The referenced article is not explicit about an extra fee. It says $9.99 tier, not a $19.98 tier. It also says it will be the same price as the standard plan.
Additionally it says this “Speculation within the industry suggests Apple's move is to provide a more aggressively priced, higher-quality option after Spotify announced this week it was raising prices.”
This suggests Apple plans to significantly undercut Spotify’s price. If this were an extra fee, it would not be undercutting Spotify.
Are we sure they are talking about it being an additional price in Apple’s case?
Apple may just be absorbing any extra cost to increase subscribers and to bring more music fans in the Apple ecosystem. They could then use Apple Music to drive more users to other Apple services. Apple tends to not like to make extra money over specs that don’t require physical hardware changes, so if they were forced to do add a fee by the industry I would expect it to be a smaller increase like Amazon’s. If they don’t increase the price, it gives Apple bragging rights that their service is superior to others.
Lossless was also something that deeply interested Steve Jobs, so I think Apple would want this to be for everyone simply in his honor.
EDIT: All the other Apple news sites seem to be interpreting this the same as me.
It blows me away how much Apple drags their feet on the obvious like lossless, podcasts and gaming. Things that should have been taken seriously a decade ago.
When did Mastered for iTunes roll out? I’m trying to remember if it was lossless.
And smart speakers, and teleconferencing, and the next frontier in audio- livestream broadcasting. Nearly every tech company in the world is investing huge sums of money into audio-only broadcasting thanks to the success of Clubhouse. Will Apple wait 5 years to enter that market as well? History suggests it will.
And why would they discontinue the HomePod only to announce lossless audio a few months later (assuming the rumors are true)? What if we don’t feel like wearing our AirPods? Are we really supposed to enjoy high fidelity audio on our little HomePod Minis? That sounds like great experience! Who knows, if this launch even happens, maybe they’ll surprise us by releasing a new version of the HomePod along with the AirPods 3 and lossless Apple Music. I doubt it though.
The referenced article is not explicit about an extra fee. It says $9.99 tier, not a $19.98 tier. It also says it will be the same price as the standard plan.
Additionally it says this “Speculation within the industry suggests Apple's move is to provide a more aggressively priced, higher-quality option after Spotify announced this week it was raising prices.”
This suggests Apple plans to significantly undercut Spotify’s price. If this were an extra fee, it would not be undercutting Spotify.
Are we sure they are talking about it being an additional price in Apple’s case?
Apple may just be absorbing any extra cost to increase subscribers and to bring more music fans in the Apple ecosystem. They could then use Apple Music to drive more users to other Apple services. Apple tends to not like to make extra money over specs that don’t require physical hardware changes, so if they were forced to do add a fee by the industry I would expect it to be a smaller increase like Amazon’s. If they don’t increase the price, it gives Apple bragging rights that their service is superior to others.
Lossless was also something that deeply interested Steve Jobs, so I think Apple would want this to be for everyone simply in his honor.
EDIT: All the other Apple news sites seem to be interpreting this the same as me.
It blows me away how much Apple drags their feet on the obvious like lossless, podcasts and gaming. Things that should have been taken seriously a decade ago.
When did Mastered for iTunes roll out? I’m trying to remember if it was lossless.
And smart speakers, and teleconferencing, and the next frontier in audio- livestream broadcasting. Nearly every tech company in the world is investing huge sums of money into audio-only broadcasting thanks to the success of Clubhouse. Will Apple wait 5 years to enter that market as well? History suggests it will.
And why would they discontinue the HomePod only to announce lossless audio a few months later (assuming the rumors are true)? What if we don’t feel like wearing our AirPods? Are we really supposed to enjoy high fidelity audio on our little HomePod Minis? That sounds like great experience! Who knows, if this launch even happens, maybe they’ll surprise us by releasing a new version of the HomePod along with the AirPods 3 and lossless Apple Music. I doubt it though.
Apple has a live audio-only station => Apple Music One (formerly known as Beats Radio). It's actually quite popular.
I’ve been saying it for years. Apple needs a separate music event like they had for iPods back in the day.
They could announce all music related tech in one go. AirPods, Beats, Speakers, Apple Music, Radio, iTunes, Apps and music related features. Have music presenters like the launch of Apple Music then cap it off it with an artist performance.
I miss Bozoma “Boz” Saint John, Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre. It’s as if Apple had a bad falling out with the music industry in general.
P.S. Apple had an opportunity to make an “Apple Records” when Jimmy and Dre were hired. This was like hiring George Lucas and Steven Spielberg but not using them for film making.
Well, probably a falling out with those three but on the flip side it's done well with its radio station, Apple Music One. To me, it's the best part of Apple Music. They have globally recognized DJ's on there. It's grown in scope since it first debuted. Not to mention the interviews they stream with famous artists.
