Apple app’s epic fail on Rhapsody

Tue,03 Nov 2009 07:14 GMT -4:00 http://www.p2pnet.net/story/30555

news view Mobiles | Music:- RealNetworks’ Rhapsody hitched an iPhone app to its waggon in early September and it’s been downloaded more than half a million times since then, according to GigaOm.

But, it goes on, “the early evidence shows that Rhapsody’s subscriber base isn’t expanding as a result — it’s shrinking.

RealNetworks boss Rob Glaser admits the company has “not yet seen a significant number of new subscribers” as a result, says the story.

RealNetworks put its subscriber base at the end of the third quarter ast “somewhere north of 700,000, down from 750,000 during the previous quarter and 800,000 in the first three months of the year,” it states, going on »»»

The dwindling subscriber base suggests that Rhapsody’s paying customers are either switching to other services — possibly because the price point of such services has fallen — or opting to use free streaming services, legal or otherwise.

Such numbers don’t bode well for any music service expecting to rely on mobile apps to give their revenues a shot in the arm. European startup Spotify is dangling a mobile app that only works for paying customers in front of its free users in the hopes that it will get enough subscribers to cover the cost of its free streams, but recent estimates suggest that its conversion rate is still below 2 percent.

“RealNetworks’ overall net revenue from music, including Internet radio subscriptions, MP3 sales and other channels, dipped to $38.8 million in the latest quarter from $40.5 million during the previous quarter,” GigaOm adds.

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