Apple Not Coercing Indie Artists Into Apple Music Deals With iTunes Removal Threats

[Bawstun]

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.

Not to say I told you so, but...

I'm glad Apple, albeit not their first choice, reversed this horrendous, disgusting and greedy decision. It was truly gross.

"#AppleMusic will pay artist for streaming, even during customer's free trial period," tweeted Eddy Cue, Apple's senior vice president of Internet Software and Services. "We hear you @TaylorSwift13 and indie artists. Love, Apple."

 

[thisrocks]

Hahhahahahahaha, as a formerly EPIC BJM fan it's amazing to see them on here. Was never a fan of Anton N as an individual due to his near psychotic and schizophrenic views of the world (heroin and other substance abuse can only help you along said path) but it's nice to see that the artist's have had their comeuppance. Even though it seemed quite reasonable for no-one to be paid during the three month trial period - Apple included - considering the capital they currently hold, I'm glad artists stood firm!

 

[Bawstun]

Why does anyone think it is reasonable for a company to not pay for artwork? Music is art. It isn't always necessarily written by your favorite pop artists, but someone writes it. And more than enough write their own. I just don't get it.

To be honest this is always going to be in the back of my mind, as some kind of small Apple red flag. Anytime I find myself agreeing with Taylor Swift, I should take a step back and really look at the situation. Lol.

 

[LethalWolfe]

How can anything bad come from no royalties coming from a revenue stream that didn't even exist before?

If someone is testing out Apple Music during the three month trail that probably means they aren't listening to Spotify, Tidal, Pandora, etc., and probably aren't buying music from iTMS or Best Buy or Amazon either. It's partly about the free trial itself and partly that the free trial will negatively impact the musicians other revenue streams.

 

[WordsmithMR]

Why do I have a feeling that their publicist was behind this more so than the artist.

 

[Darrin Bell]

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!

I see what you're saying, and I agree. I don't work for a newspaper, but my comics are syndicated to them. I can't tell you how many times we've offered a free trial to a paper, and then at the end of the three or six-month trial period that paper drops it and replaces it with another free trial from another syndicate. And then at the end of that trial period, they drop THAT one and replace it with another free trial strip. If this sort of thing continues, the syndicates are going to stop offering free trials.

 

[Darrin Bell]

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.

When you get your paycheck, that's for work you did in the past too. Not "actual work" you're doing now. Licensing is the artist's paycheck.

 

[0970373]

NOTE: This is more of a rant about streaming in general.

At the end of the day, this comes down to users not wanting to pay for streaming. They want music for free. Yes, Apple should pay the artists fairly even during the free trial. All streaming services should. And end users should also be paying to listen to music. Just because a for-profit business has billions like Apple doesn't mean they should give their stuff away for free either. It costs them to run a service. They are for-profit.

But this is a big reason why Tidal failed (is failing). They didn't offer a free service like everyone else. So it's this balancing act on what users, want, what they're willing to spend on the service, what companies are charing for their profit and what artists will consider fair payment for their music. I was really surprised that more artists didn't get behind Tidal, which pays more than other streaming services. But their subscriber base is much much lower so in the end, it just doesn't get as many streams and less payout to the artist. There is a trade off for access to a larger subscriber base/marketing. It isn't fair but that's what it is.

And again, I keep wondering why everyone who is so upset at how little artists get from other streaming services didn't run to Tidal to help grow that subscriber base as they have some of the highest payouts in the industry. Where you at, Taylor?

 

[Michael CM1]

I see what you're saying, and I agree. I don't work for a newspaper, but my comics are syndicated to them. I can't tell you how many times we've offered a free trial to a paper, and then at the end of the three or six-month trial period that paper drops it and replaces it with another free trial from another syndicate. And then at the end of that trial period, they drop THAT one and replace it with another free trial strip. If this sort of thing continues, the syndicates are going to stop offering free trials.

That sounds about right. They'll grab anything that will fill space that doesn't cost a dime.

I'm still convinced that the future has to be throwing up paywalls. Use apps to control sign-ins from subscribers. Then use IAPs and offer individual articles for like 10 cents or a day of article reading for 99 cents. Stop trying to grow readership with annoying ads that aren't selling squat and make people flee. An appropriate amount of ads like print used for decades will encourage shopping. An overload will encourage cursing.

Notice that TV people have learned from the mistake of throwing news up for free. You're lucky to find any free broadcast programming online even if it's a stream you could pick up free with an antenna. You can get free videos on Hulu, but only on browsers and not much of it.

 

[Luis Mazza]

When you get your paycheck, that's for work you did in the past too. Not "actual work" you're doing now. Licensing is the artist's paycheck.

Yes, but Apple's work is to provide a great service worldwide with it's servers, engineers, management and very expensive resources. They wouldn't be getting any money from the free 3 months either, nor artists. That's called partnership. Do you know how that works?
What Apple did reverting that was very close to charity and pleasing the artists due to a sort of blackmailing from a rich spoiled bitch.