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Taylor Swift Criticizes Apple Music's Free Trial in Open Letter
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Analogies are dangerous... but if we used your restaurant/supplier analogy, it'd more akin to all the suppliers struggling and the world's largest restaurant chain saying, hey, we have a plan to turn things around, but we need to get a LOT of consumers hooked and paying for our sandwiches instead of making them at home.
And because changing consumer behavior is one of the most difficult things to do, we think the best way to do that is to offer our wide variety of sandwiches for free for 3 months so they get used to the larger selection and convenience of buying them. We'll spend billions to add more locations, upgrade our kitchens, train staff and spend millions to promote it and pay thousands of our employees to make and serve the sandwiches every day for 3 months. All we ask is that you do your fair share and supply the ingredients for 3 months. If it all works out, we'll eventually get a predictable, recurring revenue stream that far surpasses what we make today and it will lift the entire supply chain.
So Apple makes money off non mac PC sales and itunes application downloads?
What about android?
Remember this app is more than ios from the Fall on wards.
You are confusing continuing to supply someone with tangible goods vs a good that can be reproduced at no magical cost to the supplier. In the firmer there is a real cost to the continued relationship vs the latter; where supplying the good has no cost and may result in greater sales later.
We don’t ask you for free iPhones. Please don’t ask us to provide you with our music for no compensation.
You don't help us sell iPhones, we help sell your music. You think hosting all your music for three months without collecting money pays for itself? If we can't get people to sign up it'll be more than just 3 months of free music.
You don't help us sell iPhones, we help sell your music. You think hosting all your music for three months without collecting money pays for itself? If we can't get people to sign up it'll be more than just 3 months of free music.
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
I bet I understand loss leaders better than you. There's nothing wrong here with Apple offering up a 3 month free trial as a "loss leader" for their service... EXCEPT they don't make or own this content. My point is that they could much more easily spend a tiny amount of cash they have on hand or make in even 1 quarter to do what they want to do AND make the artists who make the content happy. And those artists are not so much the Taylor Swifts of the world but those about whom she is commenting.
I offered the lobster metaphor to pull it out Apple vs. _______ and take it into something that is unrelated in hopes that maybe we could be more objective in our views (I know that is asking for A LOT around here). And I appreciate your counterpoint. Given your expertise in "loss leader" marketing and apparently the lobster business, please make that work. Get nearly the entirety of the lobster fishing industry to work for free for 3 months so that you can get a lobster subscription business off the ground on the concept that they'll make so much more money later. I like lobster much more than I'm interested in streaming music, so I'll be the first to sign up for free lobster for 3 months.
If you tried, I bet you would find all those fisherman and packers and shippers much more accommodating if you played wholesaler during your free lobster period while paying them behind the scenes... which is pretty much what the creators of this content desire. Instead, Apple is shifting the cost of Apple's promotion to them and people like you are spinning them as the villain because they just want to get paid while Apple is building up a business on the value of their (not Apple's) collective content.
The wholesale + free trial model has been around forever. It works just fine. I'd like to see Walmart pitch that all store stock shall be freely provided & given away for 3 months to establish a new store, so that the makers of all that store content can make money later when the free giveaway promotion ends. OR, I'd love to see this same thread with Google or Microsoft or Samsung in place of Apple and see those of us with such strong anti-artist opinions persist those opinions when it's not Apple on the benefitting side of the equation. If it's right when Apple's doing it should be just as right if it was Samsung or Google. But I bet we wouldn't be so quick to take those corporation's sides against the starving artists.
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OK - as you're a music snob
I don't see how you can say one is better than the other.
There will be all of the following:
- good country songs
- bad pop songs
- good pop songs
- bad country songs
And a lot of the good pop songs are probably a lot better then the bad country songs.
IMO 1989 is full of great pop songs.
Sure. But how many artists, when comped something, say" No, let me pay for its the producer gets some cash?"
Then you have no reason to be commenting. Artists work hard to produce their music. Please don't steal from them.
Not if you started the lobster subscription service to make money off selling hardware claw/shell crackers to eat the lobster. Apple is a device manufacturer. They make their money off devices (see their annual 10K income statement). The services are a loss leader to sell devices. The fishermen get no income from the sale of hardware claw/shell crackers (ie devices).
