SAN DIEGO – European artists have long realized the value in exporting and distributing music to an American audience. And today’s artists are increasingly turning to the Internet as their method of choice for reaching audiences abroad. Unfortunately, these artists’ local
fans are often left out in the cold, as access to online music has lagged
behind U.S. alternatives.
Language barriers and a lack of localized content have made navigating
music web sites problematic and uninteresting for many European music fans.
But now, an online Music Service Provider has launched French, German and
Spanish translations, allowing fans to access a vast catalog of MP3s and
music-related services in their native language for the first time.
“MP3.com gives us a great means for distributing music to an international
audience,” said guitarist Alejandro Otaola of Spanish rock group Santa Sabina
(www.mp3.com/santasabina). “It is wonderful that Spanish and non-English
speaking fans can have easier access to our music. And we hope that greater
exposure will lead to more payments through MP3.com’s Payback for Playback
program ( www.mp3.com/payback ).”
International artists are already well represented on the Internet. Over
19,000 European artists are currently utilizing the Internet to distribute
their music. The introduction of foreign language web sites is expected to
broaden and simplify the reach of those artists to music fans by creating more
language-friendly offerings.
“This represents an incredible engineering effort requiring months of work
and the translation of more than 1.5 million pages,” stated Michael Robertson,
chairman and chief executive officer of MP3.com. “Over 698,000 legally
authorized songs are available for free downloading and it’s exciting that
international consumers are now gaining greater access to music.”
The launch of the new German (deutsch.mp3.com), French (francais.mp3.com)
and Spanish (espanol.mp3.com) offerings coincide with the opening of MP3.com’s
(Nasdaq: MPPP) international headquarters in London. Spearheading the
company’s strategic international initiative, MP3.com has appointed Carolyn
Kantor MP3.com’s international president. Kantor previously served as the
company’s senior vice president of strategic transactions.
“MP3.com’s international expansion is significant,” said Kantor. “The translated sites will mean greater ease of use for the international community of music fans and broader exposure for digital artists. The German, French and Spanish sites are available to music fans now
and I encourage artists wishing to distribute their music via the power of the
Internet to visit www.mp3.com/newartist .”
