In the old days, you bought the music you wanted to control, so you could curate your playlists and listen to what you want when you want, as another poster here stated. You built a library of such music, at exhorbitant cost, at least those of us who didn't outright steal tracks from peer-to-peer [illegal] sharing sites. To own and keep up-to-date a multiple thousand track library would cost thousands of dollars to build, and perhaps hundreds more per year to keep fresh as new music is released.
Today, under the paid streaming model, at about $10/month, you can have access to 25-30 million tracks as your personal library, from which you can build playlists and access any time from anywhere. $10/month, $120/year, for the rest of your life, might come to only a fraction of what it would have cost in the past to initially build a 6000 track library. And people complain. No reel-to-reel players to purchase and spend hours recording to, no huge wall of albums, turntable cost and maintenance, no mix-tape cassettes getting stale after a few plays. Ultra convenience at far lower cost to have a lifetime of constantly refreshed music and easily created playlists, curated stations, commentary, etc.
Here's how I explain the manner in which people become so easily spoiled. It's the same experience I've had in my dating life. A woman is not so interested in enumerating what she can offer a man as in informing us what some other man will offer her. Her expectations are constantly updated by what's on offer from others. Even if those other men are making offers they cannot sustain, as they might quickly go broke if she actually takes them up on their extravagant offers. That fact seems not to be a consideration when negotiating with you. And so it matters not that Spotify and other streaming services might not be sustainable in their free-tier business models, or that the providers of their wares (the artists) get paid less from that service. Consumers expectations of what they should be offered are set by a casual review of what they see on offer, without regard to its sustainability, not from the actual value they will get from a paid service versus going back to the old way of acquiring that same capability.
If the music studios want to enable ad supported services, then fine. As noted, radio has been this way for years. But don't then bitch and whine about the music industry in decline. Allowing YouTube to stream music is a dubious proposition, as the ads are so easy to skip.
$15 for a family plan for paid streaming is a pretty good deal ($10/month for one person can be harder to justify - depends on amount of music you consume). Not sure why the criticism of Apple not providing an ad supported service - there are literally hundreds to choose from.
I do agree that Apple could bundle iCloud and Apple Music together to increase subscriptions to both. I don't see the downside.
I still buy physical media. I buy CDs, Blu-rays with 5.1 albums and Vinyl.
I buy box-sets by artists I love - (Pink Floyd's Early Years boxset, The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's 50th Anniversary and Kraftwerk's 3D Catalogue).
I rip the CDs and use iTunes Match for my iPhone. At home, I listen to the physical media in my den, the way I love it.
I think I am one of the lucky ones born at a time where I can appreciate the work that goes into putting an album out that can be enjoyed on a dedicated system and can also appreciate the convenience of having my library in an iPhone.
Craig Federighi's (Interaction Designer) to-do-list, to be shared with Iovine (Music Industry Stakeholder) and Eddy Cue (Digital Services Stakeholder):
Re-invent iTunes, make it a unified macOS and iOS experience.
Make Apple Music accessible to everyone. Do not lock them out with a pay wall, but let the music lover pay for convenience. E.g. You can listen to the individual songs, but you pay for listening to playlists (convenience).
Focus on the goals of your primary user*.
(*) I'd say to make the music lover your primary persona, the artist your secondary persona, and have the music industry as your tertiary persona. Once you have a big audience, you could shift the primary persona to the (aspiring) artist. He'll be happy to pay an extra premium:
To further develop his life as a musician in front of an active engaging music crowd by getting access to valuable insights and fan interactions (schedule and sell concerts).
To rent the Music creation software from Apple.
And if you are an aspiring DJ, to mix songs into high quality DJ sets. As a premium member, you get access to the granular parts of a song. Music lovers on the other hand, would pay for access to these high quality DJ sets/playlists (see: pay for convenience). A portion of the revenue could go to (A) the DJ crafting these playlists and (B) the songs featured in the DJ set.
I do realise that this is going to be a hard sell to the Music Industry as they concede their power to the artist. It is putting Iovine in a difficult position as he represents that very Music Industry.
"Artists are getting screwed. Period. I don't see how anybody stands behind it."
