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Apple Reverses Course, Will Pay Artists During Apple Music Free Trial

peterdevries said:
Hey man. I'm really sorry to hear about this. Apologies if my comment to you hurt you in any way. It was not intended like that at all. I was of course unaware of your condition and would not have written this if I knew. At first sight it seemed like you were trying to get additional intention as some people sometimes do here.

I relate to your condition. I have severe tinnitus myself (which of course doesn't infect my internet browsing) and had a blind dog that died a few years ago.

To avoid future comments such as mine it might help to add a signature at the bottom. I wish you all the best and thanks for responding to me in this way.
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No, usually when people hear WHY I post like this they get it as you did and are super nice. I'm not offended. And my dog, I'm not sure how much sight she had left in that bad eye, but hell it doesn't stop her from being a real sweetheart and total character at the dog park when we get someone to take us. Lady is the best friend an old guy could have. Truly sorry about your tinnitus, I worked in computer rooms for 30 years so my hearing is also pretty shot from all datacenter noise. Anyway we know each other a little better and that's a nice outcome to a few moments of misunderstanding.

Be Well, and go to a really good optomoligist and get your eyes thoroughly checked... Everyone reading this, do consider my advice, get your eyes checked.

Mike
 
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paulsdenton said:
I wonder how much this will actually cost Apple. I haven't seen any estimates.
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I don't think we've heard the end of this story, specifically what Apple WILL PAY each time a song or even a snippet of it is played via their stream. That's the Other Shoe if you ask me. I am sure they hoped they could pull it off totally for free, it was a shoot the moon gamble to try it, so what's the next concession they try to get out of the artists/writers and what flap and then concession comes from THAT gamble...
 
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Mascots said:
Am I crazy to bat an eye at the labels who should be responsible to the artists, who are giving them the talent to profit on? They were not forced. They helped to form this deal. They are responsible for the contract that was constructed as well.
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I can't speak for other labels, but I know our small firm feels powerless in these situations. Apple rules the roost, and to not include your catalog could be considered just as negligent to the artists as signing a crappy deal to have it included. It's rough when you have a small catalog, and a small core of artists. We want to make the most money possible for our firm and the artists involved, but sometimes these things come along and their non-negotiable.

The four, now three, major labels Universal, Sony, and Warner sit down at a table and negotiate these things with services like Apple, and then the contracts get handed down to the rest of us. Or in our case, we're with a big digital distributor who signs a single agreement that encompasses all of the hundreds of small labels and thousands of indie artists they distribute for. Our choice in the matter is simply participate with the crappy deal or not. 90% of our catalog is with this distributor, and only 10% is up through iTunes directly.

We haven't yet signed any amendments for the new service with iTunes directly, but the distributor has... so our choice is either go along with it, or ask them to pull our catalog from the Apple Music portion of the deal.

We've slowly begun backing out of Spotify over the last year as well, but it means we have to work harder to replace that income. Because their "torrent of nickels" as I like to call it, is still income, and taking our music out of their service doesn't automatically mean we see an increase anywhere else in the distribution realm.

Just providing some insight into what smaller labels go through. Not sure if this helped any...
 
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hkenneth said:
However hard she sings them, pop songs are not arts. Arts are something that can be appreciated by centuries, not some American girls whining about their ex-boyfriends.
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Hey, thanks for defining art so succinctly.

But here's a clue for you, all the "classical" music that has endured for centuries was once "popular" music.

I'm not saying Ms. Swift will stand the test of time, but history will decide that, not you or I.

Read a libretto some time, you'll find dumber things than "American Girls whining about their ex-boyfriends".
 
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pat500000 said:
really though...how do you know it's pr stunt? rather than turning the table..please elaborate...because i have no idea how you came to that conclusion.
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You have no knowledge on it NOT being a PR stunt anymore than I have knowledge that it is a PR stunt. I will give you some logic though. TS is nothing more than another instant successful pop star (fake country singer) that will die down soon enough. She's popular now however. Spotify is a much smaller company than Apple and they didn't accept her threats to pull her music. They let her go without even as much as a bit of a fight. She certainly didn't have enough power to hurt Spotify. The company is still doing quite well in fact without her. If she couldn't hurt Spotify how in the world is she gonna hurt Apple? Apple has been holding the crown as the biggest, most popular and most valuable company worldwide. A little pop star is not going to intimidate them, let alone single-handedly get them to make a decision change overnight when contracts have already been signed by major record labels.
Go ahead and deny that all you want. No doubt in the coming weeks the truth will be in the media.

