Well, That Was Quick - Bored Already, Not Going To Keep Apple Music

[triptolemus]

...within 10 years streaming is going to dominate how we consume music. It will not completely eradicate physical CDs as long as there are grandmas in the world, and it will not completely eradicate paid downloads as long as there are people willing to pay for downloads. But it will count for 90% or so music consumption.

Another unpopular opinion: imagine you sign up with one service, say, Apple Music. One day Apple decide that it's not profitable enough and inform you within three months it will be terminated. You have 500 albums on your hard disk, countless playlists made to match your mood, and then on September 1, 2025 poof! you have a lot of files you can't play and a lot of playlists you can't export because Walled Garden

I don't know. I think if streaming accounts for 90% of music consumption, the companies that offer it will have the stability and profitability to not simply poof it away in 90 days. It may be a business unit that is bought and sold in boardroom deals, but it won't simply poof. When Zune (and the others) went poof, the market was small. At 90% consumption, the value of the streaming business will likely keep it alive.

I guess the same argument can be made for my 8-track collection... the industry poof'd away 8-tracks and I'm screwed. Can't find a working player anymore. Technology evolves. That's just the way it is.

 

[turbineseaplane]

...within 10 years streaming is going to dominate how we consume music..

....and it will not completely eradicate paid downloads as long as there are people willing to pay for downloads

Which is basically the end of the conversation.

Paco was trying to tell us that labels and artists are soon going to go streaming only (i.e. -- NO paid downloads) - That is just not going to happen as long as money is there to be had.

This is a totally different argument than "media" is going away.

I completely agree that all forms of hard media may go away before long, but being able to outright purchase things is not going away any time in the foreseeable future -- (it will just all be digital)

 

[MentalFloss]

Good point. The music business has simply been lucky that there were no significant changes in mainstream technology for a very long time. Vinyl survived for many many decades. Then came CDs, and I think most people felt that they would never need anything else. But then the Internet half-forced and half-enabled new business models, so now all bets are off what the music business will look like in ten years. But for many of us, it's a problem, because we are used to being somewhat conservative from a technology perspective. We need to open our minds.

 

[shandyman]

Which is basically the end of the conversation.

Paco was trying to tell us that labels and artists are soon going to go streaming *only* (NO paid downloads) - That is just not going to happen as long as money is there to be had.

This is a totally different argument than "media" is going away.

I completely agree that all forms of hard media may go away, but being able to outright purchase things is not going away any time in the foreseeable future -- (it will just all be digital)

Hard media is on the decline. It won't go completely, but it will be a minority.

Just look at HMV here in the U.K., it closed a lot of its stores, simply due to the shift in the way media is consumed. Same with Game and all the other places that sold hard media. The town I live in, you can't buy an album anywhere. You can only buy films on hard media from the limited (about 20) selection in the tesco's on the high street here. Oh, and CEX, but they don't count as they're rip off merchants.

 

[triptolemus]

But for many of us, it's a problem, because we are used to being somewhat conservative from a technology perspective.

And for good reason. There is a significant financial commitment (for many) in there. It's natural to be skeptical and concerned. I don't care how much money someone has -- no one wants to told that, hey, you've just spent the last several years pissing away cash.

 

[turbineseaplane]

I don't care how much money someone has -- no one wants to told that, hey, you've just spent the last several years pissing away cash.

...sounds a lot like Paco's "streaming only", "you can never own anything", future of awful...

 

[triptolemus]

...sounds a lot like Paco's "streaming only", "you can never own anything", future of awful...

Nah... either I made my point poorly, or you missed it.

This conversation, for me, has run its course.

 

[turbineseaplane]

Nah... either I made my point poorly, or you missed it.

I guess I missed it - What "pissing away of cash" were you referring to if not streaming?

 

[Arran]

Hard media is on the decline. It won't go completely, but it will be a minority.

Just look at HMV here in the U.K., it closed a lot of its stores, simply due to the shift in the way media is consumed. Same with Game and all the other places that sold hard media. The town I live in, you can't buy an album anywhere. You can only buy films on hard media from the limited (about 20) selection in the tesco's on the high street here. Oh, and CEX, but they don't count as they're rip off merchants.

The disappearance of record stores is a great loss. They were a great place to kill time while listening to whatever was playing in the background. Discovered some cool music that way. People-watching was fun too because they attracted an eclectic crowd. Even some of the owners were truly weird - but in a good, fun way.

I guess there's still Amazon.com for hard media. But the buying experience there is soul-less.

