My Coke Music, one of the major early download retailers, is closing on 31st July.
www.mycokemusic.com/close_email/faq.html

Is Internet retail working - if you're not iTunes?
I've even heard rumours about Amazon.

I wonder how much it costs to run a site such as this.

You would think the overheads would be pretty low really, the price of the site per month + whatever payment system you use. I guess you're going to need a few members of staff to look after the labels and customers so all in all it doesn't seem like a hugely expensive operation.

They must be experiencing extremely low sales to want to jack it all in at this stage.

Well done, Tip Sheet. You got this news story 24 hours before Music week Online.