Billboard.biz has just reported that the Universal Music Group has become the first major record company to ink a licensing deal with Napter creator Shawn Fanning’s new peer-to-peer software company Snocap. We’ve also seen reliable reports that Sony/BMG will soon begin offering free legal low quality or "demo" downloads of some songs via P2P with links to purchase a higher quality version and other related products.
It will take time to know if these initiatives are sincere or just paying lip service to the the labels P2P problems. But any steps that they take towards embracing P2P are positive even if absurdly overdue.
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