Cricket is doing this by adding services to its plans. Today they announced one such premium service. Muve Music is an unlimited music plan that allows Cricket customers to stream and download music right to their phones. It’s not perfect, but it certainly does add value to Cricket’s offerings.
That’s the Samsung Suede, which will be the only device to support Muve Music from the get-go. It’s a touchscreen device that is basically tailored to the music platform. This includes services such as Shazam, which recognizes songs, My DJ, which suggests songs based on what you’ve already downloaded, and shout, which lets you broadcast your impeccable music tastes to your friends. It will cost $199 at launch.
As for the service, it sounds like it could work. The music library doesn’t figure to be huge, since Cricket has a deal with mostly big labels. That leaves out a lot of long tail music, which will disappoint many fans. But I’m sure that Cricket is going for the popular songs anyway. They say the songs aren’t DRM-protected, but that’s probably a semantic statement. The songs are stored on a protected SD card, so you can’t listen to them on any devices other than the Suede. And once you stop paying for the service, the songs are gone.
If you want to look a bit deeper into Muve Music, check out
PC Magazine’s early hands-on. They note both the good and the bad, which should help you decide whether this service will work for you. Again, it will be available in January, after Cricket puts it on display at CES. ]]>
