Zune to debut at press event tomorrow

Microsoft is set to take the wraps off the worst-kept secret in the digital music business tomorrow. The company is to unveil its Zune player at a press-only event in Seattle, just two days after Apple rolled out iPod upgrades and the addition of movies to iTunes. The Microsoft event, first unearthed in a Seattle Weekly profile of the Seattle software giant's digital music efforts, will likely provide few details that haven't already either been confirmed by Microsoft or written about extensively by tech and gadget sites.

As previously reported, the device, manufactured by MP3 player maker Toshiba, will feature a 30GB hard drive, a three-inch LCD, an FM tuner, and wireless capability. The Zune will also have social networking features that will let users stream content to one another so that one Zune user could act as a wireless DJ of sorts for another Zune user nearby. That feature, as well as Microsoft's plan to preload the Zune with audio and video content from the likes of Hot Chip, CSS, Serena Maneesh, and 30 Seconds to Mars, will be the key to Zune's success, according to J Allard, the man behind Microsoft's Xbox video game console and, most recently, the director of the company's digital music efforts. In the Seattle Weekly profile, Allard calls Apple's iPod "the Pong of digital music," referring to the elemental video game from the '70s.

RealNetworks pays $350 million for mobile music firm

Looking to make its mark on the mobile music world in one fell swoop, RealNetworks, owner of the Rhapsody music subscription service, ponied up $350 million for South Korea-based WiderThan Co., a maker of back-end mobile media services. "We believe the combination of RealNetworks and WiderThan will greatly enhance our digital entertainment products and services and accelerate our reach around the world," RealNetworks CEO Rob Glaser said in a statement. WiderThan currently supplies ringtone sales services to 50 wireless carriers across 25 countries

Barenaked Ladies launch download store on MySpace

Just a week after MySpace said it was teaming with Shawn Fanning's Snocap to offer MP3 downloads, the first music company to jump on board has added a second band to the fray. Nettwerk Music Group's Barenaked Ladies, the Canadian alt rockers, have added a download store to their MySpace page. Though managed by Nettwerk, the group is on Desperation Records. They are charging 89 cents per track for DRM-free downloads.