ad-supported

Update, 10:38 p.m. PDT: To include more background on factors that led to shutdown.

SpiralFrog, the pioneering ad-supported music service, quietly closed down on Thursday. SpiralFrog's site went dark at about 4 p.m. PDT.

A source close to the company told CNET News that SpiralFrog has ceased operations and assets have been surrendered to creditors. To keep operations going last year, the company issued secured notes in order to borrow at least $9 million from several hedge funds and others.

SpiralFrog representatives weren't immediately available for comment.

New York-based SpiralFrog made a splash in August … Read more

SpiralFrog, a pioneer in offering ad-supported music downloads, is at a crossroads as management is in danger of losing control of the company.

According to multiple sources, including current and former employees, the company's founder and chairman, Joe Mohen, has told associates and friends that he may be forced to hand the company over to investors. The sources also said that Mohen has said a shutdown of the Web site could occur as early as next week. Mohen told CNET News he was unable to comment, citing poor cell phone coverage at his location.

New York-based SpiralFrog made a … Read more

Yahoo Games announced on Thursday that it will expand into ad-supported online games by the end of the year, a move not without its controversy.

Yahoo Games expects to offer more than 400 ad-supported downloadable games via assistance from casual-game advertising network and technology players Double Fusion and NeoEdge Networks.

Under the partnership, Double Fusion and NeoEdge will sell and integrate video ads before, during, and after a game, which is downloaded from Yahoo Games. NeoEdge also is providing technology that will enable Yahoo to insert ads into its game library without requiring the game source code.

Yahoo, however, still … Read more

Editors' note: This blog initially misstated the first name of the founder of Downtown Records. His full name is Josh Deutsch.

RCRD LBL launched this week after several months of publicity. It's an online-only record label overseen by Engadget founder Peter Rojas and Downtown Records founder Josh Deutsch.

The service is an interesting combination of things we've seen elsewhere, such as blog postings, streaming audio, player widgets, and free downloads, but I wouldn't call it groundbreaking. Most of the artists on RCRD LBL are also on traditional labels and have so far only released a few songs … Read more

Yesterday, the New York Times ran an article about Imeem, pegged to the news that this fledgling site has signed a third major label, EMI, leaving only Universal in the "not yet" column. The service is getting credit for trying to pioneer a new business model for digital music distribution: users can select songs and stream them for free, as long as they're willing to sit through the occasional advertisement.

I registered and fired the service up, and while I'm not ready to call ad-supported music DOA, Imeem isn't about to unseat the current digital music leaders. The main problem: I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing on the site. … Read more

Free-music site SpiralFrog made its long-awaited debut on Sunday evening, defying critics who said the struggling company would never get off the ground.

The ad-supported music store opened with more than 770,000 songs and 3,500 music videos from numerous independent labels and Universal Music Group, the largest of the top four record companies.

When the company announced plans in August 2006 to offer ad-supported music free of charge to users media pundits called it an iTunes killer. But in December, New York-based SpiralFrog suffered an executive shakeup, burned through most of its cash and has since acknowledged selling … Read more