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Today, MySpace unveils the all-new MySpace Music alongside new BFFs: EMI Music, SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT, Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group (NYSE:WMG), and Sony ATV/ Music Publishing. 

Users can do all the playlist making, swapping, downloading, streaming, etc. to their hearts’ desires.  Expect to be enticed by MySpace Music partners McDonald’s, Sony Pictures, State Farm, and Toyota.  We can expect free downloads from Mickey D’s, State Farm playlists and Toyota Tuesdays where anything can happen.

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Sections: Audio, Web, Web 2.0, Websites, Online Music/Video

Nokia is poised to release its new “Comes With Music” phones on October 17th in Britain.  The phones will come with a subscription music service that will allow users to keep any song they obtain through it for 12 months.  The service will come with every phone, with nothing mentioned about payment.  So far, three major studios have signed on for the project: Universal, Sony BMG and Warner Music Group.  Seems like a fairly good push to start with.

According to the Reuters reports, the music companies are hoping this will diminish the popularity of Apple’s iTunes Music Store.  I don’t see why, but music publishers don’t seem to really like Apple too much lately.  Maybe they don’t like making slightly less money?  iTunes is the biggest music seller out there at the moment (well, in America at least, not too sure about worldwide), but this Nokia subscription plan may take a bit away from that.  If the iPhone and other lower-end phones have shown anything, it’s that people don’t mind listening to music on cellphones.

There are a few problems with the service that can be a bit off a turn-off with the service, though…

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Sections: Audio, Portable Audio, Communications, Cellphones, Web, Online Music/Video

Our sister site Gamertell has spotted an interesting freebie at Target retail stores. The chain is putting out a Speed Racer-themed gift card that comes with a 60+ MB USB 2.0 Flash drive built right in. It is one of those gift cards you fill with money to give to someone else, so it’s essentially free if you happen to forget to fill it before you take it home. (*wink*)

The Flash drive is preloaded with 50 MB of promotional files including the usual wallpapers, printable coupons, movie files and a videogame cheat code for the upcoming release of May 6, 2008, release of Speed Racer: The Videogame. You can, of course, keep or delete the files as you wish and simple have a nifty fat credit card sized Flash drive with a Speed Racer skin.

Read [Gamertell]

• Random Amazon game deals
• Scandalous Animal Crossing - Baabara the sheep’s catchphrase is the N-word
• Gamertell Review: Animal Crossing City Folk for Wii

National Geographic has announced that they will be joining the ranks of those who are now Blu-ray exclusive. This is certainly no surprise that National Geographic would make this decision as they are a subdivision of Warner. It does however continue the sad march to the dead pool for HD DVD. Of the Warner subsidiaries only BBC continues to holdout for non-exclusivity. The first title to be released as a Blu-ray exclusive will be the April release of Sharkwater which should get an official announcement in the next few weeks.

Read [Blu-ray.com]

• Sony giving away Qore Episode 7 for free
• Random Amazon game deals
• Deal of the Day: Buy Uncharted 160 GB PS3 bundle, get LittleBigPlanet free

If you are a heavy user of high-speed Internet, your happy days of peer-to-peer downloading might soon be over. Time Warner Cable, currently the second largest U.S. cable operator, plans to shift from the standard flat fee to a usage-based billing scheme.

The Internet subscribers in Beaumont, Texas are the chosen guinea pigs for the first trial run. The test is slated later this year but the terms had not been set yet.

Since video downloading and streaming are very popular nowadays, the cable operator claims this is a strategy to minimize network congestion. Moreover, it assured the public that its impact is very minimal for only 5% of all customers are considered heavy users. In fact, this new billing scheme is claimed to be very favorable for the majority of light users.

Other cable companies are quietly observing the results of this new pricing test. If proven effective without much hullabaloo, this could entice other players to adopt this scheme and abandon flat fee pricing totally.

Read [Reuters]

• Reality TV meets Symphonies and Youtube
• Easy Wi-Fi for AT&T temporarily free
• New .tel domain opens up

Sections: Computers, Web, Downloads