MySpace to Enable Users to Sell Songs

Shawn Fanning, whose Napster software upended the music industry in 1999, will provide technology that enables musicians on MySpace to sell songs directly to fans -- and even for fans to sell to one another.

When the tentatively dubbed MyStore launches this year, bands will be able to price and sell songs in the MP3 format, which works on Apple Computer Inc.'s popular iPod players as well as rival devices powered by Microsoft Corp. software.

Although the service is aimed at independent acts, MySpace is in talks with all four major music labels to possibly offer the works of big-name artists. As with many new forms of online distribution, the big labels are waiting to see how well the technology works before striking deals.

"This is a huge step," said Terry McBride, chief executive of Nettwerk Productions, one of Canada's largest independent record labels. "Now, fans will be able to genuinely recommend music to their friends that people can buy."

One of McBride's acts, the Format, is among the first to offer 79-cent downloads on MySpace. The Arizona-based band lost its Warner Music Group deal last year after releasing a 2003 album, "Interventions and Lullabies," but it has established a fan base on MySpace, where it posts tour dates and music videos.

Fanning's company, Snocap, spent four years creating the technology that enables artists to register their music and collect payment no matter where on the Internet a person downloaded a song. It will also enable fans to sell their favorite bands' tracks on their own MySpace pages, with a portion of the proceeds going to the artists.

San Francisco guitarist Shelley Doty, for instance, already uses Snocap's technology on her website. The singer of "Don't Miss This Ride" can set her own price and sell her music to fans.

"She can add tracks at will," Snocap Chief Executive Rusty Rueff said. "She can change the price at will. The coolest thing is the instantaneous side, the immediacy of bringing together creation and distribution like it's never been done before."

MySpace allows people to create personal Web pages and then link to circles of "friends." In addition to teenagers posting their photos or poetry, bands and movie producers create MySpace pages to promote their wares -- frequently attracting tens of thousands of friends.