Magnatune

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Magnatune is a small record label that distributes music under a Creative Commons license. It sells music mostly for download through its website. Magnatune makes non-exclusive agreements with artists and gives fifty percent of download purchase price to its artists [1]. These kind of policies were very rare among record labels in 2003-2004. Users can stream and download music in mp3 form without charge before making a buying decision. All music is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license from the Creative Commons [1].

Even though using liberal licensing is not a new idea in itself, Magnatune was one of the first and most visible companies to do this in 2003-2004. It is not yet clear whether consumers will want to buy download-only music without CDs, and if this model produces enough profits for Magnatune to run a healthy business.

External links

• Magnatune.com is the official homepage of Magnatune.
• Buckman (founder/owner of Magnatune) 2004-02-01: Magnatune, an Open Music Experiment. In Linux Journal, issue 118.