Well, That Was Quick - Bored Already, Not Going To Keep Apple Music

[zhenya]

Clearly the iTunes Download model is working for you, so no need to switch to Apple Music.

BJ

How kind of you to tell you what works best for me!

As I've said all along, streaming, for me, is something that is used in conjunction with other methods of discovery, and other methods of ownership. If I really want to own something, I'm still glad to buy it. But streaming opens the door for me to introduce myself to a huge catalog of music that I would not otherwise be exposed to and certainly would not pay to own. The funny thing is, when you open up like that, you are often introduced to the best music, music that eventually becomes your favorite. I noticed this very early on in my music explorations; that the best albums are often ones that have to grow on you over time. Streaming opens up this avenue of discovery in a big way.

No. That describes the millions of other casual iTunes users who aren't YOU.

Savvy?

BJ

Wow. Now you claim to be speaking on behalf of millions of other people. Your ego is about to consume itself.

 

[boltjames]

In that case, please enlighten me as to what model you think would satisfy both the consumers and the artists and the record companies.

Again, whatever model you propose would have to allow for unlimited on demand streaming of all available titles on a given service. Telling people to use artist radio to find specific songs isn't the same thing at all.

$24 a year and you get to permanently keep 24 of the tracks.

The average iTunes user spends $12 a year to permanently keep 12 of the tracks now, so Apple and the record companies double their income which is plenty. The consumer doubles their spend but in exchange for that they get to listen to the deep library of 30 million songs in the futile hope that the Greatest Album Ever Made was released in 1976 and somehow we all missed it. That's the right economics.

BJ

 

[boltjames]

So, I call you out on being a reckless driver, you decide that's another point for you to be right?! That's downright distasteful. If you hadn't already invalidated any points you had already, that post alone makes any argument you have worthless.

If you hit someone whilst driving, because you were using a mobile device to go looking for music, are you going to blame that on Apple too?

You shouldn't be using a device full stop when driving! Maybe you'll learn that when you get arrested for it.

Please stay on topic in my thread.

Thanks.

BJ

 

[boltjames]

Sure. Sounds like it's not for you. I don't get the big deal, if so. It sure would be nice to have threads that don't immediately devolve into accusations of people being Apple haters or apologists, or personal attacks because someone likes a product.

I've never been much on streaming services, personally, but am giving this a try. I haven't used it a ton yet, because I've had a lot going on recently, but so far I've listened to a bunch of albums that I probably would not have taken the plunge and bought otherwise. Therefore, I'd see it as I'm paying effectively to be able to go out and discover music more conveniently, not really necessarily to add to my music library.

Oh and for the record, I also have an Apple Watch, and like it. I wouldn't recommend it for everyone, but it does what I want it to, and I like it.

After the initial surge of excitement over the promises of Jimmy Iovine, Apple Music is just iTunes. Except instead of free radio and free song previews you have to pay for it now.

BJ

 

[boltjames]

Wow. Now you claim to be speaking on behalf of millions of other people. Your ego is about to consume itself.

"People have told us over and over and over again they don’t want to rent their music. Just to make that perfectly clear, music is not like a video. Your favorite movie, you may watch 10 times in your life. Your favorite song, you’ll listen to a thousand times in your life.

If it cost you 10 bucks a month or over a hundred dollars a year to rent that song, that means for me to rent that song over 10 years I’ve paid over a thousand dollars in subscription fees to listen to my favorite song 10 years from now and that just doesn’t fly with customers. They don’t want subscriptions."

--Steve Jobs

 

[Supermallet]

$24 a year and you get to permanently keep 24 of the tracks.

The average iTunes user spends $12 a year to permanently keep 12 of the tracks now, so Apple and the record companies double their income which is plenty. The consumer doubles their spend but in exchange for that they get to listen to the deep library of 30 million songs in the futile hope that the Greatest Album Ever Made was released in 1976 and somehow we all missed it. That's the right economics.

