The growing slate of legal peer-to-peer (P2P) services got another member today, as BearShare, once a major thorn in the side of the music industry, launched as a legal, industry-supported service.

BearShare 6.0, as the new legal version is dubbed, is starting with a free, 30-day trial but will charge users an as-yet-undisclosed monthly subscription fee thereafter. The service will also offer a la carte, individual song downloads.

"In our continuing effort to grow the authorized P2P marketplace, we gave full consideration to the rights of copyright holders while introducing features that greatly enhance the consumer experience," iMesh executive chairman Robert Summer said in a statement.

In May, iMesh acquired the software, user base, domain name, logo, and name from Bearshare for an undisclosed sum. iMesh formed a subsidiary called MusicLab for the transaction.

In conjunction with the deal, BearShare agreed to fold as an illegal entity and pay the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) $30 million to settle the music industry's copyright infringement claims against it.

iMesh, formerly an illegal P2P that launched as a legal service last October, has been silent about its user base and ability to lure P2P users away from illegal networks to a paid service. With the BearShare launch, the two services will exist separately but will share most of the same attributes.

Both offer "To Go" portable subscriptions that allow users to transfer purchased music onto portable devices that are compatible with Microsoft's PlaysFor Sure digital rights management (DRM) technology that applies restrictions to downloaded music. Neither iMesh nor BearShare are compatible with iPods.

BearShare also sells ringtones and incorporates social networking tools into its service, including instant messaging, playlists, and personal Web pages. BearShare will launch with a catalog of 2.5 million songs licensed from the major labels.