Had Apple's streaming service already had been active for several months and doing well and TS had not had issues with Spotify I highly doubt this would've happened. She has a tour and Apple has an upcoming service that directly competes with Spotify. Promotion for both of them go hand in hand.

I'm not denying that Apple paid the artists but I'm willing to bet that ship had sailed weeks ago.

Even if this wasn't a PR stunt Apple certainly didn't decide to pay the artist just because of TS. This whole media attention helped them to promote Music. Apparently you don't see that. It's all about business for Apple at the end of the day.

Believe what you need to believe sir. But you replying me without any facts to prove I'm wrong doesn't make your case any stronger than mine.
 
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HenryDJP said:
Spotify is a much smaller company than Apple and they didn't accept her threats to pull her music. They let her go without even as much as a bit of a fight.
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they begged her to come back.. and it still stands.
not really sure what type of fight you'd expect them to put up? she quit them and there's nothing to fight about.. just plead with her not to leave is all they could do (and did).

A little pop star is not going to intimidate them
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it sounds like you have an agenda of sorts and are purposely ignoring facts.. 'little'? she the biggest musician right now.. 25 on most-albums-ever-sold lists and is certainly selling more albums than anybody else right now.

No doubt in the coming weeks the truth will be in the media.
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ok.. that would be nice.. i'm actually more interested in the spin you'll put on it once it becomes more clear that this wasn't a pr stunt.

Had Apple's streaming service already had been active for several months and doing well and TS had not had issues with Spotify I highly doubt this would've happened.
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i don't get it.. of course if she didn't have issues with spotify then this wouldn't of happened.. it's basically the same issue she has with spotify that she has(d) with apple.
?

She has a tour and Apple has an upcoming service that directly competes with Spotify. Promotion for both of them go hand in hand.
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this isn't really much in the realm of 'Promotion'.. the majority of people that even give a hoot are posting in these threads.

Even if this wasn't a PR stunt Apple certainly didn't decide to pay the artist just because of TS. This whole media attention helped them to promote Music.
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you'd think they'd of let it go for more than 16hrs_ish and on a busier day, right? or maybe they chose sunday and a midnight announcement to make sure they didn't get too much promotion?

----
[EDIT]
like for real @HenryDJP ..
if apple wants to do some PR stuff with taylor swift, why in the world do it like this?
apple music & taylor swift running through the apple advertising machine would gain way (way!) more publicity than this hypothetical stunt of yours.. : /

it's not even an awesome stunt..
Taylor Swift -- i don't want to use your service to sell my music under your current terms.
(in an open letter as a means to bring in the public for a louder/stronger voice)
Apple -- got it.. well, we'd like to have you on board so we'll do the deal your way.
both -- ok, cool

yeah, brilliant pr stunt.. not
 
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JXShine said:
Cant believe apple bowed down to a whiny singer.
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they are not bowing down as much as they are protecting their brand. If they were the righteous company they claim to be then they would have offered it in the first place. They thought if one high profile artist complains then we ditch plan A and go with plan B...and pull if off as good pr. Come on, these guys are ahead of the game.
 
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Robstevo said:
No. Free means free for the consumers but they shouldn't expect the artists to take the hit. And not all artists are millionaires. Some are just trying to make ends meat and out food on the table. Pathetic attitude really.
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I will not support people working for a corrupt industry which actually goes against the whole design of copyright. Read: http://questioncopyright.org/promise
 
bigmikeinnj said:
I don't like Taylor Swift at all, I have tried to listen to her music and it seems she dates some guy and then dumps him and then writes a song about how lame he is (or whatever). It's like a cycle with her. I'm sure there's a core listener audience that can't figure out if they like prefer men or women and haven't faced the answer yet and have similar issues and truly identify with her music (I know I'm gonna take a big hit making that statement, but that's my opinion, it's not a bad thing not knowing, it is what it is, Taylor should just come up with different themes)
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It could be that. Or it could just be that her songs are incredibly catchy.