BJ

Okay, I'm going to counter your $12 per year spending figure. This is from the first article that pops up when I search for "average itunes spending":

The median annual music spend is probably higher than $12. If one assumes not every iTunes account has purchases music -- a reasonable assumption -- then some of the 575 million iTunes accounts represent no spending at all. So, accounts that are buying music are spending more than $12 a year. The fact that some family members share accounts means the average spend per person is less than $12 a year.

http://www.billboard.com/biz/articl...matters-average-itunes-account-generates-just

In order for your numbers to be anywhere close to accurate, you'd have to determine how many iTunes account holders purchase music at all, and you'd then have to find out how many accounts are being used for multiple family members. So I'm going to call hogwash on your $12 per year number.

Now, if you offered an unlimited streaming service for $24 per year AND you got to own 24 tracks that year, you'd likely have everyone and their mother signing up for the service. However, I don't think the economics really do work out that way. For one thing, even if the $12 average were accurate (and it's not), that's not accounting for purchases of physical media, and existing streaming service subscriptions, both of which are revenue sources. If you offer a $24 per year top of the line streaming service that allowed you to also own 24 tracks, those other sales would likely all but disappear. So instead of doubling their theoretical profit (which they're not with this model), they'd be losing a lot of money.

Now, if you offered a similar solution but gave more realistic pricing, say the same $120 per year but you get to keep 60 tracks per year permanently, or maybe 30 depending on how the economics work out, I think you could have something viable. But your numbers are absurdly low because they're based on faulty assumptions.

 

[lchlch]

$24 a year and you get to permanently keep 24 of the tracks.

The average iTunes user spends $12 a year to permanently keep 12 of the tracks now, so Apple and the record companies double their income which is plenty. The consumer doubles their spend but in exchange for that they get to listen to the deep library of 30 million songs in the futile hope that the Greatest Album Ever Made was released in 1976 and somehow we all missed it. That's the right economics.

BJ

This is only true if everyone subscribes for Apple music. If not, this statement is just plain wrong.

After the initial surge of excitement over the promises of Jimmy Iovine, Apple Music is just iTunes. Except instead of free radio and free song previews you have to pay for it now.

BJ

song previews are still free in the iTunes Store. =.=. Radio is still free as well (beats 1 and other radio stations). Having said that this statement is only partially wrong as radio is limited in some parts of the world.

"People have told us over and over and over again they don’t want to rent their music. Just to make that perfectly clear, music is not like a video. Your favorite movie, you may watch 10 times in your life. Your favorite song, you’ll listen to a thousand times in your life.

If it cost you 10 bucks a month or over a hundred dollars a year to rent that song, that means for me to rent that song over 10 years I’ve paid over a thousand dollars in subscription fees to listen to my favorite song 10 years from now and that just doesn’t fly with customers. They don’t want subscriptions."

--Steve Jobs

"... we think the current crop of 7-inch tablets are going to be DOA, dead on arrival. Their manufacturers will learn the painful lesson that their tablets are too small and increase the size next year, thereby abandoning both customers and developers who jumped on the 7-inch bandwagon with an orphan product. Sounds like lots of fun ahead."

-- Steve Jobs

No offense but Steve is not always consistent with things he's said in the past.

 

[shandyman]

Please stay on topic in my thread.

Thanks.

BJ

It was a relevant response to your post. Using a mobile device whilst driving, even just to select music, is reckless endangerment. It's another illegal activity you've demonstrated in this thread. Between that and your rampant egomania, along with repeated using inaccurate or made up facts, that make your arguments and this thread, pointless and a waste of space.

You obviously cannot accept any rational counter arguments, as you just ignore any points that prove you wrong. It's the equivalent to a child putting their fingers in their ears and going 'la la la la la I'm not listening'

 

[navaira]

... we think the current crop of 7-inch tablets are going to be DOA, dead on arrival. Their manufacturers will learn the painful lesson that their tablets are too small and increase the size next year, thereby abandoning both customers and developers who jumped on the 7-inch bandwagon with an orphan product. Sounds like lots of fun ahead."

-- Steve Jobs

No offense but Steve is not always consistent with things he's said in the past.

Mind you, iPad Mini has been released a year after Steve Jobs died.

I am waiting for the Android app for Apple Music. I want to see how playlist syncing and offline listening will work (I'm on a 1 GB per month plan, not going to stream via 4G). But so far AM has made me think seriously about changing my Spotify subscription from Premium to Unlimited. I've been posting "Daily Apple Music Complaint" on my Facebook and AM sure gives me enough material.

