Apple Still Negotiating With Sony and Warner Over iRadio Royalties

Hopefully it's announced at WWDC!!

If it isn't one company that's greedy, it's another...how about being pro consumer for once! Without us, these companies are no where.

I hope licensing issues are resolved sooner rather than later, Apple needs this

As a high school student, I can say everyone I know quit using iTunes and uses Spotify exclusively now. That's what Apple needs to compete with, NOT Pandora. In other words, you should always be able to pick the song like Spotify.

An on demand Spotify like service is the exact thing that I would absolutely love! I love Spotify but for some reason even in offline mode it seems to drain my battery a lot faster than the regular music app.

Aussi3 said:

Hopefully it's announced at WWDC!!

Click to expand...

WWDC isn't really the venue for that. I'd expect it to be announced at the fall music-related event. (If this is even something Apple ends up pursuing).

aheying7 said:

As a high school student, I can say everyone I know quit using iTunes and uses Spotify exclusively now. That's what Apple needs to compete with, NOT Pandora. In other words, you should always be able to pick the song like Spotify.

Click to expand...

As a college student, I agree with you completely.

Something weird I've found: I listen to a lot of music on Spotify on a free plan, and about once a week I find a song I like so much that I buy it on the iOS music store just so I can listen to it on my iPhone. So Spotify basically is doing all the work of convincing me to buy the song, but then Apple is the one collecting the money when I decide to buy it.

all apple needs to do is register a patent for one of the notes. problem solved

MacRumors said:

The FT notes that Apple is intentionally not launching an on-demand service like Spotify in order to avoid cannibalizing purchases from its iTunes Music Store. Instead, the iRadio service will allow customers to discover new music and likely direct listeners to the iTunes Store to buy music they enjoy.

Click to expand...

In short, wouldn't this be aggregating music, which pretty much goes against the very policy Apple adopted to crack down on apps like AppGratis, Appshopper, etc.?

If so, this smacks of hypocrisy/"do as I say, not as I do".

BL.

I think Spotify (or other services alike) are the future. Still, I do see why Apple won't cannabalize the iTunes store.

ArtOfWarfare said:

Something weird I've found: I listen to a lot of music on Spotify on a free plan, and about once a week I find a song I like so much that I buy it on the iOS music store just so I can listen to it on my iPhone. So Spotify basically is doing all the work of convincing me to buy the song, but then Apple is the one collecting the money when I decide to buy it.

Click to expand...

Hahaha. Yes, exactly the same for me.

I listen to Spotify or Pandora to find music, and use iTunes to buy the music I listen to most.

I really can't see why so much effort is being used for what seems like a fairly weak proposition.

if they had more subscribers, iTunes/Apple model should be cheaper right? like buying in bulk...

MacRumors said:

Apple is intentionally not launching an on-demand service like Spotify in order to avoid cannibalizing purchases from its iTunes Music Store. Instead, the iRadio service will allow customers to discover new music and likely direct listeners to the iTunes Store to buy music they enjoy.

Click to expand...

Tim Cook, 1/23/13:

“I see cannibalization as a huge opportunity for us,” Cook said Wednesday. “Our core philosophy is to never fear cannibalization. If we don’t do it, someone else will."

The Phazer said:

I really can't see why so much effort is being used for what seems like a fairly weak proposition.

Click to expand...

I'm with you. A better Pandora doesn't seem like much of a "next big thing". I don't get how "Apple needs this" and similar. I'm sure it will be nice and probably have a few benefits Pandora has missed. On the other hand, I'm sure it will have some "why'd they do that?" lock-down that Pandora doesn't match.

But I can't think of anything here that could be "revolutionary." It's like we're chasing a fading medium of music distribution in hopes of reviving it. Maybe after this rolls out, Apple can go into the VHS tape rental business. That was hot 10+ years ago and, with the Apple spin, maybe they can turn it into something too.

Similarly, I read that bit about the ad revenues and I wonder why people are going to want to both (potentially) pay something for this service AND listen to ads rather than just play the playlists of music they like on their iDevices for free. Yes, there's something to be said for discovering new music but we already have Pandora and Spotify for that. Is the convenience of one-click purchasing really all that? If so, we're excited to pay for something with ads so that we can easily pay for something else when we hear a song we like. Pay for the opportunity to conveniently pay more. That's innovation!

Could we use LTE to download all of this music we're paying to get to pay for so that we can burn through our data allocation even faster? That way we can pay for the convenience of getting to pay for songs and getting to pay AT&T, Verizon, etc even more because this is yet another "innovation" that seems to revolve around burning through hard-capped data as quickly as possible. Win for Apple. Win for AT&T, Verizon, etc. Win for Music Studios.

Anyone noticing a trend in iDevice innovation over the last couple of years? What does SIRI, Maps, and probably this iRadio all have in common? Hint: think about data burn vs. hard caps set by AT&T, Verizon, etc. Has Apple iDevice innovation pretty much moved to a filter involving what else could be developed to burn through capped data even more quickly?

MacRumors said:

Some music industry executives argue that cash-rich Apple should pay a higher rate [...] because of its broader ambitions [...] and a plan to allow listeners to purchase songs seamlessly via the iTunes store.

Click to expand...

Charge Apple more because they might bring in additional revenue. The music industry doing it what it does best.

I think this is major for Apple, if they can integrate this into iOS. I use itunes match and love it but having this seems like it would put even more music at my fingertips. Wonder how it would affect the battery...

Xbox music Pass is the music service to beat!
Wonderfully integrated with their smartphones and Win 8!
It is very close to perfect! (only the design of the music app is not that good - okay, it's bad)

BJMRamage said:

if they had more subscribers, iTunes/Apple model should be cheaper right? like buying in bulk...

Click to expand...

Maybe they can make it like the cable tv scam where you pay a monthly fee AND have commercials!

That seems to be the plan. Except in that model, there isn't an added bill if you watch too much television (data) in a given month. In this plan, you can pay for the service, have commercials and if you use enough data to go through your cap you can pay some more. Triple threat. Everybody (that is a corporation) wins.

Hmm

Maybe Apple shouldn't have low-balled them in the 1st place, then maybe they'd be more open to faster, friendlier negotiations.

I still don't understand services like spotify or pandora. Having a "radio" service is convenient at times, but I STILL like to buy and OWN (despite how some people interpret music purchases) my music.

Conjecture all day what you think it should be or what you want. Apple will deliver what they want and what they think you need. Never been any different, has it?

Who cares about this crap? Nobody wants another streaming radio service.

Spotify will eat an Apple for lunch.

aheying7 said:

As a high school student, I can say everyone I know quit using iTunes and uses Spotify exclusively now. That's what Apple needs to compete with, NOT Pandora. In other words, you should always be able to pick the song like Spotify.

Click to expand...

Well said. Spotify is the true rival here.
Spotify > Pandora