Apple Ceases Free iTunes Radio Streaming Worldwide

[mbgrayson]

AppleTV3 came out 4 years ago. Apple cannot support all legacy hardware with every single service that the newer devices have.

It may have come out three years ago, but they STILL sell it, and they STILL advertise ITunes Radio as a feature....

Why wouldn't they make Apple Music available on older Apple TVs? That would work for me, since I use that service too... then I could still play ad free radio thru AM.

 

[FuzzMunky]

Welcome to business. Sorry but Apple and no other for profit organization is a charity.

Its really simple. Like Apple products/services? Buy their products. Don't like it? Don't buy it. Ultimately the consumer decides what happens.

It's just sad that this is what constitutes success in the modern world. I think aliens would look on us as fools. Your comment about the essence of consumerism is also a little naive. Just because something is working according to a principle doesn't mean it is morally conscionable.

 

[citysnaps]

They offered services for $25/year. That's an implied contract that they're breaching. They need to compensate subscribers by reducing rates, providing equivalent service or a pro-rated refund for the remainder of the year.

But only for people who signed up for iTunes Match AFTER the inclusion of ad-free radio. And of course only to the extent the terms and conditions people agreed to permit.

 

[SmileyDude]

AppleTV3 came out 4 years ago. Apple cannot support all legacy hardware with every single service that the newer devices have.

Did you miss the part about where they are currently selling the Apple TV 3rd generation and saying that it has access to iTunes Radio stations? The easiest solution in this case would be to change their advertising. But right now, they are making promises they are not able to keep.

 

[DUCKofD3ATH]

But only for people who signed up for iTunes Match AFTER the inclusion of ad-free radio. And of course only to the extent the terms and conditions people agreed to permit.

True, but a class-action suit would award damages for the suffering we subscribers endured when we lost ad-free radio.

Aaaaaaaah! The pain!

 

[bstpierre]

The fact that iTunes Match customers received streaming music free was never a stated benefit or service of iTunes Match. They were never promised such service with iTunes Match. Just because I get girls driving a Ferrari doesn't mean I can get mad at Ferrari if I go out and don't get girls.

https://www.apple.com/itunes/itunes-match/

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204962

If you're upset, request a refund. I'm sure they're happy to make it happen.

From my most recent renewal notification email:
"... And with iTunes Match, your iTunes Radio music listening will be completely ad-free."

Technically, they are still not playing any ads but I would say that the statement above qualifies as a stated benefit of iTunes Match.

 

[TsMkLg068426]

Good riddance iTunes Radio was crap the curated stations such as Trance or Tech House kept playing Nsync, Justin Bieber or Britney Spears clearly Apple never bothered improving it they should get rid of it for Apple Music subscribers I never bother using it. Now improve Apple Music from having albums having tracks grayed out and work with the labels to make them available. Next step will be Apple Movies/TVShow streaming like Netflix.

 

[whsbuss]

Like the comment 'it was great when having a 16GB phone

In every instance where free music is referenced artists, publishers, etc. all get paid. Every instance. Erroneous points are being made by conflating "free to customer" with no pay for rights holders. Justifications being made based on the unpaid artists don't hold water.

The people who are upset seem to fall into two camps. Match customers with downgraded service (no question removing iT Radio is a downgrade) and Apple fans who believe in the whole "Apple cares" stuff. If it means that much, Match customers should vote with their dollars. Cancel or don't renew. The fans should realize no matter how much marketing would like them to believe otherwise, Apple is a business. A business that loves it high profit margin (apparently so do a lot of Apple fans). The failure of iAds to generate sufficient profit led to the deletion of iT Radio.

As you pointed out, there are a lot of other options outside of Apple that have ad-supported music. Maybe looking at the company in a more realistic light would cause less heartache.

I agree with your comments. Match customers only paid $24/yr and for their subscription Apple gave them ad-free radio. If the $24/yr was enough to pay artists when a songs is played, AM would be a cheap streaming service.

 

[warrior2000]

OK Apple, I'll just keep paying for Spotify, an infinitely better service.

A service that may not to around in the next 12 months. Spotify is bleeding cash at an insane rate. They lost $250 million last year. This for a company that only has about $400 million in the bank. They could literally run out of money in 12 months.

Plus add to the fact that the record labels just negotiated higher royalty fees for 2016. Bottom line is free music is not a long term viable business plan.

Just say it out loud. Spotify pays the record companies over a billion in royalties yet charges nothing. How long can that last? LOL.

 

[TsMkLg068426]

Oh yeah Apple if you really want to step up your game put Apple Music on ATV3 don't act like you can't you greedy ******s.

 

[whsbuss]

Back to my free Rhapsody listening account, care of my T-Mobile phone service. I liked Apple's as well, seeing as how it was so easy to click a button while in iTunes, but no more.

Check out iHeart Radio - free and a good alternative.

 

[DrumApple]

Or just Spotify and never look back...

