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Apple Music Was Always Going To Win (gizmodo.com)

Apple Music is about to overtake Spotify as the most popular streaming music service in the United States, the Wall Street Journal reported over the weekend. Gizmodo: [...] Here's where the inevitability comes into play. Because all Apple devices come preloaded with Apple Music, countless consumers start using Apple Music without knowing any better. It's effectively become the streaming music analogue of Microsoft pushing people to surf the web with Internet Explorer. The big difference is that people eventually have to pay for Apple Music, which is the same price as Spotify. As many suspected when it launched three years ago, Apple Music was bound to succeed simply because Apple is big enough and rich enough to will it so. Think about it this way: Spotify gained traction quickly after its 2011 launch, largely because music enthusiasts had seen its streaming model succeed globally and wanted to try this neat new thing. After all, there wasn't anything quite like it at the time, and Americans love to feel innovative.

But eventually, Spotify would cease to feel special and new. As the years passed, practically every major tech company launched its own music streaming service. And then, in 2015, Apple unveiled Apple Music in 2015 -- which was really just a rebranded version of Beats Music. Because Apple could preload the service on iPhones, Watches, and Macs, the company could effectively tap into a new revenue stream without actually inventing anything.

22 of 161 comments (clear)

  1. Preinstalled app used more than 3rd party by xxxJonBoyxxx · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Preinstalled app used more than 3rd party. Quick, someone tell Microsoft so they can try this with IE, I mean Edge.

    1. Re: Preinstalled app used more than 3rd party by Malc · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I thought the iPhone only had about a 1/3 market share in the US. Hardly Microsoftâ(TM)s 95+% they had in the heyday of Windows and the browser wars. Come to think of it, how how does Apple Music become the biggest service when itâ(TM)s only available on a minority of devices?

    2. Re: Preinstalled app used more than 3rd party by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It does - on the other hand, it's an app made by Apple, which means there's probably a pretty significant proportion of the android crowd giving it 1* reviews for no reason other than it being made by Apple.

    3. Re: Preinstalled app used more than 3rd party by arth1 · · Score: 2

      It's the same ratio no matter what bounds you apply

      No, it isn't. 3.5/5 where the bounds are 1-5 is not the same as 3.5/5 where the bounds are 0-5.

      What people are most used to are arguably 0-10 and 0-100 scales, and 1-5 scales are misleading, and deliberately so. Google has chosen to not allow 0 stars, because, well, they get a portion of the cut on sales, and giving the impression that something is better than it is in their economic interest.

    4. Re: Preinstalled app used more than 3rd party by alvinrod · · Score: 3, Insightful

      May also be Apple keeping iOS design metaphors so that while it may be functionally just as good, it doesn't feel like a native Android app which makes using it a little jarring.

    5. Re: Preinstalled app used more than 3rd party by arth1 · · Score: 2

      No one is used to a 0-10 scale because thatÃ(TM)s 11 units which is highly irregular. Same with a 0-5, being a very strange six units to humans since it looks, to the layman, like there are five units.

      On the contrary. Your hand can display 0-5 fingers. Two hands can display 0-10. It's the most natural system in the world. You don't have 11 fingers (unless you killed Montoya Senior).

  2. Hasn't worked for Google by edtice1559 · · Score: 2

    Android is the most popular mobile OS and Google hasn't been able to leverage their size to push much of anything. Google Plus? I think Google also has a music service? In this case, the services are probably so similar that it's hard for consumers to tell them apart and the convenience of being preloaded may be enough. But this is only true in parity product situations.

    1. Re:Hasn't worked for Google by squiggleslash · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Google doesn't push GPM down the throats of its users.

      Well, it kinda does, it's just Play Music is always pushing so much other crap that you probably don't notice.

      I'm in the boat I rarely use Play Music. It's a terrible app. Just launched it after not using it for a while and the first thing I see is a popup "Music for where you are". I can't do anything with the app until I respond to the popup, which reads "At the gym? In the car? On your couch? Get music based on your location". I DON'T KNOW WHAT THE FUCK THAT'S EVEN SUPPOSED TO MEAN. Why why why why would I be interested in different music if I'm sitting down vs, I don't know, not sitting down?

