Limewire the popular peer-to-peer music sharing platform, which is used by millions of people across the planet, has launched a new online music store.
The store will feature tracks available from just 50p each with a range of independent (random) artists. Limewire is well-known as the platform which allows its users to share free music, maybe this is its first move towards becoming a proper legal entity.
According to the guys from Tech Digest; "Around half-a-million MP3 files, encoded at a reasonably decent 256Kbps, are available, and users of the LimeWire application will soon see links to buy tracks as well as download free music as they usually do."
You will be able to pay on a per-track basis or for the more devoted music lover (up to 75 tracks a month) there will be three levels of monthly subscription allowing a set number of tracks to be downloaded, at a reduced track cost.
The LimeWire store is being kept separate from the LimeWire sharing application for now anyway
I think quite a few people in the music industry will be watching this one closely to see if its dedicated users will actually start paying for tracks rather than getting them for free.
Of course the real question is how is it going to stop its tracks from its paying site becoming free on its non-paying platform?
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