MSN Enters Music Store Race

MSN Music, Microsoft’s online music store, bolsters the company’s digital media strategy by providing a high-profile distribution channel for content that uses the Windows Media Format and its accompanying digital rights management (DRM) technology. Microsoft has entered this unproven business primarily to meet a threat to its digital media platform from Apple, but faces a significant learning curve and risks alienating other online music distributors that currently use the Windows Media platform.

Risky Business

Most of Microsoft’s efforts in digital media have gone into building its platform technologies, such as the Windows Media Format and DRM; creating software that supports these technologies, such as the Windows Media Player and Encoder; and evangelizing this platform to content owners, device manufacturers, and end users. Although the company promotes its platform by offering free Windows Media content through MSN and other sites, it has generally stayed away from the business of selling digital media content—audio or video—to consumers.