America Online Inc.'s Spinner.com Unveils All New Spinner.com 3.0

Business Wire, Oct 6, 1999

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 6, 1999--

Complete Redesign of its Site and Music Players to Offer Greater

Customization and Richer Content for the Complete Internet Music

Experience; Debuts Industry's First Toolbar Player for Convenient,

Interactive Control of Music Listening

America Online, Inc.'s Spinner.com, the first and largest Internet music service, today announced the launch of its completely redesigned and enriched Internet music site and players, Spinner version 3.0, to provide a more customized Internet music experience.

Spinner 3.0 has a new look with a streamlined user interface that allows easier interaction between the site and players, and offers several new features, including a "Toolbar" player, music news and customizable preferences.

Internet music is revolutionizing the way in which in the world receives music. According to Forrester Research (March 1999), more than three million households will be surfing the Net in search of music by early 2001. By 2003, the digital music market will surge to 18 million households.

"Spinner 3.0 provides next-generation tools for creating an all-encompassing online music experience catered to individual tastes," said Ted Leonsis, president of AOL's Interactive Properties Group.

"The fresh look and new features secure Spinner's leadership position, and reflect our promise of building the ultimate online music arena, where users can listen to music, learn more about it and purchase on the spot."

"We're beginning to move our award-winning service to the next level by taking the largest collection of professionally programmed streaming music channels and adding features that allow users greater control over their listening experience," said Josh Felser, general manager of Spinner.com and Nullsoft, Inc.

Felser added, "In the time since Spinner.com's launch from thedj.com in July 1998, we've grown more than 1,000 percent and have added dozens of music channels, e-commerce possibilities and best of breed partnerships.

"Spinner 3.0 allows us to go a step further, offering the industry's first Toolbar Player -- a thin, streamlined application that can be minimized to sit at the bottom of your screen -- and adding new features to our site and players for a deep, compelling, advertiser-rich environment."

Spinner 3.0 reflects a sleek design that speaks to all genres of music, and includes significant product and site updates:

"My Spinner" -- The revamped Spinner.com site serves as a gateway to music and music information, allowing users to listen, buy and read about music in a customized atmosphere called "My Spinner." Personalized "My Spinner" pages offer greater synchronization with the players by providing customizable features, such as My Channels for a personalized list of favorite channels, My Songpad for access to song picks, My Profile, What's New for genre-based promotions and Store Windows for commerce opportunities also tailored by genre. The site also debuts Music News, Artist Finder search, DJ Picks with album art and reviews, and Top Charts for each channel.

Spinner Plus 3.0 -- The Spinner Plus downloadable player gets a sleek, fun and intuitive user interface with a new Toolbar(intermediate) size, in addition to the maximized Spinner Plus player. The Toolbar player sits at the bottom of a PC desktop, allowing easy and habitual access to selected features as well as increased exposure for advertisers. Spinner Plus 3.0 includes all of the functionality of the earlier player with the addition of several new features that directly link users to their My Spinner page, Music News and Charts displaying Spinner.com's top 25 programmed songs on each of Spinner.com's 130 channels.

Spinner Lite -- Formerly known as the Spinner player, is Spinner.com's Web-based player. The redesigned player offers streamlined functionality for increased compatibility with browsers, including AOL, Netscape and Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Spinner Lite also provides links to personal My Spinner pages and features.

The launch of Spinner 3.0 is celebrated with a first-of-its kind promotion with major record label, Atlantic Records', Stone Temple Pilots. The promotion, including an Internet exclusive album debut of STP's "No. 4" and contest on Spinner.com, and a secure digital download of cover track, "Down," on Winamp.com, represents the fist stage of integration between Spinner.com and Winamp, both acquired by AOL in May 1999. Spinner.com and Winamp continue moving forward as integral parts of each other's business and the core of AOL's music initiative.

About Spinner.com

Spinner.com, an integral part of AOL's Interactive Properties Group, is the first and largest Internet music service with a database of 250,000 digitized songs delivered on 130 highly specialized music channels. Covering an unprecedented depth and breadth of music programming -- with channels such as 90's Rock, Bluegrass, British Invasion, Chicago Blues, Top Pop, Trip-, Jungle/Drum 'n Bass and Salsa -- Spinner.com reaches 1.3 million unique listeners per month, broadcasting two million songs per day.