Mobile music now DRM free from Orange

Orange has announced a significant overhaul of its on-portal music offering. Music downloads for both on-line and mobile Web users will have no DRM.  The Orange Music Portal now offers over 700,000 tracks that users will be able to pay for, download and then do with as they please.

Orange has gotten the co-operation of major labels Universal Music and EMI Music for this deal, along with some smaller independent labels. It is also introducing a tiered pricing structure similar to iTunes, with track prices starting at 79p - that’s under one euro. The downloaded track is delivered to both your mobile and your PC, and after that it’s up to you where it goes.

From the release:

Paul Jevons, Director of Products, Portals and Services for Orange: “Orange is committed to providing customers with the widest access to music tracks and content. Upgrading the Music Portal and introducing DRM-free music helps customers enjoy music how and when they want. We look forward to enhancing the DRM-free music catalogue over the coming months.”

What we think?

It seems like just yesterday I was ragging on Oranges on-portal services. Wait, it was just yesterday. Then Orange have to go and do something genuinely user-friendly like this. Ok, so its months behind other services that have gone DRM free, but it’s still a good step. Services like this make me more hopeful that Orange exclusives on monster phones like the TG01 won’t go to waste.