Napster is offering single tracks for 99 cents and albums for $9.95

NEW YORK (TechNews Forums) - Napster, the pioneering song-swapping internet service, is returning to business on Wednesday after two years. A legal version of the service, renamed Napster 2.0, will become available to customers in the US who will now have to pay for downloading music.
The original Napster had 60 million users but was forced to close when record companies began legal action over copyright infringements.

Napster 2.0 is offering single tracks for 99 cents and albums for $9.95. There are no plans to launch in Europe. It will make available half-a-million songs which fans will be able to buy through a monthly subscription or one-off purchases. Napster was one of the first companies of its kind on the web but is now among a number offering the same basic service in a rapidly evolving online music business.

Online Battle:
Napster - 500,000 songs, 99 cents each
iTunes - 400,000 songs, 99 cents each
MusicMatch - 200,000 songs, 99 cents each

Apple launched its iTunes Music Store in the US for Macintosh users, and later made it available to PC users. Within four days, a million PC users had downloaded the software, the New York Times reported.

Another major player is Kazaa, an unlicensed service which has been accused of encouraging its users to download pirated music.

Wippit.com, a London-based file-sharing network, announced last week it had struck a deal to offer 100,000 tracks from the EMI catalogue.

Napster was bought last year by digital media company Roxio for $5m (�2.9m), with plans to launch a legal service but cashing in on the brand name. Napster's founder Shawn Fanning was brought back by Roxio to work as a consultant.
Online music sales are expected to grow from 1% of the total music market to 12% in 2008, generating about $1.5 billion in sales, according to Jupiter Research.