Correction; the majority of low-level artists are getting screwed, the artists in the spotlight are doing very well; Adele for example is set to increase her fortune to £175m, Beyonce is probably worth 4-5x that at least. It's these ridiculous sums that people hear and read about and have little sympathy for in the end. Much like that southpark episode where Britney Spears had to downsize from a gulfstream 4 jet to a gulfstream 3 jet, because of kids ripping mp3s lol. The bigger problem as I see it, has always been record labels and the industry model in general.
They should allow free 1 play embedding on social media etc. Without that people have to use youtube or bandcamp or soundcloud. It would increase the brand awareness, and make it actually useful to share a song from apple music
That's a smart idea.
Outside of this, a fully free subscription option is ruining the music industry. It's one more reason why music has gone to shit—only a select number of answer make money these days. It's tough out there without time for artists to grow spiritually and take a year or two out to write a classic album.
Thanks. It could also be a way to block entrance of, say, Facebook into music. If facebook enters this streaming business, people won't need to go anywhere else to share a song. If they buy spotify is game over for other streaming services.
Because revenue from licensing fees paid by a half a billion people's ad impressions is somehow worse than revenue from direct sales.
How does that work?
If it means that a significant portion (10-20%) of those half a billion people aren't paying subscription fees because they can get what they want for free (i.e. ad-supported), then... yeah, it's worse. Ad-supported listening generates far less revenue (per listener) than subscription listening. Estimates vary, but based on a (supposed) Spotify filing from 2016 (for 2015) the ratio could be 1:20 or worse.
I wonder how many subscriptions they'd have if they hadn't nerf'd iTunes and nearly forced people into Apple Music. Our family finally gave up the other day and joined too... primarily to get back what we used to be able to do with home-sharing before Apple Music even was.
Because revenue from licensing fees paid by a half a billion people's ad impressions is somehow worse than revenue from direct sales.
How does that work?
It's less revenue for the same amount of actual listening hours.
I completely get that part, but what about the part where people who can't listen for free won't bother to subscribe when there are other free options available? People like me who, if it weren't for Pandora, would probably just listen to the radio, or my own rather extensive music collection. Isn't that "less revenue" as well? Unless your supposing that the entire music industry will collude to prevent ad based listening (which seems likely to be challenged in court using anti-trust and anti-competition laws), there will always be free options, even if it's just FM radio.
Because revenue from licensing fees paid by a half a billion people's ad impressions is somehow worse than revenue from direct sales.
How does that work?
It's less revenue for the same amount of actual listening hours.
I completely get that part, but what about the part where people who can't listen for free won't bother to subscribe when there are other free options available? People like me who, if it weren't for Pandora, would probably just listen to the radio, or my own rather extensive music collection. Isn't that "less revenue" as well? Unless your supposing that the entire music industry will collude to prevent ad based listening (which seems likely to be challenged in court using anti-trust and anti-competition laws), there will always be free options, even if it's just FM radio.
The music industry wouldn't be able to prevent ad-based listening unless it could get laws changed. Services like Pandora's - i.e., non-interactive streaming services - qualify for compulsory licenses. They don't have to get labels or artists to agree in order to stream their music. Terrestrial radio doesn't either, and it doesn't even have to pay for recording rights - only songwriter's rights.
That said, yeah, a lot of people who listen, e.g., to Spotify's ad-based service likely wouldn't subscribe to its paid service even if the former weren't available. But the key is that not many of them would need to in order for more total revenue to be generated. The free service generates very little revenue per listener as compared to what the paid service does. If 15% of those free listeners would subscribe (in the absence of the free service), then more revenue would likely be generated.
I would note though that it's possible that people listening for free (at least, those using non-interactive services) would be more likely to buy some digital copies of certain music (e.g. CDs or iTunes downloads). Those paying for an interactive service can listen to whatever they want whenever they want. But if you're listening to a non-interactive service you can't listen to particular songs whenever you want.
