RIM Prepping BBM-Based Music Service

The Wall Street Journal today reports that Research In Motion is prepared to unveil a new music service that takes advantage of its BlackBerry Messenger platform for social sharing purposes. The subscription service, which would cost less than $10 per month, would be billed to user wireless accounts and give them access to about 50 songs at a time that could be listened to on their handset and shared with others via BBM. The Journal's sources, which were cited as being "familiar with RIM's plans," said that the service isn't meant to compete against other music services such as Google Music, Spotify, or Rhapsody. Instead, it is meant to simply allow users to share music with friends. According to the New York Times, record companies will receive a piece of the monthly revenue generated by the service. Both the Journal and the Times suggest that the service could launch as soon as next week. RIM declined to comment on both the Journal's and Times' stories.

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