Shayla Posted June 25, 2010 Share Posted June 25, 2010 Microsoft as part of its Bing refresh has started allowing direct credit card purchases for music at the Zune Marketplace. The move, meant to simplify buying tracks directly from search results, lets customers skip buying the Microsoft Points that they had previously needed to get anything from the store. Prices are roughly on par with rivals. The switch may be an important step for Microsoft, whose music store hasn't had traction since it launched alongside the Zune MP3 players. Its US market share has remained almost entirely in step with the share of the players it works with. Last year, the Zune Marketplace had 2.6 percent of digital music sales in the country where Apple's iTunes had 69 percent, a situation which was exacerbated this year as iTunes grew slightly while Amazon MP3 largely took share from smaller competitors. Some of Microsoft's sluggishness has come from the complexity of its store, as the need to buy points not only adds an extra step but has been accused of masking the real cost of music. Microsoft's chief advantage has been the ability to use points for Xbox Live in addition to the Zune's store, though neither service has been tightly integrated. Zune music will finally be reaching the Xbox 360 through a Dashboard update later this year that supports unlimited Zune Pass streaming. [via paidContent] Source : Electronista Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doli Posted June 25, 2010 Share Posted June 25, 2010 Not bad. Now I have Amazon MP3 and Zune Marketplace but I think Amazon MP3 will be my first choice since I seem to be getting $5 credit for mp3 for game purchases and sometimes if I buy an mp3 album I get $5 credit for online videos from them. If I cant find it on Amazon then ill try Zune. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alan- Posted June 25, 2010 Share Posted June 25, 2010 This is actually really nice, I got tired of having to buy more MS points whenever I ran out of my 10 Buys a month with my Zune Pass, or more when I wanted to just get a whole album. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MR_Candyman Posted June 25, 2010 Share Posted June 25, 2010 I wish they would do this for xbox live. I would probably spend 5X the amount of money I do on it just because I wouldn't be forced to buy the points Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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