Amazon.com officially released Amazon MP3, a new web-based service which sells music content to the Internet users for prices starting at 89 cents. According to the parent company, the digital store currently has no less than 2 million songs created by approximately 180,000 artists so the collection might also include your favorite singer. The most attractive aspect of the online shop is that Amazon MP3 sells DRM-free music which means the songs can be listened as many times as you want because there is no limitation implemented. Moreover, you can copy the files on your iPod, PC, or any other storage device. The music is distributed under the MP3 format encoded at 256 kilobits which provide a pretty appreciable quality.

"Amazon MP3 is an all-MP3, DRM-free catalog of a la carte music from major labels and independent labels, playable on any device, in high-quality audio, at low prices," said Bill Carr, Amazon.com Vice President for Digital Music. "This new digital music service has already been through an extensive private beta, and today we're excited to offer it to our customers as a fully functional public beta. We look forward to receiving feedback from our customers and using their input to refine the service."

Among the 180,000 song artists, I can mention 50 Cent, Maroon 7, Pink Floyd, Coldplay, Nelly, Nirvana, The Chemical Brothers and The Rolling Stones.

Although you can buy a single song for 89 cents, you're also able to buy entire albums for prices between $5.99 and $9.99. If you intend to buy music content from Amazon's online store, you can do this using the Amazon 1-Click technology as well as through the Amazon MP3 Downloader solution powered by Amazon.

At this time, Amazon MP3 is only a beta but according to the parent company it provides almost the same functionality as the full solution so there is no need to worry that your shopping experience might be affected by the beta stage.