Universal next in line to rival iTunes

This from Financial Times today, Universal Music is backing a new service called SpiralFrog which will allow consumers to download songs for free and instead rely on advertising (and Spyware!?!) for revenues. When the site goes live this December, customers will be able to download an unlimited number of songs to their computer and to one other device. The article doesn't specifically list the ipod as the "other device" and I have to assume that this will go a long way to determing the success of this venture. Safeguards are also in place to prevent burning CDs of the downloaded material, and if the customer does not pay monthly visits to SpiralFrog, access to their downloaded material will freeze. This is definitely something worth watching, there are still roughly 40 illegal downloads for every legal download, and you have to expect that with Universal on board, other majors will follow suit.

9/6 UPDATE: EMI has just joined in on the fun.

[More from Reuters/USA Today]