Digital music company eMusic is rumored to be up for sale, according to various reports, but that hasn’t stopped it from signing licensing deals with big music. This morning, eMusic announced that it come to an agreement with Warner Music Group and that it will soon begin selling tracks from WMG’s roster of artists to its U.S. users.

eMusic last year inked a similar deal with Sony Music Entertainment.

The agreement includes titles from WMG’s Atlantic Records, Rhino Records and Warner Bros. Records as well as from independent labels distributed through WMG’s Alternative Distribution Alliance (ADA) stable that are not currently sold on eMusic. The deal will make 10,000 catalog albums from artists like REM, Depeche Mode and Aretha Franklin available for downloading, but does not include newer hit records.

eMusic says it currently offers more than 7.5 million tracks, and that it has sold more than 350 million music downloads under its current ownership. The company sells monthly membership plans beginning at 24 credits for $11.99. One of its rival, FreeAllMusic, yesterday announced that it had signed an agreement with Universal Music for ad-supported downloads.

eMusic CEO Danny Stein reiterated earlier rumors about its plans to complement the company’s subscription-based music download service with streaming, telling Reuters that the company is currently in talks with label partners for new licensing deals that would allow registered users to stream songs, similar to services like CBS-owned Last.fm and LaLa (which Warner Music Group invested in and was recently acquired by Apple).

Streaming would be added in 2010, provided rights holders come to terms with the realities of new business models, Stein said. We’ve contacted the company for more information about its streaming plans, such as timing and pricing.

Interestingly, Stein didn’t dismiss rumors about a potential sale of eMusic, but told Reuters that a buyer would have to pay its owner, Dimensional Associates, for a successful 2010 and 2011 upfront in order for them to consider it.

Which sounds to me like something that you would say if you were definitely up for sale.

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

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If you thought RIM had completely run out of ways to mildly remix its existing portrait QWERTY formula, think again -- the transition from trackball to optical pad has opened up a whole new world of exciting opportunities, and it looks like the venerable Curve 8900 might be the next model to get the refresh. BerryReview appears to have scored a shot of the alleged 8910 in its most natural environment -- a desk calendar -- preserving the Curve series' typical broken-up keyboard style (as opposed to the connected keys you see in the Bold line). Otherwise we don't really know much, but naturally, the new model is said to be running BlackBerry OS 5.0 under the hood (in other words, it'll look pretty much like every other BlackBerry you've used in recent memory). More on this puppy as we get it.

BlackBerry Curve 8910 in the wild? originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 11 Jan 2010 22:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Do not expect UFC to look the other when it comes to online piracy of its various pay-per-view events. Dana White, the company's president, recently told the Vancouver Sun that he and the UFC will do whatever it takes to eliminate piracy. "It’s gonna cost us a lot of money, but guess what, it’s gonna cost [the pirates] a lot of money. It’s gonna get to the point where it’s like, f*ck it, maybe we shouldn’t pirate MMA anymore." This is not a very forward-thinking way of looking at the problem, no.

It was only a few weeks ago that I first made mention of UFC's efforts against piracy. The gist of the argument was, just let it happen and concentrate on maintaining the company's momentum. The UFC doesn't want to end up like the music industry, having sued its fans into indifference, if not antagonism, toward its product.

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Just as CES is wrapping up, we managed to get some hands-on time with the AirStash wireless SD card reader, which is targeted at iPhone OS devices (but does work with other WiFi-enabled devices). Like many of the mysterious products from Vegas we have no price, release date or battery life, but what we do know now is that it's indeed very light (1.5 ounces), fits nicely in our hands and supports up to 32GB SDHC cards. As for wireless connection the AirStash acts as a WiFi 802.11b/g access point -- a cunning way to dodge the Apple dock connector license fees or the lack of Bluetooth profiles. Sadly, the prototype wasn't working properly due to "some RF interference," but as you can see above, the AirStash is accessed via a browser (UI design not final). Sure, this would mean you'd lose Internet connection via WiFi, but if the AirStash is cheap enough, then we'll live with it. Let's hope they hurry up with the release, though.

AirStash wireless SD card reader hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 11 Jan 2010 04:38:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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