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Sony's Music Unlimited service lands on Vita

Color me unsurprised that Sony's PlayStation Vita just got its own app for the company's cloud-based Music Unlimited subscription service, since a similar offering for the PSP already exists.

Nonetheless, the first version of the app for Vita features excellent aesthetics with the complement of intuitive and thorough controls (see if you agree with me after watching the demo video below). Album art and channel listings clearly pop on the large OLED screen. I found it easy to scroll around, explore music, and save tracks "from the cloud" to a storage card.

Overall, the experience seems very mature for a service often left out of the music service conversation.

Speaking of saving tunes, the Vita Music Unlimited app supports offline playback through playlist/channel caching. Users of the Android version of the music service can now listen to music offline through Music Unlimited as well. … Read more

Music Unlimited coming to iOS

LAS VEGAS--Music Unlimited, a cloud-based streaming music service, is coming to iOS devices. Is this a sign that Sony is finally ready to offer its vast content ecosystem to devices outside of its own?

The free app will be available for Apple's various iOS devices, including the iPad, this coming summer. It will essentially offer the same functionality as the Android app, and the ability to cache playlists for premium users. Representatives today also noted that Music Unlimited's catalog is now around 15 million songs, after adding content from CD Baby.

Despite the good news, things are … Read more

Sony Walkman gets killer music locker service

Walkman owners now have the ability to transfer any song from Sony's 10 million-track Music Unlimited library to their device with no restrictions, as often as possible.

The only caveat is one must be a premium member (free 30-day trial) of the service, which normally costs $9.99 a month.

The no-advertisement Music Unlimited is available for the NWZ-A860, NWZ-S760, and NWZ-E460 series personal multimedia players. … Read more

Sony's music service adds Pandora-esque feature

A big update landed Monday for users of Sony's Music Unlimited streaming audio service, adding custom artist channels and an array of playlist updates for the PlayStation 3 client.

In our hands-on, the new My Channel feature on the Music Unlimited web site allowed me to create a custom channel by simply inserting an artist's name, as does Pandora. It was simple to setup, so I offered Radiohead and Drake to see how things would play out. According to Sony, the channel is created by "analyzing and categorizing musical traits of more than 10 million tracks" and offering an array of tracks relevant to the inputted artist's sound.

… Read more

Sony's Music Unlimited comes to Android tablets

Music Unlimited, the streaming-audio service from Sony, has recently become available for Android tablets.

Originally debuting on Android phones, the Music Unlimited catalog of more than 10 million tracks joins Spotify, MOG, Rdio, and Rhapsody as one of the premiere on-demand music providers for owners of Android tablets. Music Unlimited is available in the U.S., France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Spain, the U.K., Australia, and New Zealand.

Version 1.2 of Music Unlimited also ushers in compatibility with the Sony Tablet S, and an enhanced user interface. The updated UI enables several improvements: faster playlist creation; easier discovery of related artists/songs; quicker navigation between album and catalog views; and enhanced search results.

Sony offers two types of monthly subscriptions for Music Unlimited, including $3.99 basic and $9.99 premium plans. "Sony Tablet users who are first-time subscribers to the Music Unlimited service can get a 180-day trial of the Basic subscription plan," according to the press release. A 30-day free trial is available to anyone. … Read more

Questioning Sony's new class-action waiver

The Sony Network Entertainment has added a controversial change to its Terms of Service and User Agreement (PDF) for users of the PlayStation Network and the Sony Entertainment Network (Music Unlimited, Video Unlimited). In the revised terms, consumers must waive the right to participate in any class-action lawsuit filed after August 20 against the gaming and content delivery portion of Sony.

If you don't agree, then your PS3 can't get online or purchase media content from Sony. Future disputes between consumers and SNE must occur individually in court or through an arbitration procedure.

Licensing agreements with restrictions like this are actually more common than you might think. In fact, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of class-action waivers last April in AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion. In that case, the court held that federal law pre-empted state rules against class-action waivers. Sony will have difficulty enforcing this policy outside of the U.S., as some other countries make agreements like this impossible.… Read more

Sony to launch Sony Entertainment Network? (scoop)

Sony's various content distribution services may soon be operating under a new, unifying name, CNET has learned.

The Japanese electronics giant currently operates several entertainment stores, such as Qriocity, Sony's streaming music and video service; PlayStation Network; and others. Several sources tell CNET that Sony may roll out a new name for those services during IFA 2011 next month in Berlin. That name is currently known within the company as "Sony Entertainment Network," or SEN.

Does this mean people will turn on their PS3s or PSPs one day in the near future and see Sony Entertainment Network instead of PlayStation Network? Not quite. Our sources indicate that Qriocity Music Unlimited and the VOD service would be first to move under the SEN umbrella. Other services would possibly then be moved to SEN later; this may include the PSN and the Reader Store.

A possible reason for the transition, our sources say, is that soon-to-be-chairman Kazuo Hirai desires a unified Sony user experience, as it has been fragmented over the last decade. Hirai oversees all of Sony's consumer electronics, including PlayStation products, so the PSN transitioning to the rubric of SEN seems plausible. It also wouldn't hurt to move away from PSN after the embarrassing hacking scandal that breached millions of accounts and caused service interruption for 23 days. … Read more

Samsung's debut e-book reader arrives

For its first e-book reader, Samsung Electronics has crumpled up and cast aside its catchy codename and gone downright bureaucratic.

Formerly known by the working label of Papyrus, the new SNE-50K reader will initially be sold only in South Korea, starting Wednesday. But the device may reach other markets across the world sometime next year, said a Samsung spokesperson.

Unlike larger readers such as Amazon's Kindle, the SNE-50K was designed by Samsung to be compact, sporting a 5-inch screen and weighing 6.5 ounces. The device will come with 512MB of memory and offer a resolution of 600x800 pixels.

Borrowing some features from a PDA, the SNE-50K will support handwriting recognition, so users can write and store memos, manage schedules, and view calendar appointments. The device will also let people read text files, PDFs, and Microsoft Office documents by converting those files into a viewable BMP graphic format.

The reader will sell for 339,000 Korean won, or about $270.… Read more