 

[warrior2000]

Would you continue to run a business that loses money? That is exactly what free music streaming is. Look at Pandora. They have tens of millions of users and they probably will be bankrupt in the next 2 years. Bottom line is no one can make money giving music away for free unless:

1. You spam massive amounts of ads
2. You data mine the user to death

Apple is not interested in either of those. Also keep in mind the music labels just negotiated new deals with Pandora/Spotify and its much higher than the previous deals.

Do you seriously think Apple makes profit selling 'free' music streaming for $1 a month without ads? Really? That business model would only work if people bought iTunes songs. But the market has spoken and they want to rent music instead of buy it. So Apple had to pivot to AppleMusic and now will drop free radio.

So what did you want Apple to do? Continue to lose money selling a service for less than a $1 a month? Seems silly. The market has changed. Apple is changing their music strategy. Its not the end of the world.
[doublepost=1454098664][/doublepost]

Or just Spotify and never look back...

Sorry to say but Spotify may be bankrupt in 12 months.

Spotify lost $250 million last year.
They only have about $400 million in the bank.
The royalty costs have gone up in 2016 for music.
They could literally run out of money this year.
[doublepost=1454098736][/doublepost]

Oh yeah Apple if you really want to step up your game put Apple Music on ATV3 don't act like you can't you greedy ******s.

ATV3 is a crap device only for very basic users. Go upgrade to ATV4 if you want all the features.

 

[From A Buick 8]

The issue is I paid for a year of iTunes match for the ad free radio. If Apple is going to do this, they should refund my iTunes Match subscription fee.

They will

 

[SmileyDude]

Would you continue to run a business that loses money? That is exactly what free music streaming is. Look at Pandora. They have tens of millions of users and they probably will be bankrupt in the next 2 years. Bottom line is no one can make money giving music away for free unless:

1. You spam massive amounts of ads
2. You data mine the user to death

Apple is not interested in either of those. Also keep in mind the music labels just negotiated new deals with Pandora/Spotify and its much higher than the previous deals.

Do you seriously think Apple makes profit selling 'free' music streaming for $1 a month without ads? Really? That business model would only work if people bought iTunes songs. But the market has spoken and they want to rent music instead of buy it. So Apple had to pivot to AppleMusic and now will drop free radio.

So what did you want Apple to do? Continue to lose money selling a service for less than a $1 a month? Seems silly. The market has changed. Apple is changing their music strategy. Its not the end of the world.

1. They aren't dropping ad-free radio, just removing it from iTunes Match.
2. They are certainly allowed to change their strategy. But they also need to honor the agreements they made with their customers as well. If that means they lose a little money for a year or so, then so be it. They offered the service and people signed up for it.

It's not just important for Apple to do the right thing business wise, it's also important for them to do the right things for their customers.

 

[citysnaps]

True, but a class-action suit would award damages for the suffering we subscribers endured when we lost ad-free radio.

Aaaaaaaah! The pain!

It will award attorneys an enormous amount of money - millions. For those who subscribed to ITM after the inclusion of ad-free radio, and who suffered greatly, their prorata share after all the fees will be 80 cents cash. Or maybe a free iTunes song purchase.

And that's assuming there isn't language in the revised ITM Terms and Conditions that lets Apple cancel ad-free radio at any time.

 

[KnighsTalker]

Apple's iAd service probably has been ham stringing their negotiations for an Apple TV subscription service. Now that iAd has been shuttered, I bet will see an Apple TV service agreement now!

 

[kingtj]

Yep... As much as I have complaints about Sirius/XM (mostly billing related issues, but also gripes about the sound quality), it still always works out that it's the best $100-ish per year I spend on music subscription type services.

I do a lot of my music listening in the car, where streaming something via bluetooth is not optimal. (Cell signals come and go as you drive around and you have to have the right carrier/plan and use the right services to not get charged for the data usage.)

At least with Sirius/XM, I'm paying for the fact that they're sending down signals to me constantly via satellite. That has a certain value to it that's a little different than someone just saying, "Ok... as long as you keep paying us, we'll let you pull our content over your Internet connection you're already paying someone else to use."

I actually do, also, listen to songs from my personal music collection quite a bit. Maybe it's "old school", but I like the idea that the music content lives here, on my device(s) and I'm free to copy them over to a different player whenever I want to. I keep everything in unprotected MP3 format for best compatibility and I'm not stuck paying constantly for someone else to serve it to me on demand.

I canceled a month ago. i liked it but rarely used it. I find myself listening to SiriusXm much more. I also can't even remember the last time i actually bought any music, whether it be from iTunes or from another store. Spending money on music these days is rare. if there is a song id like to hear at home i find myself looking it up on youtube

Im also an iTunes match subscriber but barely listen to my collection these days. I'm considering canceling that service too

 

[warrior2000]

1. They aren't dropping ad-free radio, just removing it from iTunes Match.
2. They are certainly allowed to change their strategy. But they also need to honor the agreements they made with their customers as well. If that means they lose a little money for a year or so, then so be it. They offered the service and people signed up for it.

