Like other small MVNO wireless carriers, Cricket is hoping to make a name for itself by having the most features for the best price. At CES, the no-contract carrier will show off its new unlimited MuveMusic plan. For $55 a month, the plan will let users download unlimited amounts of music, ringtones, and ringbacks from its music store in addition to having unlimited voice minutes, texts, and Internet usage (data).
Here’s the catch, you can’t transfer any of the music files to another device; they’re stuck on your phone. Still, despite the limitation, $55 a month for an unlimited plan is already a great price. Adding music only sweetens the deal. MuveMusic is similar to Microsoft’s Zune marketplace in some ways. For $15 a month, Zune users have unlimited access to Microsoft’s entire music catalog on all devices that run Zune software.
The Samsung Suede ($199) will be the first Cricket device to support MuveMusic. It will come with a 4 GB MicroSD card and debut at CES in January. The songs will have built in DRM (digital rights management), but will be transferable to new phones in the future, says the carrier. Unfortunately, since the phone currently runs on a proprietary Samsung OS (TouchWiz 2.0), interoperability may be limited. Cricket currently has about 4.5 million subscribers. Initially, the service will only be available in Las Vegas, but should roll out to other Cricket zones (mostly cities) by March 2011.
Would you pay an extra $10 a month to get unlimited music downloading/streaming on your phone?
