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When BurnLounge was launched in 2004, it was sold as a mix of iTunes, MySpace, and PayPal. With celebrity endorsements from Justin Timberlake and Shaquille O'Neal, "independent sellers" peddled it as a place to buy and sell music—and make heaps of cash.
But in the age of the iPod, BurnLounge was built to use Windows Media Player. And when musicians and concert attendees were approached by the BurnLounge sellers, they weren't offered a product. Instead, they were shown a complicated sales model in which they, too, could sell BurnLounge for an annual fee ranging from $29.95 to $429.95.