The referenced article is not explicit about an extra fee. It says $9.99 tier, not a $19.98 tier. It also says it will be the same price as the standard plan.
Additionally it says this “Speculation within the industry suggests Apple's move is to provide a more aggressively priced, higher-quality option after Spotify announced this week it was raising prices.”
This suggests Apple plans to significantly undercut Spotify’s price. If this were an extra fee, it would not be undercutting Spotify.
Are we sure they are talking about it being an additional price in Apple’s case?
Apple may just be absorbing any extra cost to increase subscribers and to bring more music fans in the Apple ecosystem. They could then use Apple Music to drive more users to other Apple services. Apple tends to not like to make extra money over specs that don’t require physical hardware changes, so if they were forced to do add a fee by the industry I would expect it to be a smaller increase like Amazon’s. If they don’t increase the price, it gives Apple bragging rights that their service is superior to others.
Lossless was also something that deeply interested Steve Jobs, so I think Apple would want this to be for everyone simply in his honor.
EDIT: All the other Apple news sites seem to be interpreting this the same as me.
It blows me away how much Apple drags their feet on the obvious like lossless, podcasts and gaming. Things that should have been taken seriously a decade ago.
When did Mastered for iTunes roll out? I’m trying to remember if it was lossless.
And smart speakers, and teleconferencing, and the next frontier in audio- livestream broadcasting. Nearly every tech company in the world is investing huge sums of money into audio-only broadcasting thanks to the success of Clubhouse. Will Apple wait 5 years to enter that market as well? History suggests it will.
And why would they discontinue the HomePod only to announce lossless audio a few months later (assuming the rumors are true)? What if we don’t feel like wearing our AirPods? Are we really supposed to enjoy high fidelity audio on our little HomePod Minis? That sounds like great experience! Who knows, if this launch even happens, maybe they’ll surprise us by releasing a new version of the HomePod along with the AirPods 3 and lossless Apple Music. I doubt it though.
Apple has a live audio-only station => Apple Music One (formerly known as Beats Radio). It's actually quite popular.
You mean the RADIO station Apple Music One? Not the same thing at all.
The referenced article is not explicit about an extra fee. It says $9.99 tier, not a $19.98 tier. It also says it will be the same price as the standard plan.
Additionally it says this “Speculation within the industry suggests Apple's move is to provide a more aggressively priced, higher-quality option after Spotify announced this week it was raising prices.”
This suggests Apple plans to significantly undercut Spotify’s price. If this were an extra fee, it would not be undercutting Spotify.
Are we sure they are talking about it being an additional price in Apple’s case?
Apple may just be absorbing any extra cost to increase subscribers and to bring more music fans in the Apple ecosystem. They could then use Apple Music to drive more users to other Apple services. Apple tends to not like to make extra money over specs that don’t require physical hardware changes, so if they were forced to do add a fee by the industry I would expect it to be a smaller increase like Amazon’s. If they don’t increase the price, it gives Apple bragging rights that their service is superior to others.
Lossless was also something that deeply interested Steve Jobs, so I think Apple would want this to be for everyone simply in his honor.
EDIT: All the other Apple news sites seem to be interpreting this the same as me.
It blows me away how much Apple drags their feet on the obvious like lossless, podcasts and gaming. Things that should have been taken seriously a decade ago.
When did Mastered for iTunes roll out? I’m trying to remember if it was lossless.
And smart speakers, and teleconferencing, and the next frontier in audio- livestream broadcasting. Nearly every tech company in the world is investing huge sums of money into audio-only broadcasting thanks to the success of Clubhouse. Will Apple wait 5 years to enter that market as well? History suggests it will.
And why would they discontinue the HomePod only to announce lossless audio a few months later (assuming the rumors are true)? What if we don’t feel like wearing our AirPods? Are we really supposed to enjoy high fidelity audio on our little HomePod Minis? That sounds like great experience! Who knows, if this launch even happens, maybe they’ll surprise us by releasing a new version of the HomePod along with the AirPods 3 and lossless Apple Music. I doubt it though.
Apple has a live audio-only station => Apple Music One (formerly known as Beats Radio). It's actually quite popular.
You mean the RADIO station Apple Music One? Not the same thing at all.
The referenced article is not explicit about an extra fee. It says $9.99 tier, not a $19.98 tier. It also says it will be the same price as the standard plan.
Additionally it says this “Speculation within the industry suggests Apple's move is to provide a more aggressively priced, higher-quality option after Spotify announced this week it was raising prices.”
This suggests Apple plans to significantly undercut Spotify’s price. If this were an extra fee, it would not be undercutting Spotify.
Are we sure they are talking about it being an additional price in Apple’s case?
