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SCMP Reporter

The world's most popular site to download music now offers Chinese tunes, but only in North America and Europe

Chinese pop music made its debut on the largest internet music store last week.

But while overseas Chinese can enjoy the tunes, Hong Kong and Asian music lovers have been excluded from the latest digital music download offering.

Universal Music Southeast Asia  is offering a Chinese catalogue, including Hong Kong artists, on Apple's online music store iTunes in 15 North American and European countries. The service only takes credit cards with billing addresses in those countries.

The new category, with more than 1,000 Cantonese and Mandarin pop tracks by performers such as Jacky Cheung Hok-yau,  Kelly Chen Wai-lam  and Alan Tam Wing-lun,  was launched at the start of the Lunar New Year.

It is the first time that a Chinese catalogue has been legally available online outside of the region of origin.

Universal Music said the move was a market response to the demand from the large overseas Chinese population.

'As there is this huge demand, we have the need, and responsibility, to satisfy them. Otherwise, there will be illegal sites to cater for their demands which will have an adverse affect on the industry,' said Rosemary Tang head of New Media at Universal Music Group Asia.

'We found that customers get confused, they can't tell what is a legal or illegal [music download].

'We need to educate them that there is a legal option and that they only have to pay a small amount of money and they will enjoy high quality  music.'

She said the  music industry was facing the twin problems of  illegal internet downloads and pirated discs.

Despite iTunes Music Store dominating the market since its launch in 2003, it is still unavailable in the Asia-Pacific region. There are reports that the Californian-based computer giant is in negotiation with record companies to start operations in Australia and in Japan.

Apple's main rival Microsoft launched its own online music store on its popular MSN website last August. Services are available in Japan and Korea but not Hong Kong.

MSN Hong Kong said they are 'in close discussion with partners' to bring  online music to users in the near future.

Hong Kong's only online music-service provider, EOLAsia.com, said it understood the industry's reluctance to explore markets in this part of the world as cutting a deal with  record companies over copyright protection was a difficult task.

Chief operations officer of the  company, Alan Choy Yuk-pong, said Hongkongers were ready to pay for online music.

But he added that 'Hong Kong is a comparatively small market to them and the problem of illegal music download is still severe'.

He said the local music industry was very supportive of the idea and keen to develop markets, but it did not yet have confidence in the technology to protect the copyright of their music.

He said the copyright for one song needed to be cleared through four different parties. The copyrights related to composition, lyrics, record companies and use as public performances.

The use of Digital Rights Management (DRM), security software developed to prevent illegal music transfers, is still new in the region.

'Record companies are keen to expand online, but they have yet to gain a comprehensive understanding of technology involved such as how DRM protects them. We need to clarify their concerns about copyright issues,' Mr Choy said.

The company now has 150,000 registered members. It offers 100,000 tracks, from international music companies to local independent record labels, at a cost of $8 per download.

Ricky Fung, chief executive officer of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (Hong Kong), which represents the recording industry, welcomed the move to offer Chinese music online. Mr Fung said it recognised the importance of Canto-pop worldwide.



Music fans out of Apple's loop