The Amazon iPod
A story in today's Wall Street Journal: Amazon Plans Music Service to Rival iTunes details Amazon's plan to roll out a digital music service this summer. It is likely that Amazon's service will be centered around a branded digital music player (probably made by Samsung), and unlike iTunes offer an all-you-can-eat monthly subscription plan.
It will certainly be an uphill climb for Amazon. Apple has the player of choice and years of experience selling digital music. However, Amazon has some things going for them. In particular I like how they are always innovating. First of all, they have a great web services API that makes all sorts of web 2.0 style mashups possible. They are always thinking about new ways to hook people up with content. Their "Search Inside" feature, "statistically improbable phrases", and text stats such as words per dollar give their customers other ways of exploring content. Amazon's recommendation engine is one of the better one's I've experienced. (Despite the problems with scabs, breasts and Coldplay).
So far, the iTunes alternatives have been mainly hampered by the fact that their content won't run on the iPod. Amazon will have that problem too, but with their name recognition and a