      Let me hit Skip. OK, now it's a bunch of recommendations. My music library is nowhere to be seen. I guess I'm going to have to hit the hamburger menu. Music Library is at the top... hahah, just kidding, no it's the fifth item in the menu, just below "New Releases". Wait? What? New Releases? And above that is "Top Charts"? So Google wants me to look at someone else's music library before I get access to my own.

      But let's go to Music Library, and OK, Google at least defaulted to Albums, because that's the last thing I used presumably. But have you seen the albums view? Google has managed to fuck this one up too, at any one time I can see six albums on screen. The screen is dominated by album covers. These covers consist of a gray box with a darker gray circle containing a music note in them for 90% of my library, because it doesn't recognize the CD I ripped.

      Underneath each is the label JUST KIDDING, no it's about 14 characters from the start of the label. Why 14? Because that's all that will fit on one line if you split the screen into two columns of boxes. If they, you know, showed a list, like the iPod used to do, I'd probably see the whole label in the majority of cases. But now I see things like "The 9 symphoni..." and "Adventures beyo..."

      Well, what I want to listen to is Beethoven's symphony #6. The version in my library. I can't use the album view because it sucks, so let me use the search. I try "Beethoven symphony 6" and I get.... directed to... some Beethoven "radio station"? And nothing in my library. I mean, why the fuck would I want that? I literally have no way of finding the right album without scrolling through boxes of circles with music notes in them squinting at text that might include part of the word "Symphony" in it but rarely even includes the composer's name.

      This is an awful app. I rarely listen to my music library these days, because the only way to access it is via this thing that sucks, so I've been building playlists using Amazon Prime's free music (and the music I've bought via Amazon) instead, but their app is only marginally better.

      But that said, Amazon, for all their faults, does not stop me looking at my music when I start their app, bringing up a dialog box to demand I look at some shitty new feature.

      One day I will meet Sergey Brin. I will hand him my phone. I will tell him there is a version of Beethoven's 6th in my library, and give him 30 seconds to find it. When he fails, I'll ask him why.

      --
      You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
    2. Re:Hasn't worked for Google by KozmoStevnNaut · · Score: 2

      GPM is a trainwreck. Their catalogue is a mess, with tons of artists lumped together because of similar names, albums with duplicate tracks and a host of other problems.

      They never fix anything, no matter how many times you report obvious errors.

      In contrast, Spotify generally fixes content errors within a week or two.

      --
      Eat the rich.
    3. Re:Hasn't worked for Google by farble1670 · · Score: 2

      I think Google also has a music service?

      You mean Google Play Music? Or are we talking Youtube? Or maybe Youtube Music? Or are we talking about the new streaming service they are building (seriously):
      https://www.theverge.com/2017/...

      My question: is there anyone here that fails to see the problem with this marketing strategy?

    4. Re:Hasn't worked for Google by farble1670 · · Score: 4, Informative

      I can't do anything with the app until I respond to the popup

      I just started the app and I don't see that popup. I can't recall ever seeing it.

      Let me hit Skip. OK, now it's a bunch of recommendations. My music library is nowhere to be seen.

      1. Start app
      2. Hamburger menu
      3. Select "Music Library"

      These covers consist of a gray box with a darker gray circle containing a music note in them for 90% of my library, because it doesn't recognize the CD I ripped.

      The only part of my lib that has missing art are singles for which there is no album (but I guess it could look up the album that contains that song) and audio books that I uploaded (but actually it found the cover with the audiobooks for most of them). You probably f'ed up your rips and didn't include meta data.

      Underneath each is the label JUST KIDDING, no it's about 14 characters from the start of the label.

      On my device, it's 21 characters for the title and much more for the artist. I don't see the problem. It's a compromise between fitting and many elements on the screen as possible and providing enough information to identify the element.

      so let me use the search. I try "Beethoven symphony 6" and I get.... directed to... some Beethoven "radio station"?

