Apple's 'arrogance' wrought mediocre iTunes Radio and led to Beats buy, report says
Amid the furor of Apple's $3 billion purchase of Beats, pundits asked why the Cupertino company would sink so much capital into what amounts to a brand name. A report on Thursday now claims a shortsighted and credulous iTunes management team put out an inferior product in iTunes Radio, which in turn forced the acquisition.
Citing multiple sources, Buzzfeed claims the Apple's iTunes managers ignored competing streaming music offerings like Pandora to the point where some didn't know that popular app Spotify was a subscription service. The resulting product, iTunes Radio, is feature deficient compared to rival streamers, in both content curation and purpose, these people said.
"The management in particular were pretty much tone-deaf in what Spotify was and that's why they're panicking now," one person said. "They didn't understand how Spotify worked, which is why they thought iTunes Radio would be a Spotify killer."
According to the source, other managers saw Pandora as a "dead company" because of its troubles in generating revenue. Ironically, engineers in the group reportedly preferred the competition's offerings to iTunes Radio, especially Spotify which rolls in serious social network integration.
"Pandora is an awesome radio that blows iTunes Radio out of the water. Seriously, iTunes Radio sucks and it sucks because of Apple's arrogance," said a former Apple employee. "I was floored by the decision-making skills by management over and over again."
With the Beats deal, Apple is thought to have paid some $2.5 billion for Beats Electronics and only $500 million for the firm's streaming business. When Apple CEO Tim Cook announced the deal, however, he reiterated the importance of Beats Music and said the subscription service would be kept intact as a go-along with iTunes Radio.
Some industry analysts saw iTunes Radio as a new way to push iTunes purchases, not an experiment in high quality content curation that many feel is the next step for streaming services. Beats Music touts human music curation as one of its strong suits.
Echoing an "Apple is losing its cool factor" mindset, the mid-level worker also commented on the acqui-hires of music industry guru Jimmy Iovine and rap superstar Dr. Dre, who are both taking positions at Apple in the near future. The new blood is a play for a younger generation of users, which the source said has become an increasingly pressing issue for the company.
It remains to be seen what part Beats and its cofounders will play in Apple's massive iTunes music empire and beyond. After undertaking Apple's biggest-ever acquisition, however, Cook and company likely have something special planned for the new subsidiary.
Citing multiple sources, Buzzfeed claims the Apple's iTunes managers ignored competing streaming music offerings like Pandora to the point where some didn't know that popular app Spotify was a subscription service. The resulting product, iTunes Radio, is feature deficient compared to rival streamers, in both content curation and purpose, these people said.
"The management in particular were pretty much tone-deaf in what Spotify was and that's why they're panicking now," one person said. "They didn't understand how Spotify worked, which is why they thought iTunes Radio would be a Spotify killer."
According to the source, other managers saw Pandora as a "dead company" because of its troubles in generating revenue. Ironically, engineers in the group reportedly preferred the competition's offerings to iTunes Radio, especially Spotify which rolls in serious social network integration.
"Pandora is an awesome radio that blows iTunes Radio out of the water. Seriously, iTunes Radio sucks and it sucks because of Apple's arrogance," said a former Apple employee. "I was floored by the decision-making skills by management over and over again."
With the Beats deal, Apple is thought to have paid some $2.5 billion for Beats Electronics and only $500 million for the firm's streaming business. When Apple CEO Tim Cook announced the deal, however, he reiterated the importance of Beats Music and said the subscription service would be kept intact as a go-along with iTunes Radio.
Some industry analysts saw iTunes Radio as a new way to push iTunes purchases, not an experiment in high quality content curation that many feel is the next step for streaming services. Beats Music touts human music curation as one of its strong suits.
Echoing an "Apple is losing its cool factor" mindset, the mid-level worker also commented on the acqui-hires of music industry guru Jimmy Iovine and rap superstar Dr. Dre, who are both taking positions at Apple in the near future. The new blood is a play for a younger generation of users, which the source said has become an increasingly pressing issue for the company.
It remains to be seen what part Beats and its cofounders will play in Apple's massive iTunes music empire and beyond. After undertaking Apple's biggest-ever acquisition, however, Cook and company likely have something special planned for the new subsidiary.
Comments
http://online.wsj.com/articles/apple-paying-just-under-500-million-for-beats-music-streaming-service-1401403287
Then.. again.. we are talking about blogs here.. their job is to just repeat things, regardless.. the mindless mime ..
http://appleinsider.com/articles/14/05/29/apples-paid-less-than-500m-for-beats-music-25b-for-beats-electronics
"The management in particular were pretty much tone-deaf in what Spotify was and that's why they're panicking now," one person said. "They didn't understand how Spotify worked, which is why they thought iTunes Radio would be a Spotify killer."
But then there's this:
iTunes Radio Surpasses Spotify to Take Third Place Among U.S. Music Streaming Services
Serving up some hearsay by paraphrasing "former Apple employees"and "the mid-level worker" and "according to the source, other managers". These are things that "one person said".
Nothing to see here folks. Just some click-bait. Move right along.
Wait a minute. I've read the cost distribution is the other way around. I've read only $500 million for Beats Music streaming and the rest for Beats Electronics. Who's correct? $500M is not that much for a new streaming music system.
Apple doesn't need to listen to industry analysts, who reported kids think Apple lost the cool factor, which caused Apple to buy the needless Beats purchase. Remember when these same analysts said that Apple needs to make a cheap iPhone!
http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/news/digital-and-mobile/5944778/apple-mulls-launching-spotify-rival-android-app-as
http://www.billboard.com/biz/articles/news/digital-and-mobile/6042224/underwhelming-start-to-itunes-radio-lights-fire-under
Spotify streams music, the songs are selected by me.
Which one do you think I prefer?
I'm also going to drop two facts, it's up to you to figure out why - wait for it, here it comes..
"Spotify - service reached 20 million users with 5 million paid subscribers by December 2012."
"iTunes Radio launched September 18th, 2013."
I work for Apple, directly, indirectly, high level employee, retail.. Doesn't matter. I've worked for Apple since 2008, have held four different positions and I'm privy to a lot interesting information because of it. I can say with 100% certainty that this claim is false. I can say with 100% certainty that Spotify was very well understood and was taken into heavy consideration when iTunes Radio was under development. That's where I stop elaborating. It's easier to claim incompetence on a companies "failures" when you don't understand why or how, and you only get to see 10% of the picture (believe me, you're missing the biggest pieces).
I leave you with this.. Believe what you want and who you want, but according to this article "some guy" who has previously "worked for Apple" had all this to say. I'm some guy. I work for Apple (or so I claim). Why not believe me?
I wonder if these are the same sources at Apple who told [@]drblank[/@] that Katie Cotton probably left because of what Dre's music "stood for."
I don't know, do you have such shitty taste in music that even you hate your own selections?
This exactly it. I don't know how people can compare them. iTunes Radio and Pandora choose music to play at me and stop me from skipping after awhile if I dislike their choices.
Spotify and Rdio will play almost any song I want, any time, as many times as I want. It's a completely different thing!
People compare them because somewhere along the way certain people decided to use the term streaming music without qualifying how one type is basically an advanced streaming music radio service and the other is streaming music rental service. I say the former is advanced because it does allow some interaction with your selections whereas streaming radio services of yore we purely one-way streams.
Citing multiple anonymous sources. What a joke!
A hit piece and probably bogus. Moving right along...
"Citing multiple anonymous sources, all the ladies claim SolipsismX is great in bed."
It must be true¡
Fitting a story to a predetermined headline? Check.