I know they had it for years but no reason for me to go back. I started with Spotify but when Apple Music came with family plan it’s no brainer for me. There’s no compelling reason for me to go back on top of that some artists pulled their music out from their service. And that would have been their 30 million more paid subscribers like my situation.
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Apple Music Now Has Over 30M Paid Subscribers, Up from 27M in June
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You make a good case. I like Spotify for their diversity in music of bands that Apple didn't and still hasn't covered. Or singers, for that matter. I suppose you could go crazy and get Apple Music, Deezer and Spotify. Living the futuristic life there.
Offer free tier and I am in. So far, I am not a subscription type of guy. I do not want to be hooked up 10 bucks here, 10 bucks there and next thing i know I spend $100 a month on all the useless services.
I’m not really buying into this thing and some people claims Spotify being better (maybe the free version is). I’m not saying you claim it’s better than Apple Music but maybe it is for you. But I believe I speak to majority of that 30 million Apple Music paid subscribers. We like to make our playlist of the artists we like to hear. We like the integration along with iTunes because we buy music from iTunes before streaming was a thing. And most of all we love everything Apple.
To offer a free tier, Apple would need to open AM up to an ad-supported model. They are definitely not doing that. And I wouldn't want them to. Advertisers don't need to know my listening habits. All you need is 1 service that will cover *most* of what you listen to, if not all, and supplement w/ purchases. No one service has everything so pick the one that suits YOU best. But if you find them useless then continue to purchase albums outright and everyone will still be happy.
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I was never in love with Spotify, though I have been subscribed several times prior to Apple Music.
I use Apple Music because of Siri. There are other things I like about it compared to Spotify. However, Siri is a game changer for me since I use iOS and Macs.
I have but tbh I'm more comfortable in that Apple ecosystem than I was with the Spotify apps either for desktop or in iOS. Amazon's streaming is ok too but they haven't as much catalog. And the music app for iOS is finally improving after not being very impressive at the outset (in my opinion) when it was first released.
As far as the concept of streaming and being able to download what I like, I'm thrilled w/ Apple Music as someone who has a limited budget and likes to try out stuff like operas or symphonies in their entirety for quite awhile before pouring money into a CD and ripping it lossless.
The Apple Music catalog is vast, so I've been a happy camper shelling out the $9.99 a month so far. I have a few box-CD purchases from back in the 90s to remind me how expensive it is to buy an opera on disc when it turns out you're not that fond of the soprano after all... all I have to do now is not buy one such item a month and I've made the AM fee more than worth it.
It depends on what you like but Amazon has many tracks that are playable but are grayed out on Apple Music.
Amazon touts 10s of millions of songs and Apple touts 40 million songs. Not sure why Amazon won't provide an actual (estimated) number if they have more songs than Apple.
Just compare the Fania salsa collection AM is missing tracks that Amazon has. Also look at the country music some tracks can't be played on AM.
Right. But isn't Spotify growing at more than double that rate?
AM grows by 1 million subscribers per month, while Spotify seems to grow by 2.5 million subscribers per month.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/244995/number-of-paying-spotify-subscribers/
https://www.statista.com/statistics/604959/number-of-apple-music-subscribers/
https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/31/16070982/spotify-60-million-subscribers-july-2017
I am not the person you are addressing, but I stopped subscribing to Spotify simply because they didn’t have the music I preferred listening to. Living in Asia, I was raised on a steady diet of Kpop and mandopop songs and the Spotify library was quite lacking in this regard.
For example, I wanted to listen to girls generation and the only song in their library then was the English version of “the boys” they recorded for the US market. No Ace of Angels either (back when they were huge). Had problems locating SHE albums as well.
Maybe it’s because of Apple’s close business ties with Sony and Universal, but their library of Asian pop songs is pretty fully-featured.
Not to mention the integration Apple Music enjoys with the Apple ecosystem. Native apps for the Apple TV and watch. Siri support.
So tell me - is it a downgrade when I switch from a music streaming platform that lacks the songs I want to listen, to one which does?
I believe every service will have some songs other services don’t have, but that doesn’t answer the question you quoted. If they have more songs, why don’t they give us the number? My guess is they have less songs, so they are generalizing rather than giving us an approximate number.
From Apple’s perspective, it would be great if they beat Spotify. But their business is still doing well. I think they’d be happy 1 million new subs a month.
Easy to grow when giving away subscriptions, the financials tell the real story and it’s not pretty for Spotify. Would not be surprised if applés revenues are actually higher than Spotify. I’m in premium for 2 years and basically paid nothing though Spotify is probably getting 5 bucks a month from Rogers (telco company)
I have read that 80 percent of Spotify’s paid subscribers were transitioned from the freemium service. However, the one area that has given Spotify a boost is the fact that they are available on many more products than AM. I have receivers and stand alone streamers that have Spotify built into the interface. The biggest growth has to be from its integration into the Echo, though.
Apple could do a lot more to increase paying subscribers. However, I think they are more concerned with selling their own hardware, since they can make billions doing that versus being the largest streaming company and losing money quarter after quarter (if Spotify’s performance is the benchmark). In other words, they would rather sell you a HomePod which integrates with AM than get more subscribers by putting AM in the Echo.
Oh please. I hardly think this would make me or anyonr else "feel special". It pains to even quote it. Utter BS.
Bingo! And keep you in the Apple ecosystem w/ an Apple TV, iPhones, iPad, Watch, Macs, etc. It's an additional rev stream that funnels you into their main rev stream - Apple hardware & devices.
I lost all my enthusiasm towards Spotify the day they killed platform and apps.
I still don't get why they did it.
I was a loyal Pandora subscriber for a long time, until they changed their business model. I did sign up for a trial of Spotify and one for Apple Music. After about a month of steady use and comparing the two services, I ended up choosing AM for my daily music service. It fits better into my life.
I'm just happy to see AM has improved since it began, and hope they'll continue to improve the service.
I'm just happy to see AM has improved since it began, and hope they'll continue to improve the service.