A few days ago I was re-ripping some CDs which I had in 128kbps to iTunes Plus quality. Today Apple Music recommended me TWO of them. I don't think there is any integration at all between For You recommendations and my library. It's a good idea implemented badly.

 

[johngordon]

My point is that people of our age a) who owned vast CD collections, b) were old enough for the Napster/Limewire era, and c) have been iTunes users since Day 1 already own 100% of the back catalog we want. We've already decided the Rolling Stones were must-have's and The Kinks weren't, already have every Lenny Kravitz cut and eschewed Pearl Jam, so there's not a lot of win in the 30 Million Songs! back catalog. For a 22 year old with parents not heavily into music, it can be a big benefit. Not so much for us. That was the reason for the age query.

Whilst the might be the case for some people, I fundamentally disagree with that as an all encompassing generalisation.

I remember Napster / Limewire and downloaded a fair amount of stuff to fill in a few gaps, but I haven't used anything like that for at least about 15 years so its absurd to say that in 2015, anyone who was downloading stuff 15 years ago has 100% of the back catalogue they want.

There has been at least 15 years of new music since then, there is new music being released all the time, and even if people didn't download stuff then, they might have found stuff since then.

I was never a big fan of the Stones, but got their Grrr album before seeing them at Glastonbury just a couple of years ago.

MacBook's and iPhone's are premium products in their respective competitive marketplaces; Apple Music is not. Thus paying more for a piece of cutting-edge Apple hardware feels really smart wheras paying more for a me-too piece of Apple propaganda feels really stupid.

BJ

I thought it was about what the average consumer spends?

Describing Apple Music as "Apple propaganda" sounds ridiculous.

It is what it is - a music subscription streaming service - I'm just getting more and more offended by your insinuation that I am moron suckered in by Apple scamming me just because it doesn't happen to offer you a good enough value proposition.

Did you ever answer my question about how to properly discover new music, seeing as hearing new music on the radio, or a curated playlist doesn't count because it has just been spoon fed?

 

[whsbuss]

Can't believe we are still feeding this troll. Someone please end this needless thread.

 

[Arran]

Can't believe we are still feeding this troll. Someone please end this needless thread.

I can't decide who the troll is now

Nice thread bump, BTW.

 

[johngordon]

Correction.

Paying to stream music you don't own is just fine so long as a) the price is commensurate with what consumers should be spending and b) the quality of the experience is vastly superior to what is available currently in other forms.

Apple Music loses on both counts. It's 10x more expensive than the existing Paid iTunes Downloads + Free iTunes Radio model and it's not vastly superior to that offering. If anything, it's inferior. You don't own the media you're paying for, you don't get a full catalog, Tidal and Spotify are locking up exclusives, artists are delaying new releases, etc.

BJ

Will you please just top with this 10 x more expensive nonsense!

Firstly, it has already been pointed out that that figure is flawed to begin with, and that a better figure would be the average amount based on those who semi regularly buy music, rather than simply everyone with an iTunes account. There are probably millions of people with an iTunes account just to download Angry Birds for example.

Secondly, any argument that it should be priced $12 a year because that's the average spend is ridiculous anyway.

$120 a year is only the equivalent of 10-12 albums a year, but obviously gives you access to far more than that. Which is for a lot of people a great value proposition right there.

If you don't think you would get enough out of it, then its not for you - so just don't subscribe.

But please - for the love of God - stop with this nonsense about how it is objectively poor, and anyone who disagrees is an idiot who has somehow been fooled by Apple propaganda.

I can assure you I am in full control of my faculties, understand exactly what the proposition is, and really do consider it, for me, an excellent value proposition.

Its this simple - if I wanted to buy all the music I ever thought I would like to hear it would likely cost me at least $500 a year. With Apple Music it will cost me $120 a year.

Please explain how that isn't a great value proposition for someone in my position, who - gasp! - still thinks there's a lot of great music being released?

 

[Benjamin Frost]

Will you please just top with this 10 x more expensive nonsense!

Firstly, it has already been pointed out that that figure is flawed to begin with, and that a better figure would be the average amount based on those who semi regularly buy music, rather than simply everyone with an iTunes account. There are probably millions of people with an iTunes account just to download Angry Birds for example.

