“It’s good news that Apple is making streaming work
but it is also going to accelerate the decline of downloads”
Music Industry Analyst with Midia Research Mark
Mulligan, commenting on Apple Music growth to 10 million Paid subscribers
Apple is truly on a winning streak in 2016.
It's been announced that they've reached 10 million
paying subscribers just 6 month after launched as reported in the article “Apple’s
music streaming subscribers top 10m”, published January 10, 2016 by Matthew
Garrahan and Tim Bradshaw, Financial Times.
Not surprisingly, this milestone was achieved just 2
months after Apple branched out to Google's Android operating system as reported
in the article “Apple
Music launches on Android to tap billion-strong new audience”, published
Wednesday 11 November 2015 by Stuart Dredge, The UK Guardian.
What makes this even more amazing is that in October
2015, Apple CEO Tim Cook announced that Apple Music has achieved 6 million paid
subscribers as reported in my blog article
entitled “How
Apple Music has 6.5 million Subscribers - Spotify's 20 million subscribers
Total Eclipse of the Heart by January 2016”.
In less than three (3) months, Apple Music added on
another 4 million subscribers! Amazing, no matter how you look at it!
Apple
Music’s 10 million paid Subscribers - Streaming Video and Audio to replace
Television and Radio
Apple iTunes Radio, their early attempt at a
streaming music service to fight the likes of Pandora, Spotify, Amazon Music
and Google Play Music, is no longer free.
It is to become a part of Apple Music as reported in
the article “Apple
iTunes Radio Is No Longer Going To Be Free”, published January 19, 2016 by
Amit Chowdhry, Forbes.
This indicates that Apple is confident about their
product and knows people are willing to pay for Streaming music. The Nielsen
year-end music report indicates that Music Streaming is on the rise, with 145
billion audio streams in 2015, up 79% percent from 2014.
Audio Streaming will basically replace Radio in much
the same way Video Streaming is predicted to replace Television and is a global
phenomenon.
Hence the reason why the RJR Communications Group
and the Jamaica Gleaner merger occurred, as Streaming affects all of Media as
noted in my blog
article entitled “Why
the Abeng 88.7 FM is the last FM Radio Station as @BCJamaica plans DSO for
Radio and Television”.
So how does Apple Music compare to Spotify?
Apple
Music beat Spotify - Total Eclipse of their rival in June 2016
Apple Music, which had launched in August 2015 with
some 11 million trial subscribers as reported in my blog article
entitled “Apple
Music 11 Million Trial users – Why 100 million Apple Music Subscribers by 2016
versus @Spotify and @TIDALHiFi beckons”.
Currently Apple Music has the following Streaming
plans:
1. US$9.99
per month for an Individual plan
2. US$14.99
per month for a Shared Family Plan (6 people)
3. 24/7
radio station called Beats 1
4. Connect
Social Networking that allows musicians and their fans to meet
Their service recommends songs based on user
purchase habits from the following sources:
1. Apple's
iTunes Store
2. Ripped
from CDs
3. On-demand
from their 30 million title online catalog
Their 24/7 radio station called Beats 1 also
features Connect, where artists can mix and mingle with fans and give them
music promos.
By comparison, London-based music streaming service Spotify has a premium service costs the same as Apple Music in the UK, Australia and the US of A. Their numbers were by far greater than Apple Music being as they had launched on both Apple iPhone and Google Android smartphones:
1. 20
million paid members
2. 75
million who listen for free
Not bad for a service that began as an ill-advised
purchase of Beats Audio for US$3.2 Billion in May 2014 as reported in my blog article
entitled “Apple
officially confirms Beats Audio Purchase - US$3.2 Billion as Apple gears up for
Subscription Streaming and improved Headphones”.
Apple, in the space of six months, has achieved a
milestone that took Spotify six years to achieve as noted in the article “Apple
Music said to have 10M subscribers”, published January 10, 2016 by Steven
Musil, CNET.
Spotify had hit the 10 million mark in June 2014. So
at this rate of growth, Apple is expected to pass Spotify by June 2016.
No comments:
Post a Comment