What wireless service do you have; “Can you hear me now” Verizon Wireless, “Raising the bar” Cingular or another service claiming to be better than all the rest? In an recent online Campus Press survey, between the two most popular providers 60 percent said they use Verizon, while 30 percent use Cingular.
This week Cingular announced that it would release a music service available for streaming download on their cell phones.
Cingular has teamed up with Yahoo!, Napster, eMusic and XM Satellite Radio. Cingular has designed its music service not as something new, but is allowing people to use their existing music services on their cellular phone.
“Although the ability to listen to music on the cell phone is not new, what is unique about Cingular Music is the ease of use and open access it provides to music-related content,” Jennifer Bowcock, a media representative for Cingular, said in a press release.
Cingular’s new service hopes to convince people to buy it by providing all different kinds of music services.
“Unlike other wireless carriers who provide access to a single music storefront that may or may not seamlessly integrate with a consumer’s PC-based music library, Cingular Music makes it easy to take your music with you and offers the widest selection of music content in the industry today,” Bowcock said.
The XM Satellite option for Cingular acts like its own radio and people can buy subscriptions that give them access to the entire set of XM channels.
Jordan Reeves, a freshman open-option major and a Verizon Wireless customer, says he would never use music on a phone, no matter the service.
“It seems pointless to have music on a phone,” Reeves said.
Verizon, a strong competitor of Cingular, offers its own mobile service called V Cast. Unlike the Cingular service, however, V Cast offers live TV from many popular channels like CNN and Discovery.
Verizon’s V Cast also has a music service, similar to the one Cingular offers.
“We have 1.4 million songs included with the V Cast service in the V Cast library. Any subscriber can just search through the library, and for $1.99 they can download a copy to their phone and PC,” said Bob Kelley, a representative for Verizon Wireless in Colorado.
Customers are also informed when V Cast gets new music.
“With music alerts, people are alerted to songs that are now in the library, so they know exactly when they can get the music they want,” Kelley said.
