Looks like
BMG has its eyes on EMI; under the proposed deal, EMI would acquire the Big Mean German, in return for a large stake in itself. The Reg says that this could
be
good for Napster and more liberal online business models; could be moving in this direction, as neither BMG nor EMI are as hard-line as, say, Sony and Universal.
(OTOH, we probably can't expect non-proprietary, unencrypted downloadable
media of any sort from any of the majors, which means that you'll still need
to use Windows to play downloads.)