AmieStreet Japan, a joint venture between Turbo Linux and AmieStreet.com, was launched recently, marking a milestone in Amiestreets.com’s recent efforts in creating its niche in the global markets and in the video and animation sectors.

   
Akin to its American counterpart, AmieStreet.jp will sell DRM-free mp3s, in addition to Japanese video anime, along with Manga, a format of Japanese comic books that maintained a $4.4 billion market in Japan in 2006.   

Co-founder of AmieStreet.com, Elias Roman noted, “Japan represents a significant first step in Amie Street’s international expansion. Japan’s numerous and vibrant digital media markets, as well as advanced mobile technology, will be very well served by Amie Street’s community-driven pricing model and real-time content recommendations from members’ social networks.”

The prices of music, anime, and Manga, will be decided by the members of Amiestreet.jp jointly, according to a model in which price for each song starts at zero, but increases in proportion to its popularity. With this arrangement, members will be able to earn extra bucks for buying more music if the songs they recommend increase in price according to the AmieStreet.com REC (recommendation) system.

Presently AmieStreet.jp is in private beta. It will be made available to the public by April 2008.

AmieStreet.com provides a platform to all the music lovers for sharing a musical extravaganza with like-minded people and in the process discovering their favorite artists in the music industry. Launched in the spring of 2006, AmieStreet.com involves its members in the price fixation process of the songs on sale.

 

The site is a boon for budding artists who can put their music up for sale on AmieStreet.com. Beginners can use the site as a vehicle for reaching a wider audience and for promoting and publicizing their product.  AmieStreet.com has increased its collection by 3000% to almost one million songs, from the time when it declared its Series A financing led by Amazon.com (News - Alert) in August of 2007.