Sprint ready to launch wireless music store

Sat Oct 29, 2005
Herald.com | 10/29/2005 | Sprint ready to launch wireless music store: "NEW YORK - Sprint Nextel is poised for a full-scale launch of its high-speed wireless network, a service that will include the first over-the-air music download store in the United States.

The newly merged cell phone company was planning a series of major announcements for Monday morning.

In advance of the announcement, Sprint Nextel distributed review units of a new cell phone equipped with EV-DO, the technology with which the company's network is being upgraded to offer speedier Internet connections and other data services.

The Samsung handset also featured a menu icon for music that leads to a service named ''Sprint Music Store'' offering music downloads from a wide array of genres for $2.50 per song. The purchase entitles a user to download a copy of the same song to a computer as well.

There already are a growing number of phones that can store and play music -- most notably the ROKR handset introduced last month by Motorola and Apple Computer to songs from Apple's popular iTunes store. But only a few overseas cellular operators have launched services where the music can be delivered directly to a handset over the air.

Sprint Nextel and Cingular Wireless have stated numerous times they plan to introduce speedier wireless data capabilities by the end of this year. Both companies have lagged far behind Verizon Wireless in deploying such capabilities for business usage on laptops and multimedia services on phones.

As a prelude to a full-blown launch, Sprint began turning on its EV-DO service at airports and business corridors in cities around the country during the summer."

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