The appearance of Amazon MP3 in the music download market has finally provided a worthwhile challenger to iTunes—in the US. But what about the rest of the world? If comments we’ve received are any indication, Amazon MP3 is a non-starter outside of America, given that it’s just not available. That won’t be the case for long, however, as Amazon has announced that they plan to take the store worldwide in 2008.
Where? you may ask. And when? Well, according to Amazon’s press release: somewhere and sometime. 2008 is about as specific an answer as we’re going to get right now. But Amazon itself has country-specific sites in several other places, such as the UK and Japan, so it seems likely that those will be the first targets for the digital download market as well. iTunes, meanwhile, is available in twenty-two countries, including the US, so it still has a hefty lead on its rival.
Of course, we’ll have to wait to see what countries, as well as what kinds of prices Amazon will be offering, but if they can continue to offer competitive rates, this could make Amazon that much more of a serious competitor in the market.
One would think that with digital downloads, geographical locations wouldn't matter as much. Turns out I can actually order a CD from Amazon, but can't buy a digital song. Weird.