Taylor Swift praises Apple, but calls 90 day free trial of Music service 'shocking, disappointing' f

12346

Comments

  • Reply 101 of 135
    rogifanrogifan Posts: 10,669member
    So basically Eddy Cue confirmed that Taylor Swift and these indie artists got Apple to change their mind. Apple was owned by Taylor Swift. Sigh.

    http://recode.net/2015/06/21/apple-says-it-will-pay-taylor-swift-for-free-streams-after-all/
  • Reply 102 of 135
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by TheWhiteFalcon View Post

     

    That's not a good attitude to have. Because people will keep saying that as justification, until one day Apple suddenly can't afford it.




    If they can't they must shorten the trial period. They were wrong about this. How about starting a free movie streaming service next? Include all movies and TV shows and offer a three months trial period without paying any content creator anything? Does not seem fair? Well, because it is not. What Apple negotiated exactly, we don't know. But Swift has her own record label and does not need to join any deal the other record labels may have struck with Apple. The antitrust issue is also crap. As long as Apple pays the artists in the same fashion it will pay them after the trial ends they are safe from antitrust. Striking a deal in which they force record labels to "give away the music for free or else" would be an antitrust case though.

     

    Cue did the right thing. And was late at that. Beats used to do a lot of these Guerilla marketing stunts in the past. Maybe this is why Apple tried it this way. Stupid idea... 

  • Reply 103 of 135
    arlorarlor Posts: 532member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by TheWhiteFalcon View Post

     

    That's not a good attitude to have. Because people will keep saying that as justification, until one day Apple suddenly can't afford it.


     

    So, supposing you were a musical artist and not a rabid Apple fan, you'd be happy with Apple giving away your music for three months? This was the right move from the start; it's just unfortunate Apple made a different announcement (or at least appeared to make a different announcement). 

  • Reply 104 of 135
    mobiusmobius Posts: 380member
    Proof-reading is good - just saying...

    ...now, where's that new Taylor Swift album you speak of?
  • Reply 106 of 135
    So they're gutless and caved.

    It's not that simple. And I'll thank you not to push that narrative because the trolls and hater sites will be spinning that heavily.

    Negotiations is a complex chess game, and Apple doesn't sacrifice a chess piece unless it buys them something more valuable. In this case, winning over Taylor Swift and other noisy holdouts will if nothing strengthen the Apple Music service. Tidal has already failed, Spotify is losing money, and Apple has one chance to get it right. They can afford to run this service at break even because they make their money selling hardware. Having the best music streaming service on Apple's platform (and one that artists like because they get paid fairly) is a win-win, even if it generates no profit for them. It's the one thing Apple can do that Spotify can't sustainably do.
  • Reply 107 of 135
    lightknightlightknight Posts: 2,312member
    What's more disappointing is the author putting a screen cap of that person's album, "1989", and then calling it later "1986".

    I don't have a clue who's the artist or what the album is about, but surely it's not that hard to proof-read a sentence, especially one where the author pokes fun at people who, apparently, can't read as well as he does?
  • Reply 108 of 135
    djsherlydjsherly Posts: 1,031member

    This article I found a it weird. DED appeared to be equivocating on the issue. Almost confused.
  • Reply 109 of 135
    lightknightlightknight Posts: 2,312member

    Well, in any case,I went and looked Taylor Swift up, and she's famous for teenagers. Now I feel old.

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by djsherly View Post





    This article I found a it weird. DED appeared to be equivocating on the issue. Almost confused.

  • Reply 110 of 135
    gatorguygatorguy Posts: 24,213member
    if Apple enters the streaming market by paying labels to give out unpaid access to Apple Music subscribers, it becomes an antitrust issue. .
    Antitrust keeps Apple from paying them.

    Riiight... Antitrust issue. :rolleyes:

    It was never an antitrust issue as shown by Apple's course reversal. Anti-trust was just going to be an AI invented cover, not something backed by fact.

    Anyway, Apple should be lauded for acting so quickly to correct the original error in judgement. That's the Apple I expected to step up.
  • Reply 111 of 135
    starbird73starbird73 Posts: 538member
    That's not a good attitude to have. Because people will keep saying that as justification, until one day Apple suddenly can't afford it.

    The new American way
  • Reply 112 of 135
    rogifanrogifan Posts: 10,669member
    gatorguy wrote: »

    Riiight... Antitrust issue. :rolleyes:

    It was never an antitrust issue as shown by Apple's course reversal. Anti-trust was just going to be an AI invented cover, not something backed by fact.

    Anyway, Apple should be lauded for acting so quickly to correct the original error in judgement. That's the Apple I expected to step up.

    Some are still arguing this but saying Taylor Swift's letter gives Apple cover. And now she'll be forced to put her latest album on Apple Music. Even if she does it this wasn't some genius move by Apple. It was Apple PR saying we've got mess on our hands and Eddy Cue scrambling over the weekend to deal with it. He says this is what he and Tim Cook wanted but that's obviously spin as were it true they would have done this from the beginning.
  • Reply 113 of 135
    gatorguygatorguy Posts: 24,213member
    rogifan wrote: »
    Some are still arguing this but saying Taylor Swift's letter gives Apple cover. And now she'll be forced to put her latest album on Apple Music.

