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Mitsubishi Electric Telecom Europe, parent company of cellphone company Trium, is a founding member of a group promising to bring cheap high speed 3 downloads music to next generation 3G mobile's

Article by Andy Szebeni, London England, The Mobile Music Forum has been launched to encourage the development of wireless systems offering affordable music to the high-speed 3G mobile user. It aims to define and promote a specification for the transfer of digital content over the broadband phone network, the third generation (3G) systems that phone companies are in the process of establishing.

Napster nipped - The group wants to overcome the complex rights issues that have dogged the distribution of music over the Internet. The move against swapping digital music formats culminated this month in a court ruling that will close down the controversial Napster music swapping site.

Appropriate Charge - The 3g forum said that it wanted to develop and promote a solution ensured that only entitled users can access the music content and will be appropriately charged for the privilege of having wireless access to the desired music. It recognises the music industry has failed to control Internet piracy of music - the strangling of Napster will inevitably result in new pretenders to the online music-swapping throne, and would rather control how people swap the tracks rather than banning it.

New members invited - Digiplug, Mitsubishi Electric Telecom Europe, Oberthur Card Systems and Thomson multimedia are the first four members of the Mobile Music Forum and they are inviting new members from the music and the wireless technology sectors. The forum wants to work towards developing a specification for handling music through mobile phones and to present this to relevant standards bodies for approval.

Develop Standards - The aim is to ensure that any system will be widely accepted and to prevent bickering over ownership of standards. Already we are seeing a battle emerging for mobile device memory with Sony’s Memory stick, Flash cards and MultiMedia Cards vying to be the de facto standard for portable devices. Stéphane Moussé of Oberthur Card Systems said that the forum did not intend to develop a product but to use existing technologies and round up existing industry standards in order to create a “technological architecture” for mobile music.

Secure and Fair - One of the forum’s main motivations is to ensure mobile music services are provided in a secure and fair manner. They make clear that the security and the fairness are from the point of view of the cellphone industry. This requirement will help the networks and infrastructure companies to recoup some of the staggering expense of setting up 3G cellphone infrastructure.

Help to Fund 3G - The 3-G forum notes that by offering subscription to a mobile music service that allows users fast access to a large database of titles from the golden oldies to the latest hot music hits, 3g operators can add value to their mobile offers, differentiate themselves from competitors, increase the airtime usage and reduce the customer churn.

Maybe this new forum is being more open than some of the recent 3G industry collaboration in that agreement on 3 G standards between the players means it is easier to make more money!