I know that's why I like a lot of them. :)
 
iPadPublisher said:
I can't speak for other labels, but I know our small firm feels powerless in these situations. Apple rules the roost, and to not include your catalog could be considered just as negligent to the artists as signing a crappy deal to have it included. It's rough when you have a small catalog, and a small core of artists. We want to make the most money possible for our firm and the artists involved, but sometimes these things come along and their non-negotiable.

The four, now three, major labels Universal, Sony, and Warner sit down at a table and negotiate these things with services like Apple, and then the contracts get handed down to the rest of us. Or in our case, we're with a big digital distributor who signs a single agreement that encompasses all of the hundreds of small labels and thousands of indie artists they distribute for. Our choice in the matter is simply participate with the crappy deal or not. 90% of our catalog is with this distributor, and only 10% is up through iTunes directly.

We haven't yet signed any amendments for the new service with iTunes directly, but the distributor has... so our choice is either go along with it, or ask them to pull our catalog from the Apple Music portion of the deal.

We've slowly begun backing out of Spotify over the last year as well, but it means we have to work harder to replace that income. Because their "torrent of nickels" as I like to call it, is still income, and taking our music out of their service doesn't automatically mean we see an increase anywhere else in the distribution realm.

Just providing some insight into what smaller labels go through. Not sure if this helped any...
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I thought about your post a lot last night, sorta takes the fun out of buying music or books from Apple knowing this. But I remember how Amazon tried squeezing a bunch of publishers by literally refusing to sell their titles until they got the terms they wanted... Food for thought. Thank you for your insight.
 
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I stopped reading this thread after a few pages, did anyone else notice/mentioned that this pic of Taylor Swift makes her look like some sort of sex doll?
 
rangen said:
Is it misogyny because the protagonist is female? I think the same reaction would have been garnered had the protagonist been male (except for the usual minority band of idiots). it is not the case that any criticism of a stance taken by a woman should be perceived as misogyny, and you don't get points as a male for implying that it is.
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The misogyny is apparent in the descriptives. "Whiney" being the most oft repeated. I read the letter, there was no whining.

Read it yourself here:
http://taylorswift.tumblr.com/post/122071902085/to-apple-love-taylor

So if a similar letter was written by Neil Young and people were posting about senile ramblings when the letter was a clear as this one we would be right in pointing out the ageism of the comments. If a black musician's letter was mischaracterized with racially loaded pejoratives it would be right to call out racism.

There is a lot of hate being directed at TS in this thread and the criticisms seem unfounded. She has taken a feminist stance in recent times and I suspect that some of the vitriol arises from that.
 
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sualpine said:
You don't think its unauthentic for someone that lived in Nashville to not only suddenly move to New York, the greatest city in the world, but then also have the chutzpah to pretend she knows and loves the city enough to become an official city ambassador less than a year after moving there? Yeah, that's about as fake as it gets.
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This sort of nonsense simply puzzles me. I figure there must be something else motivating this attack.
I lived in the city for a little over a year and was authentically singing its praises in a few short months. You seem to be saying that NYC is great but this would be impossible for anyone who lived in Nashville to accept. This is absurd. This is a fake argument. What is your issue really?

edit: the ad was great. good for nyc and ts
http://www.nycgo.com/w2ny
 
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shinji said:
Men can whine, too. Pointing out that a person is whining is not an attack on his or her gender.
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My point is that she was not whining. Read the letter. "Whiney white girl" is a trope we all understand. For it to be applied when the facts don't support it suggests mysogyny. "Whiney" is only the closest to hand and the most repeated on this thread. Read the rest of the attacks and sort it out.
 
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moderately said:
This sort of nonsense simply puzzles me. I figure there must be something else motivating this attack.
I lived in the city for a little over a year and was authentically singing its praises in a few short months. You seem to be saying that NYC is great but this would be impossible for anyone who lived in Nashville to accept. This is absurd. This is a fake argument. What is your issue really?

edit: the ad was great. good for nyc and ts
http://www.nycgo.com/w2ny
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I'll bite! Swift is just another bad creation. She started out on her merits. Learned quickly that a certain formula "sold it" and has stuck with it since. She takes no chances. She puts out what is written for her. She does write "part" of her own lyrics but even then she has people helping. Sorry but she's a fraud musically in my eyes. It's now more about the show than the music. If that's misogyny then oh well!
 
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