    Well of course that was Apple's clever plan all along. How devious! /s

    Isn't it great how we can come up with these convoluted explanations in hindsight to explain away anything that disagrees with a talking point?
  • Reply 114 of 135
    maestro64maestro64 Posts: 5,043member
    What I find funny about this is when the Artists take a stance on things like this, they are not the one making the money, we all know record label and such all collect most of the money and Taylor Swift is no different. It not like she did it all on her own without the record companies involvements. Very few artist are not tied to a very one sided contract with the record companies. In this case she is just a mouth piece for the record companies she is just helping them make more money. The record labels obviously had no power in the negotiations so they pulling in the artist in hope to sway public opinion their way. Well it worked this time, it did not work in the past.

    People all ready said it 3 months to Taylor Swift is chump change and a rounding error in what she makes, most of her incomes comes from touring and personal appearances. she only get a small faction of play time or music sales.

    I suspect this is now going to cause a problem for Apple, becuase the likes of Sportify and various states AG's will come after Apple becuase it using it size and money to stop on the competior by offering 3 months free, they will claim is preditory pricing tactics.
  • Reply 115 of 135
    Apple should just get rid of the three months free trial. Or remove them from the trial if they want to get paid when Apple gets nothing for those three month. Can't believe artists are complaining about this as it will ultimately result in more sales for them. I thought Taylor was a smart cookie. Image shattered.
  • Reply 116 of 135
    gatorguygatorguy Posts: 24,213member
    maestro64 wrote: »
    What I find funny about this is when the Artists take a stance on things like this, they are not the one making the money, we all know record label and such all collect most of the money and Taylor Swift is no different. It not like she did it all on her own without the record companies involvements. Very few artist are not tied to a very one sided contract with the record companies. In this cast she just a mouth piece for the record companies she is just helping them make more money. The record labels obviously had no power in the negotiations so they pulling in the artist in hope to sway public opinion their way. Well it worked this time, it did not work in the past.

    People all ready said it 3 months to Taylor Swift is chump change and a rounding error in what she makes, most of her incomes comes from touring and personal appearances. she only get a small faction of play time or music sales.

    I suspect this is now going to cause a problem for Apple, becuase the likes of Sportify and various states AG's will come after Apple becuase it using it size and money to stop on the competior by offering 3 months free, they will claim is preditory pricing tactics.
    Another competing paid music service has a 2 month free intro. Apple has absolutely no antitrust issues to be concerned about with their free 3 month trial. Zero.

    That whole "Apple can't pay the artists because... ANTITRUST!" spiel was simply an imaginative but silly talking point from the mind of someone looking for a way to explain away Apple's initial plan. Whether it made sense didn't matter apparently as there were enough fans to grab hold and talk it up as a banner theme. Should be pretty obvious now that was no reason not to pay the IP owners.

    That does not mean that the EU might have some other concern with Apple Music and the negotiations with license holders. But offering a free introductory period won't be one of them. There's nothing wrong with that at all and certainly can't rise to the level of "predatory pricing".
  • Reply 117 of 135
    rogifanrogifan Posts: 10,669member
    gatorguy wrote: »
    Well of course that was Apple's clever plan all along. How devious! /s

    Isn't it great how we can come up with these convoluted explanations in hindsight to explain away anything that disagrees with a talking point?

    Yes I'm highly amused by all these conspiracy theories. Especially the ones that think this was all an elaborate PR stunt and Apple probably even wrote this letter for Swift. Ha that's hilarious. It's so obvious this was Cue scrambling at the last minute because it was turning into w PR nightmare and Apple had to nip in the bud before more spoke out.
  • Reply 118 of 135
    jungmarkjungmark Posts: 6,926member
    rogifan wrote: »
    This is one of my problems with Tim Cook's Apple: the fact they can't stand behind a position and are often times reversing themselves. It's happened with the App Store where things get rejected (that maybe shouldn't have in the first place) and then after an outcry from the developer community Apple reverses course. Same thing happened with the AltConf where Apple initially said no to them streaming WWDC keynote but once again after complaints reversed themselves. The reversals might be the right thing to do but it makes you question Apple's original stance.

    So my question here is, was Apple intending to pay artists/labels during this free trial all along and if so why was the media reporting otherwise and artists thinking otherwise? And if Apple wasn't intending to do so and had legitimate reasons for not doing so why are they caving now? Why wasn't this all worked out before the free trial was announced? This just looks like Apple caving to Taylor Swift and makes one wonder if Apple really thought all of this through. Same thing with that U2 promotion last year. Was there no one at Apple who thought not all consumers would be OK with Apple placing a U2 album in their iTunes library as though they purchased it, especially those who have automatic downloads turned on? i certainly don't have a lot of confidence in Jimmy Iovine and especially Eddy Cue right now. Perhaps the reason we don't have a new Apple TV yet is because Eddy's not the great negotiator he's made out to be. Maybe Steve Jobs really was the one who had to close the deals in the end.
    Because Jobs never changed his mind. /s

    Didn't new music on iTunes go from .99 to 1.29 under Jobs?

    Apple did the right thing but this should have been done prior to any announcement.
  • Reply 119 of 135
    It's 2015. Anyone that really wanted her album already bought it, and these "indie" people whining about not making money ignore the fact that they probably wouldn't have had their music purchased any way. Never mind that most of their profit as musicians comes from merchandise and shows (where said merchandise is most frequently sold)

    Taylor has had her rich parents from the suburbs pay for every little thing that got her where she is today so she should be the last person to complain about anything.
  • Reply 120 of 135

    It's 2015. Anyone that really wanted her album already bought it, and these "indie" people whining about not making money ignore the fact that they probably wouldn't have had their music purchased any way. Never mind that most of their profit as musicians comes from merchandise and shows (where said merchandise is most frequently sold).

     

    Taylor should be the last person to complain about anything.

Sign In or Register to comment.