Microsoft mulls plan for new music service (exclusive)
The software maker has discussed with some of the major record companies about creating a music service to serve Xbox as well as an upcoming Windows-based phone. — Microsoft is in talks with some of the major record companies …
Context & Ripple Effects
Microsoft has circled music before without landing a durable consumer service: it mapped an Ignition platform meant to unify MSN, Xbox and Zune back in June 2007, struck an early DRM-free deal with EMI that same spring, and by February 2009 was still defending its music-subscription strategy with the labels. Each attempt stalled while iTunes consolidated downloads.
CNET now reports — and eight other outlets from Gizmodo to The Next Web picked up the same day — that Microsoft is again in talks with major record companies, this time for a service spanning Xbox and the next Windows-based phone. Nothing is signed; the report is explicitly at the discussion stage, and it lands amid a broader Microsoft reset that includes a confirmed 'complete reimagination' of Windows 8 and rumors around the next Windows Phone build ('Tango').
First-order effects
- The major record companies gain a fresh negotiating counterparty alongside Apple's store, with Microsoft seeking rights for a service tied to two of its own device lines rather than a standalone player.
- Xbox and the upcoming Windows Phone would ship with a first-party music offering baked in, giving Microsoft's hardware a bundled content hook that neither currently has as a unified service.
Second-order effects
- Apple faces a rival whose play is cross-device bundling — console plus phone plus PC under one subscription-style relationship — rather than competing track-by-track, pressing it to deepen its own device-services tie-ups.
- The fate of Zune, which the 2007 Ignition plan positioned as the hub of Microsoft's music ambitions, becomes an open question if a new Xbox-and-Windows-Phone service absorbs that role.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds across Microsoft's attempts since 2007, media services stop being products and become ecosystem glue — the console-to-service flywheel where hardware exists to carry recurring entertainment revenue.
- For the labels, a credible third major buyer of streaming/download rights beyond Apple reshapes licensing leverage industry-wide, though whether these talks convert into a launched service remains unconfirmed.
The trend: Consumer tech platforms are converging on bundled, cross-device entertainment services — consoles and phones as distribution rails for licensed music — with Microsoft making its third run at the model since 2007.