It's not just important for Apple to do the right thing business wise, it's also important for them to do the right things for their customers.

Apple is dropping free radio. You can buy radio play with AppleMusic. Like I said giving something away for free that is not ad subsidized is nuts. Apple does not want to do ads anymore, thus no more free radio.

Problem is Apple does not have full control of the media. They don't own the music. The labels could have easily demanded that Apple can no longer offer free music, only paid subs. Who knows. But again the main draw for Match was access to your own music. The free radio was just an added bonus. Do you really expect Apple to give that for free for all eternity?

 

[starkreality70]

I'm quite convinced that this is just the first step to getting rid of iTunes match all together. Next thing will be Apple emailing us, and letting us know, that if we want our songs in the cloud, we'll have to subscribe to Apple Music.

 

[mguzzi]

they had radio?

Commercial free iTunes radio.
[doublepost=1454100059][/doublepost]

Guess what? I use Apple Music every day. Love to use it while I work-out, and in my office. $10/month is a small price for something so useful in my life. I don't understand people who won't get something for $10. I can understand saving like $1,000 on something, but $10 is pigeon feed. I'm glad my finances are better than yours.

My whole model of listening has changed with Apple Music. Sure, I have options, I could choose Spotify, but Apple Music is more convenient and cheaper. The family plan brings our cost to less than $5 a person.

I now hear a song by an artist, and find out other albums the artist has made, and listen to the whole albums in their entirety. I'll find a few favorites and add them to my work or work-out playlists.

All of those monthly fees add up. Data and Phone Service, Next Plan or whatever for the iPhone then $10 a month for music and another $10 or so for Netflix.

 

[MacFanatick]

Again the customer ultimately decides the success of the company or service.
I'm glad you found an alternative that you are happy with and you will get a refund.

But for most people setting up PLEX would take many hours and a dedicated server. For most they are fine paying the $25 a year. Again no service can get 100% satisfaction.

Actually, I had only been using PLEX (which is easy to configure) for movies and had not considered it for music until I started reading about the plans to unbundle Radio from iTunes Match. AAPL is a substantial portion of my portfolio and I want to see the company succeed in every way, but I don't like it when a service I've subscribed to gets devalued - just like when the cable company drops channels but my bill goes up anyway... If Tidal starts streaming MQA files I'll probably switch to that for music service anyway...

 

[sudo1996]

If Apple keeps abandoning things like this after a couple of years and without warning, their brand is going to deteriorate. I understand why they wouldn't want to give out free music, but if so, they shouldn't have done it in the first place. Yeah, I know, it was just a gimmick to get people to buy iTunes Music.
[doublepost=1454100878][/doublepost]

Guess what? I use Apple Music every day. Love to use it while I work-out, and in my office. $10/month is a small price for something so useful in my life. I don't understand people who won't get something for $10. I can understand saving like $1,000 on something, but $10 is pigeon feed. I'm glad my finances are better than yours.

My whole model of listening has changed with Apple Music. Sure, I have options, I could choose Spotify, but Apple Music is more convenient and cheaper. The family plan brings our cost to less than $5 a person.

I now hear a song by an artist, and find out other albums the artist has made, and listen to the whole albums in their entirety. I'll find a few favorites and add them to my work or work-out playlists.

Free is better than $10. Less hassle too because you aren't dealing with an account then.
There's free listening on Pandora, Spotify, and YouTube. I liked iTunes Radio because of how nicely it was integrated with Apple products, but anything iTunes-related has been so buggy and confusing that I'm going to stop dealing with it.
[doublepost=1454101090][/doublepost]

Now if I could only get Siri to stop sending me there.

I think it stops doing that if you disable "show me iTunes Music" in your settings.

 

[Mactendo]

After 10 years of paying $10 a month of music, what will you have if Apple ends AM? You would have spent crap loads of money, and nothing to show for it.

It's like saying: After 10 years of paying for coffee at Starbucks, you would have spent crap loads of money, what will you have to show for it?

 

[SmileyDude]

Apple is dropping free radio. You can buy radio play with AppleMusic. Like I said giving something away for free that is not ad subsidized is nuts. Apple does not want to do ads anymore, thus no more free radio.

Problem is Apple does not have full control of the media. They don't own the music. The labels could have easily demanded that Apple can no longer offer free music, only paid subs. Who knows. But again the main draw for Match was access to your own music. The free radio was just an added bonus. Do you really expect Apple to give that for free for all eternity?

I do not expect Apple to give anything away for free. I expect them to continue honoring the agreement they made with their iTunes Match customers when they said that as a part of subscribing to iTunes Match was that you can "listen to on-demand music stations without ads".

Where have I once said that I am upset about Apple getting rid of free radio? I paid for a service that included ad-free radio stations and now Apple has pulled that part of the deal. How is that acceptable?