Secondly, any argument that it should be priced $12 a year because that's the average spend is ridiculous anyway.

$120 a year is only the equivalent of 10-12 albums a year, but obviously gives you access to far more than that. Which is for a lot of people a great value proposition right there.

If you don't think you would get enough out of it, then its not for you - so just don't subscribe.

But please - for the love of God - stop with this nonsense about how it is objectively poor, and anyone who disagrees is an idiot who has somehow been fooled by Apple propaganda.

I can assure you I am in full control of my faculties, understand exactly what the proposition is, and really do consider it, for me, an excellent value proposition.

Its this simple - if I wanted to buy all the music I ever thought I would like to hear it would likely cost me at least $500 a year. With Apple Music it will cost me $120 a year.

Please explain how that isn't a great value proposition for someone in my position, who - gasp! - still thinks there's a lot of great music being released?

The $12 average spend is actually very high.

It relates only to iTunes customers, who are more likely to purchase music. The average annual spend for the world is $3.

Also, there are a lot of albums on iTunes for $4.99, so a person could easily buy 24 albums a year for the equivalent of Apple Music. As these albums can have 50 tracks, that's 1,200 songs! That's far more than most people would ever listen to.

Apple and the labels want to milk people and turn music into the same huge ripoff that tv is.

Will they succeed? Let's hope not.

 

[johngordon]

No. That describes the millions of other casual iTunes users who aren't YOU.

Savvy?

BJ

Point is you can't make ridiculous sweeping comments like:

Apple Music costs 10x more than if you buy music.

It doesn't.

You might as well argue that it shouldn't cost $360 for 36 albums, because that's 36 x more expensive.

 

[johngordon]

What should I project my own opinion as? Fallacy?

You realize that this is a discussion forum and posting style matters, yes? If you view my opinions as projected fact, I'm doing my job. Do a better job yourself and you won't feel this way. Make a decent argument.

BJ

Present it as your own subjective opinion, particular to your circumstances, and not as some sort of objective fact which applies generally to everyone.

 

[johngordon]

The $12 average spend is actually very high.

It relates only to iTunes customers, who are more likely to purchase music. The average annual spend for the world is $3.

Also, there are a lot of albums on iTunes for $4.99, so a person could easily buy 24 albums a year for the equivalent of Apple Music. As these albums can have 50 tracks, that's 1,200 songs! That's far more than most people would ever listen to.

Apple and the labels want to milk people and turn music into the same huge ripoff that tv is.

Will they succeed? Let's hope not.

All any of this tells us is that the cost of something should not be based on the average spend per person on that product or service.

I don't see how $120 a year, or the equivalent of one regular, normal priced album per month can ever be described as a rip off.

You can't just say "that's more than I spend on music in a year, therefor its a rip off, period."

Its like someone who doesn't drink much arguing $100 for 20 beers is a rip off because they only ever drink two beers.

 

[johngordon]

That's part of it, definitely. Those damn kids and their portable telephones, I tell ya.

Bigger picture is this: I'd hate my kids to spend their parent-paid college years building a custom Library full of artists and playlists they adore and then be faced with their student loans and first apartments and the burden of a $120 annual fee to keep the music they otherwise could have bought.

I know my kids. No way they are going to purchase 120 songs a year. My iTunes collection is all the back catalog they need and a few dozen tracks each year are all they'll purchase from the dearth of new material. So to pay that kind of money merely to rent them is ludicrous.

BJ

Oh, why didn't you say?

Maybe if you let Apple and Spotify know that your kids would never buy as many as one album a month, and they might reconsider their pricing strategy.

Or wait - here's a though. If that's the case, why don't they just buy the music then?

Because this isn't complicated.

If you think you'll buy much more than an album a month, a streaming subscription is a great value proposition.

If you think you'll buy less than that, then not so much, so just but the music.

What's the problem?

With respect, did you actually just say that you're iTunes collection is all the back catalogue your kids need?

You actually said that?

I'm actually speechless!

 

[johngordon]

$24 a year and you get to permanently keep 24 of the tracks.

The average iTunes user spends $12 a year to permanently keep 12 of the tracks now, so Apple and the record companies double their income which is plenty. The consumer doubles their spend but in exchange for that they get to listen to the deep library of 30 million songs in the futile hope that the Greatest Album Ever Made was released in 1976 and somehow we all missed it. That's the right economics.

