The Little Monkey That Could: MediaMonkey Hits 1 Million Downloads on Download.com

Ventis Media, a scrappy 4-person company, announced the millionth download of MediaMonkey on Download.com, making it the #2 Music Management application on the world’s leading software download site*.

“Our competitors are huge, but they’re also weighed down by proprietary technologies and audio formats,” explained Russell Samuels, VP Marketing at Ventis Media. “iTunes is closely aligned with AAC/Fairplay and works really well with the iPod, but doesn’t work with other devices and lossless formats such as FLAC. Windows Media Player uses WMA and works well with ’Plays for Sure’ devices, but doesn’t synch with iPods. These types of issues have driven users to the open MP3 format and MediaMonkey.”

Market research confirm users’ frustration with proprietary formats and preference to the standard MP3 format: The average iPod contains only about 10 AAC tracks purchased via iTunes**, while the rest of it is filled with MP3s. By the same token, eMusic has vaulted into the #2 position in online music sales thanks to its focus on selling music in the non-proprietary MP3 format***.

According to Clayton M. Christensen, the Harvard professor and author of The Innovator’s Dilemma, during the early phases of an industry “a proprietary solution is almost always the right solution -- because it allows you to knit all the pieces together in an optimized way. But once the technology matures and becomes good enough, industry standards emerge. That leads to the standardization of interfaces, which lets companies specialize on pieces of the overall system, and the product becomes modular. At that point, the competitive advantage of the early leader dissipates...”****

“Being as small as we are, MediaMonkey has no alternate agenda of selling specific devices, or marketing a particular music format. Serious music collectors appreciate a music organizer that focuses on their needs and supports a broad range of formats and devices.” commented Jiri Hajek, VP Development.

MediaMonkey is available at http://www.mediamonkey.com

Ventis Media is an upstart provider of advanced music distribution technology. We provide businesses and consumers with an integrated environment where they can view, play, organize, and purchase multimedia content.

* See: http://www.download.com/sort/3150-2141_4-0-1-4.html?
* See: http://www.itunesperipod.com/ & http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/08/12/apple_itunes_2006/
** See: http://arstechnica.com/articles/culture/emusic.ars
*** See: http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/jan2006/tc20060109_432937.htm

Contact Information

Russell Samuels

VP Marketing

Ventis Media, Inc.

Contact via E-mail