Although Sweden-born streaming music startup Spotify has done well in Scandinavian countries it would appear to now have a local competitor in the shape of a new service launching in Norway.
Tech companies Aspiro and Platekompaniet have teamed up with telco Telenor to launch a music streaming service for Norwegian users. That’s all fine and dandy. However, someone there needs to go to marketing 101 classes as the service is called WiMP. Yes, I can just imagine myself “WiMPing out” at my Oslo pad listening to music …
Naming #fail aside, WiMP is launching with streaming deals with over 20 content providers for over 6.5 million songs, including the four major record companies and a number of smaller independent partners. These include Universal Music, Sony Music, EMI, Warner Music, Phonofile, Arts Pages, IODA, The Orchard, Beggars Group, Naxos, Vidzone and a few more.
Just as with Spotify, you can search for and discover new music, create playlists, favourites, and recommendations. It’s in Norwegian, obviously.
But aside form this being a vaguely interesting aside, it does rather pose a question for Spotify. If a local Scandinavian telco can come up with this, why can’t another telecoms provider?
Afterall, they have the billing relationship. Yes, there have been plenty of similar services from ISPs, however Spotify may in fact simply be starting to get people used to the idea of streaming music, rather than the company that ultimately benefits, with other players coming up later with the actual services that take off.
It can be tough out there on the bleeding edge.