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    Will Best Buy take a bite out of Apple, Zune and Sirius XM?

    By Dan Haugen | Published Wed, May 20 2009 9:30 am

    The Motley Fool asks whether Best Buy's new Napster pricing might kill Apple, Microsoft and Sirius XM.

    Best Buy, which acquired the digital-music service last September for $121 million, rolled out a new pricing structure Monday that starts with a $5 monthly subscription.

    The Napster news comes on the heels of a new ad campaign for Microsoft's Zune, which promotes its $14.99 monthly subscription plans. Napster not only beats Zune on price, but its MP3s are free of digital rights management. That means customers can play them on any MP3 music player as opposed to a single device such as Zune.

    The Fool also notes, as I did yesterday, that anyone who regularly spends $5 a month at iTunes will have an incentive to try out the new Napster service, which comes with free streaming access to its entire 7 million song catalog.

    I haven't had a chance to try out the new Napster yet, nor have I read any reviews about how well the service works. For now, though, it appears breaking customers' habits might be the biggest barrier standing in Napster's way.

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