Even bigger than the launch of Spiral Frog is the news that Amazon is due to launch a new music-download website, imaginatively named Amazon MP3. The service, which will offer tracks for as little as 89 cents, is the latest in a line of companies attempting to oust iTunes as the world’s premier music-download service.

Online-seller Amazon unveiled plans for Amazon MP3 this week, announcing a service with more than two million downloads available for users to buy, with albums going for between $5.99 and $9.99.

Users of Amazon MP3 will be able to play downloaded songs on any device, including Apple’s iPod, due to no copy protection being used on all files. This is likely to attract iPod users who currently pay $1.29 for each song from iTunes, which has a 70% share of the market at present.

Almost 20,000 record labels are behind Amazon MP3, and the world is waiting to see how Apple will respond to the launch of this and Spiral Frog. If it means cheaper music for all of us then it can’t be a bad thing. We’re excited about the launch of all these new services.

Whether or not another paid service can succeed when we all know how to download songs for free will be the real test for Amazon. The digital music market is worth some $2 billion, so people do still buy their music at least some of the time, although CD sales are at the lowest for years.

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