BJ

This whole argument is ridiculous.

You might as well argue that, because the average spend on music is $12, that anyone should be able to get 30 albums for $12, or 50 albums per year, or 100 albums a year. For $12. Because that's your average.

It doesn't, and cannot ever, work like that.

 

[shandyman]

The $12 average spend is actually very high.

It relates only to iTunes customers, who are more likely to purchase music. The average annual spend for the world is $3.

Also, there are a lot of albums on iTunes for $4.99, so a person could easily buy 24 albums a year for the equivalent of Apple Music. As these albums can have 50 tracks, that's 1,200 songs! That's far more than most people would ever listen to.

Apple and the labels want to milk people and turn music into the same huge ripoff that tv is.

Will they succeed? Let's hope not.

Apart from the fact that Apple Music is not the first streaming service. Spotify has been going for 9 years.... For example.

 

[Benjamin Frost]

Apart from the fact that Apple Music is not the first streaming service. Spotify has been going for 9 years.... For example.

Which hardly anyone pays for.

 

[Rusty33]

But are you really discovering it if it's being pushed to you?

You just blew my mind...

 

[johngordon]

But are you really discovering it if it's being pushed to you?

Well, yes.

Or are you telling me that all the music I thought I had discovered from year's of listening to John Peel, it turns out that I didn't really discovered it all, because it was "pushed" over the radio?

Or are there wires crossed here - obviously I wouldn't be claiming to have literally discovered music that no-one had ever heard before. I just mean discovered music which was new to me.

Does that not count in the context of "discovering music"?

 

[shandyman]

Which hardly anyone pays for.

Over 20 million counts as hardly anyone?!

 

[boltjames]

In order for your numbers to be anywhere close to accurate, you'd have to determine how many iTunes account holders purchase music at all, and you'd then have to find out how many accounts are being used for multiple family members. So I'm going to call hogwash on your $12 per year number.

It's not hogwash. It's an average. An average spend of all people who have iTunes. It's $12.

You don't need to get stuck in the math, most of this is common sense. People are used to the established business models. iTunes Radio is free, it's very diverse, it's customizable, lots of discovery there. iTunes Movies is fantastic, they have a hugely deep catalog and we can rent a single movie for $3 with no other strings attached. iTunes is the best thing ever, they have every song ever made and all labels/artists onboard for $1 a song with no other strings attached.

Ah, but now they're trying to change that Music model that we love so much and worked so well. And while the simplistic view sounds interesting ($10 a month for every song ever made just like iTunes!) you dig just a hair under the hood and it's very discouraging ($120 a year for the rest of your life, fragmented services, fragmented artists, incomplete catalog, Beats 1 a gimmick, For You just iTunes Radio repurposed).

Now, if you offered an unlimited streaming service for $24 per year AND you got to own 24 tracks that year, you'd likely have everyone and their mother signing up for the service. However, I don't think the economics really do work out that way. For one thing, even if the $12 average were accurate (and it's not), that's not accounting for purchases of physical media, and existing streaming service subscriptions, both of which are revenue sources. If you offer a $24 per year top of the line streaming service that allowed you to also own 24 tracks, those other sales would likely all but disappear. So instead of doubling their theoretical profit (which they're not with this model), they'd be losing a lot of money.

Now, if you offered a similar solution but gave more realistic pricing, say the same $120 per year but you get to keep 60 tracks per year permanently, or maybe 30 depending on how the economics work out, I think you could have something viable. But your numbers are absurdly low because they're based on faulty assumptions.

Good post, but two things:

1. Early in the thread I proposed a hybrid streaming model that includes the ability to permanently keep a portion of the tracks each year and from a personal standpoint that would be what it would take to get me over the top. And we're not talking about milk here. The "product" of Apple Music is a tiny song file living on a server.

2. On pricing, $12 is the average of all users. If Apple got $24 from those same users it's a huge win obviously, and then think of the conversion on everyone else- that important group who has an iPhone or an iPad and doesn't buy any music at all. Get only 20% of those people, it's a massive win. The assumptions aren't faulty; the average is the average. Take any corporations revenue and increase the average annual intake by 20% and it's happy days for investors.

BJ