PC, can't say I've ever had any major complaints about it. I've got an old P4 3.00Ghz PC that's about 5-6 years old and iTunes still runs fine for me and hey, it's free. I don't know if they've changed but Windows Media Player would only rip to wma format unless you were willing to pay $10 for the MP3 codec plugin. As for Sony, their first attempts at getting on the MP3 bandwagon were woeful. Their software only ripped to their proprietary audio format which was also the only thing their devices would play.

  • bad09 #19 2 years ago

    @EarlBassett

    have to agree there about the virus thing, I was most annoyed the other week when my girlfriend put ITunes on my PC to do a playlist on her Ipod and it decided to scan my entire drive for anything it could add to itself and then it decided I should use it to play all my media!

  • des #20 2 years ago

    flop

  • xandoodle #21 2 years ago

    @photoboy "almost impossible to easily migrate from one Windows install to another (and I've tried several times)"

    You really must struggle finding the power button on your computer if you can't manage to do this...

  • AliRay #22 2 years ago

    This is gonna be HILARIOUS.

  • makeamazing #23 2 years ago

    I generally like iTunes, what i dont like is that as a service you have to look after your own files. Unlike DD games services which allow you to get access to your stuff (like Steam), if Sony did a music service which i could access anywhere and still get access to content that I've purchased, then i would be all over it to be honest.

  • StooMonster #24 2 years ago

    Hilarious that my "Sony are obviously trying to steal Apple's thunder" comment has gone from positive to down-vote, and jonbwfc's post too.

    Ages ago Apple announce an event to launch new products one of which is a rumoured to be a new streaming media service.

    The day the Apple announcement is due, maybe even the night before, Sony PR announce an hour-long conference a couple of hours before the Apple one rumoured to be announcing their new streaming service.

    So that's not attempting to steal thunder? I'm sure it will be as successful as Steve Ballmer with HP Slate just before launch of iPad. Have they even managed to get a senior person there in time to give the presentation?

  • Ryze #25 2 years ago

    Sony wont be able to make an iTunes rival that works properly.

  • SpaceMonkey77 #26 2 years ago

    Doubt anything will come of it. Sony after all these years haven't learned the lesson in this area. Even the PSP still can't run a DivX file, and be open to formats when strangely PS3 is the opposite.

    All they'll probably do is mix Connect into PSN, allow users to buy music etc. Success does indeed hang on decent pricing and decent format options.

  • jefranklin18 #27 2 years ago

    @drxym: If I buy a video from a Sony store I may well wish to take it and play it on some other device. The reverse holds true as well and that's how a platform grows. The likes of DIVX springs to mind as a decent cross platform format with DRM. For ebooks, then EPUB with Adobe Digital Editions is also well established.

    In fairness, the Sony eReader does allow you to use EPUB format ebooks, along with PDF and others. I have been looking at getting an e-reader for the train, but the only one that matches my requirements (automatically downloads a daily newspaper of my choice with no user interaction) is the Amazon Kindle which uses its own format, and even worse uses world editions of UK newspapers.

  • drxym #28 2 years ago

    @jefranklin18 Yes Sony do seem to have garnished a little bit of a clue but they're not the whole way yet. For example they announced with much fanfare about 18 months ago being part of a consortium which would produce cross platform videos. What the hell happened to that? Sony licences DIVX in the PS3 but doesn't use it for its store downloads and I haven't see much movement elsewhere.

    The situation is a mess. To be fair to Sony they have bitten the bullet with their Sony Reader devices. EPUB + Digital Editions is a good solution. I would be far more tempted to buy a Read over a Kindle (for example) because of it. I recognize many people hate DRM altogether but reality suggests it will not go away, so given that at least the DRM and file formats should be cross platform and device neutral.

  • StooMonster #29 2 years ago

    Note the article: subscription service, not purchase to own.

    Current rumours are Apple, Amazon, Google and Sony are going to offer streaming services for content (e.g. television programme rentals).

    DRM, portability between devices, "I wish I could download in DivX", are all irrelevant ... content owners and service providers are planning on switching to streaming. So they can charge per view, and attempt to tackle piracy (again). I wouldn't be surprised to see streaming books one day soon.

    Guess we'll see later this PM with Sony then Apple's announcement.

  • StooMonster #30 2 years ago

    Qriocity (pronounced "curiosity";) on demand streaming music and movies, launched in Europe this Autumn. Natch!

  • AOFanboi #31 2 years ago

    "New service - now with ATRAC4! No, 5!"

  • KarlosFandango #32 2 years ago

    How about gapless playback please? How hard can that be on the most powerful console ever???

  • Seehuusen #33 2 years ago

    Im runing itunes with a windows system, working perfectly for me, actually changed from using other media players to using itunes because it was simple and quick, so it's probably just software issues for you guys.

    I bet most of the anti-itunes comments here are coming from people that never even used the service, but heard about it and likes bashing it for whatever reasons...

    Still think it's gonna be a fail from Sony, who the hell wants to use the PS3 for an itunes-like service ? you wouldnt even be able to hear it since there's too many kids on the console screaming into them, because game developers do not use push-to-talk in games....bloody idiots...

  • callum9999 #34 2 years ago

    Who cares if Sony is attempting to steal Apples thunder. Apple can look after themselves, they can do with some proper competition (this announcement won't necessarily be serious competition, but if it isn't then apple has nothing to worry about).

  • Chazmeister #35 2 years ago

    @EarlBassett & bad09

    Earl you can configure iTunes so that you don't have to see all the advertising etc when you load up. I have mine so that it just opens up straight away into my music library and as I don't shop on the iTunes store I have all of that stuff switched off, so I see no ads or any of that, just my music collection. Doesn't take more than 20 seconds to start up either, and as I've said, that's on a 5-6 year old PC.

    And bad09, well your girl friend just wasn't paying attention whilst she was installing it as you can skip the media search and configure the file associations yourself, if indeed you want it associated with any files at all. I guess your girlfriend just isn't much of an IT expert.

  • King_of_Hyrule #36 2 years ago

    iTunes opens in about 3 seconds on my imac, what are you guys going on about? The windows version is a bit slower but still pretty fast if you set it up right (disable the store etc) You just need to pay some attention when you install it, so it doesn't take over all the file extensions, as you have to do for pretty much any media player.

  • Sunyavadin #37 2 years ago

    Eh. I like Amazon's offering. A few pence to get a direct download link in my browser for a plain simple mp3 I can do what I like with.

  • Kaminari #38 2 years ago

    About time. Or is it too late.