Apple may just be absorbing any extra cost to increase subscribers and to bring more music fans in the Apple ecosystem. They could then use Apple Music to drive more users to other Apple services. Apple tends to not like to make extra money over specs that don’t require physical hardware changes, so if they were forced to do add a fee by the industry I would expect it to be a smaller increase like Amazon’s. If they don’t increase the price, it gives Apple bragging rights that their service is superior to others.
Lossless was also something that deeply interested Steve Jobs, so I think Apple would want this to be for everyone simply in his honor.
EDIT: All the other Apple news sites seem to be interpreting this the same as me.
It blows me away how much Apple drags their feet on the obvious like lossless, podcasts and gaming. Things that should have been taken seriously a decade ago.
When did Mastered for iTunes roll out? I’m trying to remember if it was lossless.
And smart speakers, and teleconferencing, and the next frontier in audio- livestream broadcasting. Nearly every tech company in the world is investing huge sums of money into audio-only broadcasting thanks to the success of Clubhouse. Will Apple wait 5 years to enter that market as well? History suggests it will.
And why would they discontinue the HomePod only to announce lossless audio a few months later (assuming the rumors are true)? What if we don’t feel like wearing our AirPods? Are we really supposed to enjoy high fidelity audio on our little HomePod Minis? That sounds like great experience! Who knows, if this launch even happens, maybe they’ll surprise us by releasing a new version of the HomePod along with the AirPods 3 and lossless Apple Music. I doubt it though.
Apple has a live audio-only station => Apple Music One (formerly known as Beats Radio). It's actually quite popular.
You mean the RADIO station Apple Music One? Not the same thing at all.
Yes, that one.
I’m very familiar with Apple Music One. But, audio-only livestream broadcasting is very different from radio. Spotify, Amazon, Twitter, Reddit, and Facebook are all investing heavily into it. Here’s a good article about Clubhouse, the original service all the others are trying to copy:
The main quote from the above article, in case you don’t feel like reading it:
” The app bills itself as “drop-in audio chat.” The idea is similar to the chat rooms of the early internet. But instead of instant messaging, it’s real-time audio. Any user can start a “room” that others can join. Each room has moderators, speakers and listeners. Moderators control who gets speaking privileges, though listeners can “raise their hand” to ask to speak.” -engadget
Assuming this rumor is true, how do you best set up a decent HiFi sound system based on Apple Music? It’s hard to find good floor speakers with built-in amplifier and full AirPlay 2 support.
And even then, how do you control music playback from your iPhone’s Music app without actually streaming from your iPhone? I mean, I would like to offload my iPhone but still control all music from its Music app.
Steve Jobs never wanted lossless. He and Neil Young had a meeting about that very thing before there ever was an iTunes Store let alone streaming. So as Neil’s Pono player and music store were about to start making money, Apple bought their mastering facility and shut it down. Because Steve was an asshole.
I’ll stick with Qobuz.
Source please!
1. I’d like to know about Pono’s in-house mastering facilities. Because in my experience with the business, every mastering engineer just gets a list of target formats to print to. There are some special requirements that can be adjusted for digitally by any engineer. The requirements for vinyl are outliers, since they need to be cut to lacquer, which requires specialised hardware and experience.
2. I’d like to know how Steve managed to acquire them “just as Pono was starting to make money”, given that they never did, and given that Pono wasn’t founded until a year after Steve’s death.
I don’t doubt that there might have been a meeting between Steve and Neil about making iTunes purchases lossless. But the rest of your comment is just weird.
Just placed an order for a pair of Sony WH-1000XM4 and had just googled if Apple offered High Res Audio for Apple Music. Fingers crossed they do release this.
I can see a lot of people talking about a waste of bandwidth, but as someone who works from home and is usually on wifi that's not an issue. Even outside of home I have a healthy death package each month and would happily use twice the data for a higher quality audio.
I’d like to give my two cents here. I think it should be a standard with the option to lower the quality dedicated by the user via software. No price increase at all. By giving the user the ability to change streaming quality on the fly let’s them manage their own data usage if necessary.
So if I’m an audiophile and Apple offers lossless without an increase in price…… My money would be going to Apple and I’ll share that info with all my other audiophile buddies. If they absolutely want to increase the price then increase it by $5.
I agree with Beats’ comment. Apple should have been on these things a long time ago. These are no-brainers.
Thanks for listening.
The AI reporting on this is wrong. The actual rumor is that there will be no price increase.
Steve Jobs never wanted lossless. He and Neil Young had a meeting about that very thing before there ever was an iTunes Store let alone streaming. So as Neil’s Pono player and music store were about to start making money, Apple bought their mastering facility and shut it down. Because Steve was an asshole.
I’ll stick with Qobuz.
