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SXSW Interactive: Spot the next iTunes

Austin, TexasSpotify, a Web and mobile application for digital devices, will make iTunes look like a laser disc player. That much we already know. When will it finally arrive in North America? That’s a subject of some interest.

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More than 2,000 South By Southwest attendees packed an auditorium to hear Daniel Ek, the 27-year-old Swede who started the music service in October 2008, reveal the latest ETA.

This even though only a small fraction of the audience has actually used Spotify, since it’s not yet legal on this side of the Atlantic.

Anyway, there wasn’t a peep from the young CEO about a North American release. Disappointing, but that’s about all that’s disappointing about Spotify.

The showdown between Spotify, which is wildly popular in the UK and Europe, and iTunes, which is becoming monolithic in North America, could change music forever.

Spotify legally plays music for free. It charges iTunes-like micropayments of 99 cents or some nominal fee per download. It also works like subscription-based satellite radio and, unlike iTunes, can be used on mobile phones like the BlackBerry.

In a word, the service isn’t married to any one model. So its 7 million-plus users can listen to 100 million songs, Spotify’s current arsenal of music, any way they want. Legally.

This is the case because Spotify is in the cloud, storing music creatively online, sometimes using peer-to-peer architecture, sometimes storing music in servers in the UK.

Ek adheres to the philosophy that music is like water and should be able to take the shape of whatever you put it in. While it can be difficult to get iTunes downloads off your computer (a song can only be copied to five authorized accounts), you can access and share your Spotify library anywhere you find the Internet.

Spotify allows very easy sharing, with Twitter, Facebook and email buttons on each song. And, according to Ek, it’s reviving the album format 30 million playlists shared in Europe are albums. Long live the long-player.

Ek gave a quick demonstration of Spotify as both a Web application and a mobile one to robust applause.

“The music industry and the technology industry are aligned for the first time,” he said to more applause. Sure thing. Just on another continent.

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