Starbucks to Give Away Free ITunes Songs

Hey, it worked for Pepsi. I think. AP reports : Starbucks Corp. plans to give away 50 million free digital songs tocustomers in all of its domestic coffee houses to promote a newwireless iTunes music service that's about to debut in select markets. From Oct. 2 to Nov. 7, baristas in the company's more than 10,000U.S. stores will hand out about 1.5 million "Song of the Day" cardseach day. The cards can be redeemed at Apple Inc.'s online iTunes Store. Thirty-sevenartists with featured songs include Paul McCartney and Joni Mitchell --the first two to sign on with Starbucks' Hear Music label -- along withJoss Stone, Dave Matthews, John Mayer, Annie Lennox and Band of Horses. The first song will be Bob Dylan's "Joker Man." Alsoon Oct. 2, Starbucks will start selling iTunes digital release cardsthat allow a full album of music and bonus material to be downloadedonline. KT Tunstall's "Drastic Fantastic" and the soundtrack to thefilm "Into the Wild" with new music from Pearl Jam frontman EddieVedder will be the first two featured albums, retailing for $14.99 and$11.99, respectively. Starbucks also will offer a limited-editionreloadable purchasing card that includes two free iTunes downloads whencustomers register their cards online. It's hard to get excited about something like this. I guess if you're already getting fleeced at Starbucks, getting a free song or two is a nice incentive to keep it up. Not a game changer, obviously.