Comments
Today, under the paid streaming model, at about $10/month, you can have access to 25-30 million tracks as your personal library, from which you can build playlists and access any time from anywhere. $10/month, $120/year, for the rest of your life, might come to only a fraction of what it would have cost in the past to initially build a 6000 track library. And people complain. No reel-to-reel players to purchase and spend hours recording to, no huge wall of albums, turntable cost and maintenance, no mix-tape cassettes getting stale after a few plays. Ultra convenience at far lower cost to have a lifetime of constantly refreshed music and easily created playlists, curated stations, commentary, etc.
Here's how I explain the manner in which people become so easily spoiled. It's the same experience I've had in my dating life. A woman is not so interested in enumerating what she can offer a man as in informing us what some other man will offer her. Her expectations are constantly updated by what's on offer from others. Even if those other men are making offers they cannot sustain, as they might quickly go broke if she actually takes them up on their extravagant offers. That fact seems not to be a consideration when negotiating with you. And so it matters not that Spotify and other streaming services might not be sustainable in their free-tier business models, or that the providers of their wares (the artists) get paid less from that service. Consumers expectations of what they should be offered are set by a casual review of what they see on offer, without regard to its sustainability, not from the actual value they will get from a paid service versus going back to the old way of acquiring that same capability.
$15 for a family plan for paid streaming is a pretty good deal ($10/month for one person can be harder to justify - depends on amount of music you consume). Not sure why the criticism of Apple not providing an ad supported service - there are literally hundreds to choose from.
I do agree that Apple could bundle iCloud and Apple Music together to increase subscriptions to both. I don't see the downside.
I still buy physical media. I buy CDs, Blu-rays with 5.1 albums and Vinyl.
I buy box-sets by artists I love - (Pink Floyd's Early Years boxset, The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's 50th Anniversary and Kraftwerk's 3D Catalogue).
I rip the CDs and use iTunes Match for my iPhone. At home, I listen to the physical media in my den, the way I love it.
I think I am one of the lucky ones born at a time where I can appreciate the work that goes into putting an album out that can be enjoyed on a dedicated system and can also appreciate the convenience of having my library in an iPhone.
And I will always pay for my music.
(*) I'd say to make the music lover your primary persona, the artist your secondary persona, and have the music industry as your tertiary persona. Once you have a big audience, you could shift the primary persona to the (aspiring) artist. He'll be happy to pay an extra premium:
I do realise that this is going to be a hard sell to the Music Industry as they concede their power to the artist. It is putting Iovine in a difficult position as he represents that very Music Industry.
>:x
EDIT: Layout.
Correction; the majority of low-level artists are getting screwed, the artists in the spotlight are doing very well; Adele for example is set to increase her fortune to £175m, Beyonce is probably worth 4-5x that at least. It's these ridiculous sums that people hear and read about and have little sympathy for in the end. Much like that southpark episode where Britney Spears had to downsize from a gulfstream 4 jet to a gulfstream 3 jet, because of kids ripping mp3s lol. The bigger problem as I see it, has always been record labels and the industry model in general.
And I'm not a fan of facebook.
Because revenue from licensing fees paid by a half a billion people's ad impressions is somehow worse than revenue from direct sales.
How does that work?
I completely get that part, but what about the part where people who can't listen for free won't bother to subscribe when there are other free options available? People like me who, if it weren't for Pandora, would probably just listen to the radio, or my own rather extensive music collection. Isn't that "less revenue" as well? Unless your supposing that the entire music industry will collude to prevent ad based listening (which seems likely to be challenged in court using anti-trust and anti-competition laws), there will always be free options, even if it's just FM radio.
That said, yeah, a lot of people who listen, e.g., to Spotify's ad-based service likely wouldn't subscribe to its paid service even if the former weren't available. But the key is that not many of them would need to in order for more total revenue to be generated. The free service generates very little revenue per listener as compared to what the paid service does. If 15% of those free listeners would subscribe (in the absence of the free service), then more revenue would likely be generated.
I would note though that it's possible that people listening for free (at least, those using non-interactive services) would be more likely to buy some digital copies of certain music (e.g. CDs or iTunes downloads). Those paying for an interactive service can listen to whatever they want whenever they want. But if you're listening to a non-interactive service you can't listen to particular songs whenever you want.