Radio and Internet Newsletter is a daily compilation of news (plus essays, commentary, and resources) designed to help you better understand the Internet and its potential impact on radio -- both the dangers it presents and the opportunities it offers. We hope you find it valuable.

ABC launches 'ePrep' service: "The Internet-based show prep service will provide affiliates with a daily collection of music, movie and TV news, along with celebrity birthdays, almanac and biography information, tour dates and audio. All of it can be downloaded by affiliates for immediate use on morning show broadcasts..."

Click here for the story in R&R (subscription required) or the banner ad above to go to ABC's site.

BY KURT HANSON
In yesterday's issue of RAIN, we wrote about a promotional offer at eMusic.com, in which if you buy $50 worth of downloadable MP3 music from the site, they'll throw in the latest version of RealJukeboxPlus (worth $29.95) and an 32 meg RaveMP portable MP3 player (which they claim is worth $215), including shipping. (The current, 64 meg version of the MP3 player is pictured below.)

We noted that one possible catch to this apparently irrational offer is that it's limited to the first 5,000 customers -- so by the time you successfully submit your order, it's theoretically possible that the promotion could be over. ("Thanks for your purchase, but sorry, you're customer number 5,001+, so there's no MP3 player for you!")

Well, here's an update: As it turns out, they've been running this offer for over two months! (Click here to read a September 30th article about the launch of the promotion.)

Do you see what this implies? It implies that eMusic, which sells MP3 downloads from independent record labels (at $.99 per track or $8.99 per album), can't find 5,000 people who'll pay $50 to get $200 worth of stuff! (You'd think you could readily find people who'd pay $50 to get RealJukebox and a Rave MP player. But then if you offer to throw in $50 worth of MP3 downloads to sweeten the deal, they apparently change their mind!)

This does not bode well for the concept of downloadable music.

As for me, as I tried searched through eMusic's site trying to find $50 worth of MP3 tracks that I wanted to buy, I realized that I'd rather pay a couple of bucks more to get a shiny CD inside a jewel box with artwork and lyrics (knowing I could later download in an MP3 file on my computer if I want to) than only the MP3 file.

As we previously noted, eMusic recently bought the Chicago-based music portal Tunes.com for $144 million in stock. According to industry reports, Tunes.com had revenues of $1.3 million in Q3 1999. That doesn't seem like much, given the company's $144 million valuation. But, on the other hand, eMusic had Q3 revenues of only $180,000! (Meanwhile, it's listed on the NASDAQ with a market capitalization of $500 million.!) (Source: The May Report, an e-mail newsletter about Chicago high-tech issues.)

"To Infinity, and beyond!"  "Want to bet on the Net?" asks The Industry Standard. "Consider investing in radio stations."

"San Franciscans live in a dot-com sea. Billboards for Internet companies flank Highway 101 into San Francisco like trees in a forest. Up above the Maze – a twist of highways and on-ramps approaching the Bay Bridge – an airplane circles, towing a banner ad for EarthWeb.

"And imagine the view from the plane: thousands of cars, each with a car radio tuned to a station littered with Net company advertising. It's a view that Wall Street has come to appreciate. Even to the Internet's true believers, no Net company seems a clear winner at this early stage.

"But the car radio's another story. That's where a real Net winner is revealing itself: radio giant Infinity Broadcasting. Online companies have gone into a frenzy..." For the full article, writen by The Street.com and published in The Industry Standard, click here.


Zims to Co-Pilot Internet Start-Up
The Gavin Report's senior editors Keith and Kent Zimmerman, who built its Triple A and Jazz/Smooth Jazz departments, are leaving Gavin to found "a new Internet entity that will deal with music, radio, and business-to-business applications," the Gavin website reported yesterday.

"According to the Zimmermen, the company is prepared to close its first round of funding, after which a full staff will be hired....Specific details about the company will be announced early in the year 2000." Click here for the full story from the Gavin website.



For more news stories from the past few days, click here.

To give us your feedback about this newsletter, click here.

Day-trade