UMG puts 1,000 albums online

Universal Music Group is poised to put a large part of its music library online.

It's adding about 1,000 albums to a subscription service called Emusic.com.

It differs from other subscription sites by giving customers the same ownership rights as if they had bought a CD.

Users will be able to store tracks and transfer them to CDs or portable players using the MP3 file format.

But UMG is approaching the medium cautiously - only making content from lesser-known acts available at first.

Executives want to see whether offering the downloads will boost sales inside stores or end up cannibalising them.

Larry Kenswil, president of UMG's eLabs division, says: "Our feeling is people signing up are not going to say, 'Boy, I don't have to go out and buy the CD now'. We'll see what happens."

Emusic - a separate unit of Vivendi Universal - has cut deals with about 90 independent labels in its two years of existence.

The deal with UMG, which is also owned by Vivendi Universal, is its first deal with a major label.

UMG's music library includes big names such as the Four Tops, BB King, Joe Cocker, Burt Bacharach, Ringo Starr and Stevie Wonder.