 

[navaira]

The reason streaming legally exists can be tracked to Napster.

Napster for many was the first time they found out they can get music that sounds acceptable without going to a brick and mortar store and handing money over in return for a compact disc. When labels realised what's going on, the shut Napster down, but it was way too late. People realised MP3 was free. And this idea stuck.

I'm 37. I remember buying my first tape (Jason Donovan, I'm sorry), first vinyl (Madonna, not sorry), CD (Pet Shop Boys, still great). I have no clue what my first download was, but it was illegal for sure. Within years I amassed 1500+ CDs, 300 or so vinyls, 33.000 tracks in my iTunes library. And then streaming came along. So Apple Music has 30 million tracks. But I don't know which ones are good. The Apple Music recommendations are, to put it mildly, inaccurate. So the result is I use Apple Music either to listen to Beats One for five minutes, get irritated and switch it off, or to listen to a playlist occasionally and get irritated that I am being played music I already own. "The Human League: Deep Cuts" has four singles in it, and contains only one song I don't own. And by "own" I mean on CD.

A lot of small independent artists and labels don't even release their music on physical media anymore, because that costs money. Production, design, storage costs. This is also why most record stores went out of business by now. iTunes Store doesn't have a fraction of the costs your local HMV or Virgin had. Physicals often cost less than downloads (compare prices on iTunes and WOW HD). Profit margin on downloads is huge. But the younger generation has been raised in the post-Napster turf. For them, music is something that comes for free from the Internet.

What Apple Music, Spotify, TIDAL etc. have to offer that "free option" does not is 1) selection, 2) quality. Imagine I really want Madonna's Rebel Heart album, I download it from a torrent site and find out it's 96kbps. Then I download it again and discover it's all the demoes but no finished songs. How much easier it is to go to Spotify/AM/TIDAL and just play the deluxe version. Here, have my €4.99 per month, so that I can listen to the same 1000 tracks out of your 30 million selection over and over again.

@triptolemus : I think that while 90% of the market will belong to streaming, the market will be incredibly fragmented. Spotify have exclusives, AM have exclusives, TIDAL has exclusives, New Company will have the best live recordings, Other New Company will painstakingly collect all EPs and singles, Yet Another will digitalise vinyls, etc. Same as there were 50 record stores in Amsterdam (where I live). Now, if I am correct, three persist. I'm pretty sure Apple Music will survive because it's Apple, Google Play Music will survive because it's Google, and Spotify will survive because it came in first. But then, Google killed off Google Reader for no reason, so what's the guarantee they won't kill off Google Play Music? And as for my Spotify prediction, there was a time when everybody was on MySpace, used AOL to connect to Internet and Yahoo! was the best portal for everything.

 

[MentalFloss]

And then streaming came along. So Apple Music has 30 million tracks. But I don't know which ones are good. The Apple Music recommendations are, to put it mildly, inaccurate. So the result is I use Apple Music either to listen to Beats One for five minutes, get irritated and switch it off, or to listen to a playlist occasionally and get irritated that I am being played music I already own. "The Human League: Deep Cuts" has four singles in it, and contains only one song I don't own. And by "own" I mean on CD.

Well, one advantage of streaming is that it's a risk-free discovery mechanism. You can listen to anything from the library, without having to know in advance if it's good or not, and it will not affect how much you pay to the streaming provider. The "I don't know which ones are good" problem applies much more to record stores than to streaming.

And I keep saying it: The best way to discover music on Apple Music is not the For You page with its oh-so-great human-curated playlists, but the artist radio stations. I am also realizing more and more that these For You playlists are largely for people who are pretty much new to music. There are very few gems hidden beside the "Intro to your favorite musicians" playlists and the "Summary of the genre that you are currently listening to the most" playlists, which make up 95% of "For You".

Here, have my €4.99 per month, so that I can listen to the same 1000 tracks out of your 30 million selection over and over again.

If you keep listening to the same 1000 songs over and over again, then streaming is really the wrong choice for you, because it would be cheaper in the long run to just buy the albums, and you are not using the risk-free discovery options offered by streaming.

I have a core collection of music that I have been holding on to like Gollum to the One Ring, but since Apple Music came along, I have created playlists with roughly a thousand songs that I hadn't owned before, and listening to them has been quite enjoyable. I suspect that is only the beginning, because so far, I have only gone for the more obvious choices, and I have a growing "Discovered on Apple Music" playlist that I have not yet mined for the gold that might be hidden inside it.

 

[hans1972]

Apple Music makes you pay $120 a year for the rest of your life to listen to the 30 songs a year that actually mean something to you.

