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Tellers sing me a song
22 March 2001

If the vision of a Boston entrepreneur is realised, we will soon be able to download music 24 hours a day, writes Chloe Veltman

Remember a time before cash machines? The patient, 5pm queues in front of ponderous bank clerks; staying in on a Saturday night because you didn't get out of bed in time for weekend opening hours: a culture of cheque-books and IOUs?

If Mark Hardie, the founder and chief executive of the Boston-based ETC Music gets his way, we'll be saying the same thing about music in the near future: when ETC's MusicTeller machine hits the high streets, Hardie envisages that we'll be downloading music on the move as glibly as drawing money from a cash point.

With its curvy retro contours and flashing user interface, the MusicTeller looks like a cross between a 1950s juke-box and a cash dispenser.

"Instead of spitting out cash, it downloads music," says Hardie. The machine gives consumers access to digital music while away from their computers, delivering songs by artists such as Aimee Mann and a local Boston band Entrain, directly to a portable MP3 player at the touch of a screen.

The technology supports Nike and Rio digital players. Songs can be stored in a "virtual locker", so consumers can access their collection from any MusicTeller machine or from the MusicTeller website at home.

Hardie, who worked as an entertainment industry analyst at Forrester Research and as a technology specialist in the financial sector before founding ETC in 1999, sees a link between the automation of the banking industry and the future of digital music.

"I understood that if digital music was to be successful in a retail environment, it would have to be aimed at the mass- market: as quick and as easy to use as a fast-food outlet or cash dispenser," says Hardie.

The machine is being tested in three music retailers in the Boston area, where customers can download six songs free.

Although the MusicTeller has been on trial on-piste at this year's Winter X Games and at a health club, the first batch of commercial machines will roll out later this year in a more predictable environment.

"The MusicTeller was designed to operate 24/7, but we're going to start with music stores because that's where people expect to find music," says Hardie. MusicTellers will soon be available on the US west coast in a new partnership between ETC and the Djangos music retail chain.

At least one major obstacle stands between the MusicTeller and its bid for ubiquity. Although it looks as though the days of free digital music may be numbered, with Napster being forced to curb its online song-swapping service, ETC and its competitors in the "copyright-compliant" digital music sector are having trouble forging partnerships with major record labels. They see digital audio as a threat to copyright laws. ETC's limited repertoire of some 100 songs is heavy on local Boston bands but light on well-known artists.

"The major record labels have not yet enabled our service with top-line content," says Paul Melnychuck, the vice president of sales and business development of Liquid Audio, a Silicon Valley-based digital audio company whose Liquid Kiosk network enables customers to download individual songs or entire albums on to CDs from special booths in music stores.

Melnychuck says Liquid Kiosks are doing the best business in niche markets such as the Hawaiian tourist industry, with tourists customising CDs of Hawaiian music from Liquid Kiosks installed at the duty free shop in Waikiki, Honolulu, at around $16 for a 10-song compilation.

Nevertheless, Liquid Audio's fortunes may change with the recent announcement of a deal with the music giant BMG, music label to stars like Whitney Houston and Britney Spears.

Soon, many titles from the BMG playlist will be available to customers at Liquid Kiosks around the globe from Singapore and Austria to the flagship Top Shop store at Piccadilly Circus, which houses eight of the machines.

Meanwhile, smaller labels, including Artemis Records in New York, see a bright future for MusicTeller, allowing ETC to use eight of its songs.

"With any new media, you've got to take it step by step," says Michael Krumper, the executive vice president of Artemis.

ETC also has a powerful ally in SonicBlue, the maker of the popular Rio portable MP3 player, with a 25% stake in the company.

It might be awhile before the MusicTeller makes it on to the high street, but customers at Record Town music shop in downtown Boston are intrigued by the music-dispensing contraption on trial. "People play with it a lot," says the store manager Ted Putnam. "They all seem to know how to use the machine."