Yahoo! Partners with Rhapsody After Dumping “Music Unlimited”

By Michael Santo
Executive Editor, RealTechNews

We already knew, though quietly, that Yahoo! was dumping its Yahoo! Music Unlimited service (from last week’s Yahoo! earnings call). Today Rhapsody and Yahoo! announced a new music partnership.

From the press release:

In the coming months, Yahoo! Music Unlimited subscribers will be migrated to Rhapsody’s digital music service through a simple process that will convert Yahoo! Music Unlimited subscribers’ music libraries to Rhapsody. Current Yahoo! Music subscribers will have the opportunity to maintain their existing pricing tiers for a limited time period after migration to the Rhapsody service. Additional details will be communicated to Yahoo! Music subscribers closer to the date when account migration begins.

Looks like the transition will start toward mid-year. Also interesting is that today Yahoo! also announced the acquisition of FoxyTunes, a company that supplies a browser plugin that controls playback of both offline and web-based media players.

Also from the press release:

FoxyTunes’ functionality across multiple music sources and services also furthers Yahoo!’s goal to be more open.

Hmmm, more open? Now the question: Zune Marketplace anyone? - meaning what happens if the Microsoft deal goes through? Guess we’ll wait and see.