      I search for an artist for which there's an album in my library. The first entry was an "artist" link. The second was a list of albums, for which my album was the first in the list.

  3. Itunes just sucks by Archfeld · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It doesn't matter that it came from apple, or Atari or whomever. Not using apple hardware ensured I never got wrapped up in that nightmare that is iTunes.

    --
    errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
    1. Re:Itunes just sucks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      When used on MacOS, iTunes is pretty good, On windows it might be another story.

    2. Re:Itunes just sucks by Uberbah · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Then how do you know it's a nightmare. Going off of some anecdote that dates back to the Bush Administration?

    3. Re:Itunes just sucks by MachineShedFred · · Score: 4, Insightful

      iTunes was the most useable at version 9. When they added this ridiculous interface we see today where even on the "large screen" iPhone 7+ / 8+ it can show all of four albums at a time instead of 10+ in a list with scaled album art and ABSOLUTELY NO LANDSCAPE FUNCTIONALITY WHATSOEVER, it's been downhill ever since.

      Remember CoverFlow? Bring that back for if someone cares about the album art. Otherwise, just give us a damn list like the iPod has had since 2001 - it's more efficient and just works better.

      --
      Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
  4. Keep in mind this is Unites States only by enjar · · Score: 4, Informative

    From TFA: "Globally, however, Spotify remains in a league of its own, with nearly twice as many paid subscribers as No. 2 Apple, and slightly faster subscriber growth."

    I'm a happy Spotify customer. It works on every platform we have in our house, including Linux

  5. For me, it's about Siri by The+Good+Reverend · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I used Pandora and Spotify until I got my iPhone 6, which was my first that had Siri. Being able to use voice control for my music in the car made Apple Music the obvious choice.

    Since the catalog is pretty much the same for on-demand specific music between the major services, the one that is integrated into my phone just makes sense. If Amazon or Spotify stood out in some other way, I would consider them, but they don't.

  6. Most Don't Use MacOS Nor iOS by Sweettoother · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The last I heard, more than 90% of computers don't run MacOS and more than 80% of the smartphones being used in the world are not iPhones. That means that less than 10% of desktop and laptop computers, and less than 20% of smartphones, being used today, have Apple Music pre-installed. Based on that alone, it doesn't appear to be a given that Apple Music would win. So, it must have to do with which users are using iPhones and Macs. Also, keep in mind that before streaming services started being offered, iTunes was the biggest music retailer, and iTunes did allow you to stream the content you bought (IIRC, it was called iTunes Match). So Apple just had to get their existing iTunes customers to start paying for Apple Music. I suspect that that, as well as Apple's long-standing entrenchment in the music industry, was what determined whether Apple Music would win or not.

  7. Misunderstanding history by nine-times · · Score: 2

    It's effectively become the streaming music analogue of Microsoft pushing people to surf the web with Internet Explorer.

    That's misunderstanding either the situation with Apple Music or the situation with Internet Explorer. Apple isn't sabotaging Spotify and making it crash on Apple devices. As far as I know, Apple isn't actively trying to redirect you to using Apple Music with every update of iOS. Apple isn't pushing to have record labels to produce only music that works on Apple Music.

  8. Not compatible with enough Android devices by tepples · · Score: 2

    When I checked Google Play Store five minutes ago, I found that Apple Music for Android was incompatible with my Samsung Galaxy Tab A 8" tablet (SM-T350) despite that it runs Android 7. What am I missing?

    1. Re:Not compatible with enough Android devices by fluffernutter · · Score: 2

      Oh you must not be familiar with Apple. Everything needs to be at the newest level before anything will work together.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
  9. Re:Pandora by jwhyche · · Score: 2

    And? Spotify has a bigger library so it will probably have the song that I want to hear. Not just a similar song. Also once Spotify plays the song I want to hear, it will go on and play similar songs too.

    --
    I read at +2. If your post doesn't reach that level I will not see or respond to it.