iriver dances to the tune of Rhapsody

iriver dances to the tune of RhapsodyRealNetworks and iriver have announced the launch of the clix Rhapsody, a version of iriver’s portable media player which is optimized to integrate with Real’s subscription-based digital music service. The new features focus on music discovery, such as automatic updates that deliver personalized play-lists each time a user connects to the service, as well as the ability to rate songs, albums and artists directly on the device. The partnership follows a similar arrangement between Real and SanDisk for the later’s Sansa Rhapsody player.

It’s interesting to see a number of hardware manufacturers align themselves so closely with Real, in an attempt to create devices which work seamlessly with the Rhapsody service. The upside is, in theory at least, that — like with iPod/iTunes — the user experience should be greater as both companies can control all of the pieces and fully integrate the hardware and software. This is also the reasoning behind Microsoft’s abandonment of its ‘PlayForSure’ partners when the company launched its Zune platform. The downside is a lack of choice for consumers, where each device is tied to a single paid-for music service. However, the success of Apple’s iPod strategy would suggest that users will take ease-of-use and simplicity over choice, anytime, and that’s assuming that most people get their music from paid-for digital music services in the first place. Which, of course, we know they don’t.

(CrunchGear and Gizmodo both have a review of the clix Rhapsody)

last100 is edited by Steve O'Hear. Aside from founding last100, Steve is co-founder and CEO of Beepl and a freelance journalist who has written for numerous publications, including TechCrunch, The Guardian, ZDNet, ReadWriteWeb and Macworld, and also wrote and directed the Silicon Valley documentary, In Search of the Valley. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.

2 Responses to “iriver dances to the tune of Rhapsody”

  1. I really miss my iriver hard drive player, which was perfect. Unfortunately the line, which kind of looked like an iPod had iPods been Battlestar Galactica props, has been discontinued, and it looks like their new players require a software install on your desktop. (From their website: “The players contents will be erased when converting from MTP to UMS and vice-versa.”)

    This is why I won’t buy an iPod: I just want something that works like a hard disk and plays everything I throw at it.

  2. slot pulsa says:

    pengalaman pengguna harus lebih besar karena kedua perusahaan dapat mengontrol semua bagian dan sepenuhnya mengintegrasikan perangkat keras dan perangkat lunak. Ini juga merupakan alasan di balik ditinggalkannya Microsoft atas ‘slot deposit pulsa‘ mitranya ketika perusahaan

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