When I heard about a 3-month free trial, I had assumed that Apple would be 'covering' the cost for me. I had no idea it was covered by the artists/labels. Does anyone know if Spotify's $1 trial is similar? Does Spotify eat the cost, or do the labels/artists?
If the labels/artists are eating the cost, then there must be some 'deal' with the labels to allow this. Apple can't legally use the music without their consent. So, it seems that we have labels giving away the artists' music AND Apple working against artists' best interests.
So much for that Apple Music ad they aired glorifying artists, eh?
If the labels/artists are eating the cost, then there must be some 'deal' with the labels to allow this. Apple can't legally use the music without their consent. So, it seems that we have labels giving away the artists' music AND Apple working against artists' best interests.
So much for that Apple Music ad they aired glorifying artists, eh?
Out of curiosity, and because I genuinely do not know, does Spotify pay artists during their free trial period? Or Tidal? Or any other subscription service?
Spotify free is supported by ads, and the Spotify Premium trial isn't free (right now it is $0.99/mo for 3-months). So either way there's some kind of money moving around however little it may be.
I don't know about Tidal.
Then you really ARE missing the point. I'm not saying for anyone to sign up for Apple as if they are the only game in town. People most certainly can go to a competing company. The issue at hand is people HERE are complaining that Apple should pay the artists during the 3 month period. I'm saying if you want these artists paid then PAY THEM YOURSELVES by way of paying for Music or any other service. Plain and simple. I don't know how much clearer I can be with that. It's about principles.
Taylor Swift hates streaming. Considering she's one of a few artists in an era of torrenting that can still sell over a million album the first week it drops, it makes good business sense for her to turn down Spotify or Apple Music. Especially if these figures of digital downloads vs streaming is still accurate.
I have not read the whole thread but what I have read does not address what I see as the two main issues. 1 is that Apple is paying the artists because of the extra fees they get after the trial, for ever. These extra payments come out of Apple's cash pile and as they are permanent it would appear to be a generous way of avoiding the main problem which is...
2. If Apple were to use their cash pile up front and offer a three month suscription that they directly pay for you then surely that would be challenged in the courts as unfair competition. Its not just a 'loss leader' it's paying your sub for you and for a considerable time.
It would be useful if someone could come up with some actual figures on what the avereage artist would forego in revenue over that period and how long it would take to recoup that loss from the higher payments and how the higher payments would pan out over a longer period.
2. If Apple were to use their cash pile up front and offer a three month suscription that they directly pay for you then surely that would be challenged in the courts as unfair competition. Its not just a 'loss leader' it's paying your sub for you and for a considerable time.
It would be useful if someone could come up with some actual figures on what the avereage artist would forego in revenue over that period and how long it would take to recoup that loss from the higher payments and how the higher payments would pan out over a longer period.
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Then they don't have to take part in the streaming service, no one's forcing them too, despite unsubstantiated rumours to the contrary. They can keep their music in the iTunes store and receive income from purchases. The biggest problem right now is that there doesn't seem to be a way for them to opt out of just the free trial and then have their music available to paying subscribers. That doesn't mean there will never be that facility though, it's a work in progress.
Whilst I think it might be noble for Apple to pay during the free trial, it's probably a bit too close to writing a blank cheque for them to be comfortable with.
Want to also bet that Taylor and the rest of the complainers will want the enhanced % royalty meant to make of for the 3 months of not being paid even if they don't sign up until after the 3 months are up. Don't know details of the contracts obviously but she and others I would imagine will make much more in the long run because Apple is paying more than "normal" for streaming after the 3 months.
Would be interesting to know if I download a song but don't play it - does the artists still get money (after the 3 months) just because it is sitting on my device.
Folks - for those who forgot - Apple is a corporation whose job it is to make as much money as possible for its stockholders - that is capitalism and what made the US as strong as it has been.
Sorry Taylor - no sympathy from me.
Would be interesting to know if I download a song but don't play it - does the artists still get money (after the 3 months) just because it is sitting on my device.
Folks - for those who forgot - Apple is a corporation whose job it is to make as much money as possible for its stockholders - that is capitalism and what made the US as strong as it has been.
Sorry Taylor - no sympathy from me.