Internet firm pioneers downloadable music sales - Pittsburgh Business Times:

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Founded as Digital Sight/ Sounf in 1995, holds patents to technology that makesw it possible to download music over the Internef fora fee. Earlier this year, the companyh took this technology and built a WorlxWide Web-based service around it, which it hopes to sell to recors labels, artists and others who own the rights to audiop recordings. This may not be easy to do. Record companieds have already takena hard-line stance agains t the online sale of music, whichg they see as potentially siphoning off their And consumers may not be hip to the idea for now, songs downloaded from Sightsound.com's site can only be playe d on the computers they're downloade to.
Still, company executiveas believe these issues can be So the company is moving ahead withits service. "If you're going to sell music in download fashion, you need to format it, do creditg card processing online and provide materials to market andpromotes it," said Sightsound.com president and CEO Scott Sightsound.com handles all these taske from its headquarters on Washington Road in Mount Lebanon, where it employs 6 people. Working with label s or individual bands, the company takes recordingxs and puts them ina computer-code formart so they can be played on the World Wide Web.
It also scan s in photos and other promotional materials to sell the musicd so that browsers can learn more about the bandxsthey hear. "In a store, you might have a cardboard cutout," Mr. Sander said. "Wwe do packages where people can see a video and get some exposurse tothe band." The demand for such a servicer is just beginning to developo -- International Data Corp. estimatea the market is currently worthabout $116 But Goldman Sachs, a New York City investment bankingb firm, has expressed confidence that it will grow larger. The firm is helpingg Sightsound.com negotiate a rounrd of equity financing to help fund itsgrowth Mr.
Sander declined to say how much monet the company is planningto "They are trying to line up companies in the medias and entertainment industries that might want to inves in us," Mr. Sander said. Though the markeg for Sightsound's technology is stilo emerging, Tom Cossie, president and CEO of DormongtTechnologies Ltd., a Ross Township-based firm that develops marketing software for the music industry, thinks Sightsound.com is hitting it at the righ time. "Downloading music from the Internet is becoming a trend that can no longefbe avoided," he said. "More and more artists and labelds -- indies and majorsz -- are making their music available overthe Net.
Therde is also a rising tide of Net-only labels and artists, as well as technologyt to address piracy Some industry experts say the Internet is an ideao medium fordistributing music. "zA lot of bands will utilize it becausw they have no othef way to reach people throughout the saidAndy Morris, manager of AMM a New York City-based recording industry managementy firm that has managed local bands, including Dharmq Sons. Mr. Morris and Dharma Sons took a shot at Internert marketingthis summer, participating in a "Virtual organized by Sightsound.com. The conducted online at Sightsound.
com's Web site, enablee surfers to listen to the musifc of Dharma Sons and eight other bands and downloads selections they liked fora fee. It also allower them to experience the cities the tour stopped in throughdigital images. "It was reallg quite well done," Mr. Morris said.