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Apple Not Coercing Indie Artists Into Apple Music Deals With iTunes Removal Threats
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Spotify has a larger listening audience, and even a less expensive subscription price if you want one. And they only have a few million paying subscribers.
Spotify has more labels, more song selection. I don't see how Apple can compete with this, they've chopped themselves off at the knees before they even began.
Spotify has more labels, more song selection. I don't see how Apple can compete with this, they've chopped themselves off at the knees before they even began.
A lot of artists have said no. Adele is not on board, Swift will not have her latest album available, a majority of the indie labels have still not agreed to terms with Apple.
Nop Adele is ON iTunes and Taylor too. Personally i don't differentiate between iTunes and Apple Music for me both artists are with Apple.
Sure but shes with Apple, just a question of time...$$ same for Taylor.
I want to see both artist removing all their music from both services...that would be brave.
It wouldn't be good. There's a risk for everyone. Yes, music artists will probably dislike the iTunes Store for having such harsh terms. I think Apple, for their own good, should pay the artists full or at least half price during the trial period so they don't scare 'em away. There are plenty of music streaming services they can go to instead that are more popular than Apple's. But it's not illegal as some want to claim.
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It's about artists wanting to avoid getting screwed by large corporations that take their performances and don't want to pay them anything for it while they sit back and collect it instead. A lot of big artists would like to be independent too (who wants to give the record companies your money, particularly after you are already well known?). I think to some artists it's simply more of the same. Any way a big company can make money off their music or name without paying them is just more fuel to the fire. It's not just music either. It's the top 1% making 300x the average person's income and then using that clout to rig the game (laws) so they make even more and you make even less. Free enterprise? It starts off that way, but evil begets more evil and the more you get the more you think you should make and the less you should have to work for it. France reached a tipping point in the past that corporations and the rich should take more heed of before history repeats itself yet again in ways they won't like. FAIR and FREE aren't the same word.
Ultimately, Apple should not be making decisions with other people's property. You may think it's fine for them to volunteer free trials and that it would benefit the artist in the end. Others may disagree. The point is who owns the music they're handing out for free? I guarantee you it's NOT APPLE so why is Apple making the ownership decisions? They want to do free to attract more people to their business? Fine. Let Apple pay for it. Surely it's chump change for the richest tech corporation in the world but not so for others.
Interesting topic! People have made some good points on both sides of the argument. I have mixed feelings on it all...
Thanks for sharing your perspective on this as an indie artist. I found it enjoyable and informative. I hope you're right!!
I hope I am too. To be honest I do have some mixed feelings about this. In reality, if you are already a big artist like Taylor Swift, this isn't going to affect you one bit (they've made a great amount of money on sales previously, and they will again once any trials are over) and if you are complete unknown indie artist that makes very small sales like my Seven Summer Eyes project, then I doubt millions of people, or even hundreds of thousands, will be specifically seeking you out during the trial just to stream your stuff. Most likely, it won't affect them either.
Who it will affect is those indie artists that are on the verge of becoming successful, that may get tens of thousands of sales, just enough to live off on, and once Apple Music goes live, if a bunch of people subscribe and get the free trial and seek out that particular, on-the-verge-of-success, indie artist, that means those fans are no longer buying that artist's music and are instead, streaming it for free, for 3 months. That could bankrupt that artist! That's where I am at with one of my new projects Science Patrol, which is quite surprising how this project of mine has taken off. I've been enjoying steady album sales, so if other people discover me during the trial of Apple Music, it could really hurt me.
Let's just say what everyone knows - advertisement from streaming services, sales from physical purchases, and digital purchases, live tours, as well as all other forms of merchandise and advertisement revenue generate far more than enough dollars that no one has to be depriving the artists of anything here. It's all BS - and quite confusing greed on Apple's part, IMO. Seriously, offer the free trial, and pay the damn artists. The new 6S will pay for that 1000000000 billion times over. It's nothing short of ridiculous.
They whole point of Apple music as well as their other services is to keep people buying their hardware. They make almost all their profits from hardware, not itunes, match, etc.
Just read the terms from the Apple Music site and it looks like it's 3 months from when you sign up. This is a dumb move, they should do a one time trial then they would have no moaning.
Except they're not working anymore. That music was recorded and we're talking about licensing, not actual work. Dont't pretend that is same thing.
Absolutely! Just by landing your music alone on iTunes will make you living and famous. Such prosperity hasn't been seen since the dot com bubble.
Wrong. Apple is paying a higher royalty in perpetuity over any other service so it does benefit them.
An artist being against getting higher royalties in exchange for a shortbread trial offer is an idiot.
So is Apple paying according to upthumbs and downthumbs, or some sort of ranking "star system"?
If users downthumb, then song is played less or not at all and pay to artist is less. If they upthumb, song gets more rotation and pay is more.
If we're gonna be all entrepreneurial about this, then let's take the training wheels off!
If users downthumb, then song is played less or not at all and pay to artist is less. If they upthumb, song gets more rotation and pay is more.
If we're gonna be all entrepreneurial about this, then let's take the training wheels off!
Without taking any side, it means, Apple wants to use and distribute someone's content for free for certain period of time? Isn't that considered illegal elsewhere?
I mean, go try using some unlicensed music even in your non-commercial YouTube video and you're going to face a legal claim in no time, or your video gets banned "because of using copyrighted material"...
So why doesn't Apple want to pay copyright owners for three whole months?
Well, because they wont get paid by customers for the same period of time. But this is called a commercial risk, which only Apple has to bear and nobody else.
But maybe Apple will send those "ungrateful hipsters" another U2 album, at least. Because that's punk and because Apple has already paid Bono for it.
No it's not illegal. Apple has a negotiated contract to do this with the record labels. In fact in exchange for the longer trial period they guarantee higher royalty payments.
Except spotify pays lower royalties for student plans and for their ad supported tier. So the real percentage between what apple pays and what Spotify pays is much greater than 2%
Actually retailers and manufacturers do all kinds of promotions together to offer discounts where both parties absorb the expense.
This is not unusual at all. And again, in exchange for the free trial condition apple is paying higher royalties. This was a negotiated contract between apple and those who control the music licenses.
Independent artists are free not to participate.
Yes, and cars had engines before planes.
iTunes isn't a streaming service, and for some reason (I honestly don't know why because I prefer downloads) people seem to be moving towards streaming.
Pretty much because they will get more for their money.
10 bucks = 1 month = hundreds of songs
10 bucks = 1 iTunes album.
Me, i prefer physical stuff (CD) if i cant get that then files of course however it is very practical to have a streaming service you have all the music in one place.
I work for a newspaper. I totally know the pitfalls of "free" work, especially with as many times as I have fixed technical stuff for other people. I mean I don't really mind that for friends and family, but it is nice when they appreciate the effort you put in and throw you a bone.
And I wasn't saying indie artists shouldn't be paid. In fact I thought Apple should've made the recent decision to foot the bill from the beginning. But now it's fixed, all a moot point.
Our society needs to learn that work doesn't come without a price. So many industries have been hit hard by this. Journalism, music, software, etc. If you haven't seen some of the complaints on here when a very useful app is 99 cents but also has ads, it's amazing. It's like they've never used cable/satellite TV before. It has a subscription fee PLUS ads!
Certainly an artist should be paid for any use of their product, and even though Apple is not making any money during the free trial period that's their choice and should not apply to the artists. That said.... I find the cries of impending doom and labels going under quite laughable. How can anything bad come from no royalties coming from a revenue stream that didn't even exist before?