I think here is the difference between you and me. I have about 1600 songs that I "care" about in my iTunes library of about 20 000 songs (a majority pirated). These 1600 songs I listened to several times a year. Just buying these would cost $1600. In addition there is probably another 5000 songs that I don´t care that much for and I only listen to them once every other year.

Apple Music and similar services makes it possible for me to expand my music library many fold without resorting to piracy.

And for people between 10 and 30 it is a really cheap way to get a lot of music. In those years your musical taste changes a lot and I could easily see that you run through as much as 10 000 tracks during that 20 year period.

 

[Dark Void]

I think here is the difference between you and me. I have about 1600 songs that I "care" about in my iTunes library of about 20 000 songs (a majority pirated). These 1600 songs I listened to several times a year. Just buying these would cost $1600. In addition there is probably another 5000 songs that I don´t care that much for and I only listen to them once every other year.

Apple Music and similar services makes it possible for me to expand my music library many fold without resorting to piracy.

No offense, but if you take part in pirating music I don't think your stance on whether or not Apple Music is worth the cost or not in comparison to downloading locally stored music holds much water, if any at all.

 

[turbineseaplane]

Some really interesting points being made in here...

It's such a tough topic because the spectrum of individual preferences of music, how it's consumed, how much is consumed, etc is virtually limitless.

I think the reason I'm not that into the new pay service is simply that I myself just don't really enjoy constantly discovering new stuff and/or listening to things and artists I've never heard of. I stay much much closer to my sphere of likes and enjoy very occasional branches off of that.

Very interesting topic for sure

 

[hans1972]

No offense, but if you take part in pirating music I don't think your stance on whether or not Apple Music is worth the cost or not in comparison to downloading locally stored music holds much water, if any at all.

Of course it does.

Apple Music is so cheap and convenient that I think it beats pirating which has a cost of close to zero.

So if you want to listen to a lot of different music this is how I view the different offerings:

Streaming: A small cost, convenient
Pirating: Almost no cost, labor intensive and inconvenient
iTunes: Expensive, convenient
CDs: Expensive, labor intensive and inconvenient

Here in Norway pirating of music went from extremely high to very low in just a few years after streaming services were introduced.

 

[Dark Void]

Streaming: A small cost, convenient
Pirating: Almost no cost, labor intensive and inconvenient

This is now a topic of whether or not the $120 annual cost of Apple Music is "worth it" in comparison to purchasing downloads though. Obviously, if everyone here pirated their music, it wouldn't even really need to be discussed as everyone here would therefore be obtaining their music for free.

 

[macuser27]

Been using since release and have to say i love it

 

[JSB1540]

Been using since release and have to say j love it

Agree, enjoy it, not bored, keeping it.

 

[turbineseaplane]

Agree, enjoy it, not bored, keeping it.

Were you guys streaming users before?

 

[macuser27]

No I've always been a buyer and between me and my wife we would easily do £100+ a month

 

[mike1726]

Why would you spend that anyway. I had deezer was £9.99 a month you download in the same way as Apple music. The advantage with the apple music is on my family package I can have 6 people all using it at the same time, where as my deezer was 1 unless you used it in offline mode.

 

[turbineseaplane]

No I've always been a buyer and between me and my wife we would easily do £100+ a month

Interesting. So not streaming, but heavy buyers...

I don't know if I just got old or my habits of listening (narrow focus with careful library additions over time) have just made me not a streaming person...

I am kind of hoping Apple tightens all this up at some point to include extra iCloud storage (photos), iCloud Music Library & Apple Music in one larger "Apple Premium Pack" (sort of like how Amazon Prime gives a wide range of benefits). I think I'm far more likely to jump into that type of situation.

 

[macuser27]

Yep I fully agree with you in that

 

[S.B.G]

Were you guys streaming users before?

I've listened to the new Apple Music for a while over the last week or so here and there. But I find myself going back to Spotify, such as at this very moment.

I like iTunes for my local libraries of music, TV shows and movies. But when I want to listen to something that isn't in my local library, I tend to turn to Spotify more often as I have been a streaming user of theirs for a while now.

I tried the paid version of Spotify for a couple of months and then went back to the ad-supported version. I like the interface and style of the app better than the Apple Music. Plus I seem to find more music I enjoy easier in Spotify than I am able to in Apple Music.

 

[JSB1540]

Were you guys streaming users before?

I bought and downloaded. But I see this working out for family sharing and less money overall. I am not familiar with spotify, have used the free Pandora for stations.