Magnatune
Magnatune is a small record label that aims at treating both its musicians and its customers fairly. It originally only sold music for download through its website magnatune.com, but added a print-CDs-on-demand service in late 2004. Magnatune was founded in spring 2003 by John Buckman, CEO of e-mail software company Lyris. Magnatune makes non-exclusive agreements with artists, and gives them fifty percent of any proceeds from online sales or licensing [1]. These kind of policies are very unusual for a record label in 2003-2004.
Users can stream and download music in mp3 form without charge before making a buying decision. All freely-available music is licensed under the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license from the Creative Commons [1]. Even though using liberal licensing is not a new idea in itself, Magnatune is one of the first and most visible companies to try to build a business in music around this idea. It is not yet clear whether this model produces enough profits for Magnatune to run a healthy business.
Magnatune artistsCargo Cult - an electronic musician, whose album consists of beat-driven and ambient styles.Roots of Rebellion - a hard rock group
External links Magnatune.com is the official homepage of Magnatune. Buckman (founder/owner of Magnatune) 2004-02-01: Magnatune, an Open Music Experiment. In Linux Journal, issue 118.
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