SEOUL KOREA - Samsung Electronics launched a radio-style music streaming service “Milk Music” on September 26. Milk Music passed the 2-million mark in cumulative downloads as of November 18, just 54 days after its launch.
YouTube also launched a music streaming service Music Key in seven countries, including the United States and the Britain, on November 17. This service allows users to enjoy music without advertising at a monthly fee of $9.90.
These services are good examples of showing the future direction of the music market in and outside Korea.Smartphone users, in general, prefer streaming services which enable them to enjoy an unlimited number of music tracks on a monthly fee basis, to existing pay-per-download services.
At Korea’s largest music site MelOn, for example, the percentage of download and streaming service users shifted from 30:70 in 2012 to 10:90 in October 2014. Such a share pattern also changed from 3:7 to 2:8 at another music site KT Music.
Article provided by The Korea Economic Daily
