Amazon launches Music Unlimited to challenge Spotify & Apple Music
Breaking out of the confines of its existing Prime Music service, Amazon on Wednesday launched Music Unlimited, directly targeted at the current leaders in on-demand streaming, Spotify and Apple Music.
Unlike Prime Music -- which has just 2 million tracks -- Music Unlimited has "tens of millions" of songs, putting it on par with Amazon's rivals. Subscribers also don't need to be Prime members -- a non-Prime Unlimited plan costs an industry standard $9.99 per month.
The service becomes cheaper with a Prime membership however, priced at $7.99 per month, or $79 per year. With or without Prime, a family plan due in the near future will cost $14.99 per month, or $149 per year.
An even cheaper $3.99-per-month option is available, but extremely limited in that the plan can only be used on a single Echo, Echo Dot, or Tap speaker.
Music Unlimited also includes features like offline caching, and AI integration, such that people can make broad requests to Amazon's Alexa voice assistant. Reuters noted that people can ask Alexa to play music fitting a particular mood, or even use the phrase "play music by the King of Pop" to start tracks by Michael Jackson.
One downside to Amazon versus other services is a limited trial period. Amazon's trial period is just 30 days, versus three months for Apple Music. Spotify is free to use with ads, only asking subscribers to pay if they want Premium benefits.
Unlike Prime Music -- which has just 2 million tracks -- Music Unlimited has "tens of millions" of songs, putting it on par with Amazon's rivals. Subscribers also don't need to be Prime members -- a non-Prime Unlimited plan costs an industry standard $9.99 per month.
The service becomes cheaper with a Prime membership however, priced at $7.99 per month, or $79 per year. With or without Prime, a family plan due in the near future will cost $14.99 per month, or $149 per year.
An even cheaper $3.99-per-month option is available, but extremely limited in that the plan can only be used on a single Echo, Echo Dot, or Tap speaker.
Music Unlimited also includes features like offline caching, and AI integration, such that people can make broad requests to Amazon's Alexa voice assistant. Reuters noted that people can ask Alexa to play music fitting a particular mood, or even use the phrase "play music by the King of Pop" to start tracks by Michael Jackson.
One downside to Amazon versus other services is a limited trial period. Amazon's trial period is just 30 days, versus three months for Apple Music. Spotify is free to use with ads, only asking subscribers to pay if they want Premium benefits.
Comments
I also tested "Queen of Soul", "The Boss", "The Fab Four", "Mimi" (Mariah Carey nickname). All artists' songs were played.
But you don't have to use their services.
i also use AM, which i can use to stream stuff or augment my playlists from.
Or at least that is what its investors think, as reflected in its share price being three figure multiples of its earnings.
Anyway, what I meant is that I added a number of albums, songs and playlists to my Apple Music Library; some of these I have downloaded and some of them I stream when I select to play them. But they are in my Library and I consider them "my music collection", notwithstanding that I have further access to an unlimited music collection.
What I'd like to see is that when I switch from, say, Apple Music to Spotify, this list of songs and playlists is also transferred, so that my Spotify Library looks exactly the same as my Apple Music Library right away, and I do not have to "search / add" for hours to replicate my original Library. Optimally, it would also know which songs of my Apple Music Library I had downloaded and download these same songs from Spotify. Let's face it, streaming does not work where you most listen to music: in the car on rural roads, in the tube, on airplanes, even at home when you simultaneously use AirPlay over your speakers and browse the web.
Without this function, the switching costs, i.e., spending hours setting up the new Library, are very high, and we all know what companies do when switching costs are high: charge you more and provide you less (see banks).
Lastly, I am not asking for the right to transfer the music files, I'd just like to be able to transfer the metadata decsribing the songs, playlists, and albums I selected so that the new service can immediately show me the same Library (and thus lend me the same music.
It is the same with bank accounts: it used to be that switching bank accounts meant hours of work cancelling and setting up all your direct debits and standing orders; now you just appoint a new bank and your old bank is required to work with your new bank to transfer all of these. I think it would be nice if music services did the same. It would drive down prices everywhere and encourage music service providers to continuously improve their service so tat people don't switch.