Yahoo Launches Portable, Unlimted Music Subscription At Bargain-Basement Rate

Developing: paidContent.org: This is a big shot in the digital music sky by Yahoo: It has a bargain-basement priced online and portable subscription music service called Yahoo! Music Unlimited...
The beta version of Yahoo! Music Unlimited is priced to undercut the competition with introductory rates of $4.99 a month for an annual subscription (about $60) or $6.99 monthly (about $84). By comparison, Real's Rhapsody Unlimited is $9.99 while Rhapsody To Go runs $14.99...
Billboard.biz: (sub. req.) The subscription service does not create a separate pricing tier for portability..."We think it's tough to charge people extra for portability since it is not as seamless as everyone would like it to be," explains Dave Goldberg, VP/GM for Yahoo! Music. However, Goldberg says that long-term pricing for the service--which is still in "beta" testing mode--is yet to be worked out.
Yahoo Messenger will be integrated into the application allowing subscribers to pass tracks back and forth via IM. Users of the service can also forward 30-second clips over IM to friends who do not subscribe.
Yahoo Music Unlimited was built internally by Yahoo; it runs separately of MusicMatch, the jukebox software developer Yahoo acquired last year. Yahoo! Music will continue to offer Musicmatch's Jukebox 10 music management and On Demand subscription services for now.
More to come...