Amazon launches free 'Prime Music' streaming service for Prime members
Amazon on Thursday threw its hat into the streaming music service game with Prime Music, a "free" value-added service that touts access to more than one million songs for paying Amazon Prime members.
A mix between existing free services like Pandora and for-pay options like the Apple-owned Beats Music, Amazon's solution takes a middle-of-the-road approach by focusing on ad-free playback, loosely curated playlists and manual track searching.
Playlists range from 20 to 30 songs, are curated by "Amazon's Music Experts" and come with titles like "Pop to Make You Feel Better," "Boss, Not Bossy" and "Bedford Ave. Hipster Hits." More generic collections include hits from popular bands and artists, while single tracks can be found by searching the Prime Music library.
Users can add to a Prime Music library, which is accessible on Macs and PCs via Amazon's CloudPlayer, while smartphone playback is handled by the Amazon Music app.
At the moment, it appears as though Prime Music's social element ends at playlist reviews -- none were available at the time of this writing since the service just launched -- though there is an option in the Web player to broadcast the currently playing song to your Facebook friends.
Finally, the trial version of Prime Music pulled in 47 songs from our personal library using AutoRip, the Amazon equivalent of iTunes Match. It is unclear how Amazon gained access to the list as the songs were purchased through iTunes in 1999 and we gave no permission for a system scan.
In any case, Prime Music's Web view and overall aesthetic is more in line with Amazon's other value added services like Prime Instant Video than a polished standalone offering. Searches are conducted through Amazon's usual search bar and available music is displayed in an identical manner to Amazon's Digital Music Store.
Amazon Prime Music is available now for Prime subscribers who pay an annual rate of over $79. The company is offering a free 30-day trial -- actually a promotional Prime membership -- that automatically converts into a $99 per year annual fee at the end of the period. For now, Prime Music is limited to the U.S.
A mix between existing free services like Pandora and for-pay options like the Apple-owned Beats Music, Amazon's solution takes a middle-of-the-road approach by focusing on ad-free playback, loosely curated playlists and manual track searching.
Playlists range from 20 to 30 songs, are curated by "Amazon's Music Experts" and come with titles like "Pop to Make You Feel Better," "Boss, Not Bossy" and "Bedford Ave. Hipster Hits." More generic collections include hits from popular bands and artists, while single tracks can be found by searching the Prime Music library.
Users can add to a Prime Music library, which is accessible on Macs and PCs via Amazon's CloudPlayer, while smartphone playback is handled by the Amazon Music app.
At the moment, it appears as though Prime Music's social element ends at playlist reviews -- none were available at the time of this writing since the service just launched -- though there is an option in the Web player to broadcast the currently playing song to your Facebook friends.
Finally, the trial version of Prime Music pulled in 47 songs from our personal library using AutoRip, the Amazon equivalent of iTunes Match. It is unclear how Amazon gained access to the list as the songs were purchased through iTunes in 1999 and we gave no permission for a system scan.
In any case, Prime Music's Web view and overall aesthetic is more in line with Amazon's other value added services like Prime Instant Video than a polished standalone offering. Searches are conducted through Amazon's usual search bar and available music is displayed in an identical manner to Amazon's Digital Music Store.
Amazon Prime Music is available now for Prime subscribers who pay an annual rate of over $79. The company is offering a free 30-day trial -- actually a promotional Prime membership -- that automatically converts into a $99 per year annual fee at the end of the period. For now, Prime Music is limited to the U.S.
Comments
“Free for paid,” huh.
I don’t recall paying for my Mac in perpetuity even if I don’t use it.
Plus, you don't get your money back if you stop using your Mac for a month either, so it's a pretty moot attempt at a point.
I'm a Prime subscriber and I've downloaded the updated "Amazon Music" app ("Amazon Cloud Player" as was) but I can only see stuff I've bought?
Let's hope it goes better than the Prime Instant streaming TV service in UK, on launch Amazon claimed it would work on smart TVs that Amazon actually knew it didn't work on (as I found after much complaint and email exchanging with the support people) - 2014 models, not ancient ones
Months later, it's still not working
Finally, the trial version of Prime Music pulled in 47 songs from our personal library using AutoRip, the Amazon equivalent of iTunes Match. It is unclear how Amazon gained access to the list as the songs were purchased through iTunes in 1999 and we gave no permission for a system scan.
iTunes in 1999? AI must've gone back in time before the iTunes store was created...</s>
Apple is wide awake and realizes your scenario is pointless. It doesn't help Apple at all.
Anyone get this to work yet? I sign in and see nothing. Just a message telling me to he to the website and sign up. All other prone services work fine
I did...and my iPhone got really buggy after that and when I tried to relocate the icon it refused to let me sort it how I wanted. It's been deleted.
As for their selection...meh...for the most part it sucks and I don't see a lot of positive non-biased (ie. unpaid by Amazon) reviews coming down the pike.
Just like the iWork apps are "free" to anyone who bought a >$500 Computer, right?
theres nothing wrong w/ that statement. iWork wasnt one of the bulleted features on any apple device....and it has a retail price. to get it included is indeed getting it free, regardless of the fact that you spent money on the hardware.
Please consider in your news the fact that some of your readers are living outside of the US. As one reader from the UK has already mentioned the service is not available in the UK, the same is true for Germany.
and parts of africa dont have electricity...so? does that make the story any less true or relevant? nope.
Is Apple ever going to wake up and make android/windows apps of facetime / imessage / iradio / maps / iworks/ itunes/ ibook ...
"wake up" ? no. these software features are designed as features of the apple ecosystem, to drive sales of...wait for it...apple hardware. wow, crazy, huh?
theres nothing wrong w/ that statement. iWork wasnt one of the bulleted features on any apple device....and it has a retail price. to get it included is indeed getting it free, regardless of the fact that you spent money on the hardware.
I don't disagree. But the same applies to this Amazon service. People who already signed up for Prime are getting it free as an addition to their service.
Anyone get this to work yet? I sign in and see nothing. Just a message telling me to he to the website and sign up. All other prone services work fine
I did...and my iPhone got really buggy after that and when I tried to relocate the icon it refused to let me sort it how I wanted. It's been deleted.
As for their selection...meh...for the most part it sucks and I don't see a lot of positive non-biased (ie. unpaid by Amazon) reviews coming down the pike.
Just tried the Amazon app again and while the radio stuff is cool, there's still no gapless playback in any facet, not even albums you've downloaded from library. I'm shocked at how a rudimentary feature like that continues to be non-existent. I listen to many concerts and love Pink Floyd which makes this unusable for me. iTunes is still where it's at imo.
Is Amazon now the Apple Maps of streaming music services? Give it time, it's a new product, etc, etc.