The iTunes Store opened in 2003.
Jobs died in 2011.
Pomo launched in 2015.
Pomo hardware was too expensive for mainstream consumption.
Pomo's content partner, Omnifone, was bankrupt when Apple bought them in 2016.
You obviously have a casual relationship with reality.
It was hard to take Neil Young seriously about that stuff, particularly after he'd go on a diatribe about compressed audio to plug his Toblerone player's lossless format, and then mention that his favorite place to listen was in one of his 1950s or 1960s classic cars. So considering the abysmal signal-to-noise ratio of that kind of listening experience, Young was pretty much full of it.
Steve Jobs never wanted lossless. He and Neil Young had a meeting about that very thing before there ever was an iTunes Store let alone streaming. So as Neil’s Pono player and music store were about to start making money, Apple bought their mastering facility and shut it down. Because Steve was an asshole.
I’ll stick with Qobuz.
The iTunes Store opened in 2003.
Jobs died in 2011.
Pomo launched in 2015.
Pomo hardware was too expensive for mainstream consumption.
Pomo's content partner, Omnifone, was bankrupt when Apple bought them in 2016.
You obviously have a casual relationship with reality.
Streaming lossless puts a considerably higher load on the servers and to give lossless without a premium would result in a very high user uptake.
256K AAC music files are about 5-8 MBs in size. Lossless ALAC files usually run 25-35 MB in size. So bigger? Sure. But these are the same networks that handle video streaming (much bigger file load) without breaking a sweat. I think Apple (and the cell networks) can handle it.
Streaming lossless puts a considerably higher load on the servers and to give lossless without a premium would result in a very high user uptake.
256K AAC music files are about 5-8 MBs in size. Lossless ALAC files usually run 25-35 MB in size. So bigger? Sure. But these are the same networks that handle video streaming (much bigger file load) without breaking a sweat. I think Apple (and the cell networks) can handle it.
Actually you 5-8 MB AAC files will translate more to 35-55 MB ALAC files, I'm pretty sure that your home or work WiFi network can easily handle this just like your cell LTE network can. The problem is when you stream on the road. Five tunes alone will eat through 200-250 MB of your monthly high speed plan. If you listen to 10 that's 400-500 MB per day. May not be a problem for some but these can quickly eat through your cell monthly plan say 5GB per month. Then you get bumped down to Edge speeds and you can't even open up Maps.
This is a feature I’ve been waiting for. Lossless audio likely also includes surround mixes like Dolby Atmos. Unlike just about every other past ‘audiophile’ format, in Apple’s case there are already millions of users who have the necessary hardware to play lossless and surround/spatial audio.
Atmos distribution for streaming is lossy compressed Dolby Digital Plus. Lossless Atmos is based on Dolby TrueHD and is only used for UHD Blu-rays. In terms of spatial audio few people have speaker arrays and frankly spatial audio on sound bars or computer speakers is a useless gimmick. Where it might take off is via headphones with a Head Related Transfer Function. Apple already have some support for this
However it's it's being used for locking audio with respect to the screen so the sound field rotates as you turn your head and stays locked to the screen so it only works with their own headphones with accelerometers and gyroscopes in them.
Comments
Love to see 24/44 ALAC. Sounds amazing but the files are only about the same size as 1K411.
https://apple.news/AjpFyWG2fSKqCCWcSqw7Lig
The main quote from the above article, in case you don’t feel like reading it:
” The app bills itself as “drop-in audio chat.” The idea is similar to the chat rooms of the early internet. But instead of instant messaging, it’s real-time audio. Any user can start a “room” that others can join. Each room has moderators, speakers and listeners. Moderators control who gets speaking privileges, though listeners can “raise their hand” to ask to speak.”
-engadget
https://apple.news/At4wmHWH1S46TdWf26Md8LA
And even then, how do you control music playback from your iPhone’s Music app without actually streaming from your iPhone? I mean, I would like to offload my iPhone but still control all music from its Music app.
I can see a lot of people talking about a waste of bandwidth, but as someone who works from home and is usually on wifi that's not an issue. Even outside of home I have a healthy death package each month and would happily use twice the data for a higher quality audio.
I'm pretty sure that your home or work WiFi network can easily handle this just like your cell LTE network can.
The problem is when you stream on the road. Five tunes alone will eat through 200-250 MB of your monthly high speed plan. If you listen to 10 that's 400-500 MB per day.
May not be a problem for some but these can quickly eat through your cell monthly plan say 5GB per month. Then you get bumped down to Edge speeds and you can't even open up Maps.
https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT211775
However it's it's being used for locking audio with respect to the screen so the sound field rotates as you turn your head and stays locked to the screen so it only works with their own headphones with accelerometers and gyroscopes in them.