Mikey Campbell
Apple issued a rare statement on Wednesday debunking rumors that claimed the company has plans to discontinue iTunes music downloads sometime in the next four years, ostensibly in favor of an all-streaming service powered by Apple Music.
Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr told Re/code that reports of the death of iTunes downloads were greatly exaggerated, simply saying, "Not true."
Earlier today, a questionable report from Digital Music News, citing sources "close and active business relationships with Apple," said an end to iTunes downloads was no longer a matter of if, but when. Highly suspect, the report offered two separate timelines for Apple's seismic strategy shift, one with a termination date "within two years," and another dating out to "the next 3-4 years, maybe longer."
Neumayr said both timelines are false, but would not comment further.
A number of outlets circulated the spurious report.
Apple arguably popularized the digital music industry with iTunes and iPod, and has reaped the rewards for years. Digital downloads are the foundation of iTunes' business model, one Apple is unlikely to abandon anytime soon. The company is, however, following industry trends and last year launched a subscription-based streaming music service in Apple Music. Initial uptake is promising, and streaming is quickly catching on, but music downloads is still a huge segment for Apple.
In the near term, the company is more likely to leverage Apple Music as a sales booster instead of switching formats altogether. Drake's recent release, "Views," is a prime example. The album ran as an Apple Music exclusive for one week and in that time racked up well over one million download sales.
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Wesley Hilliard
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24 Comments
It better not! If it ever happens, I'm done with Apple.
Whoever made this rumor is certainly a product of the "Apple is doomed" articles.
pathetic.
That said...
have you ever tried to BUY a song you heard in Apple Music? I must have clicked 20 different links. They do NOT want you to buy anything! i had to literally exit Apple Music and enter the iTunes music app.
There may be something to this. Otherwise why not "hear a song -> like a song -> but that song?"
I've mentioned this before, but it's worth mentioning again: "just because you can buy music and see it in the iTunes Store does NOT mean Apple has a contract to allow it to stream in Apple Music."
Case in point: classical music.
I work on commercial dance music all day long as a dance remixer. When I'm not working I ONLY listen to classical. I tested Apple Music and it only had 1% of the classical music found in the "buy music" site. Had they had even 50% of the titles, I would have kept Apple Music but for me it was terrible. To see this yourself pick a popular title "The Messiah". On Apple Music there's 6 recordings. On the iTunes buy music site there's 1,000's of recordings.
If Apple could get new contracts on all titles (that's because you need one contract to sell and a completely different one to stream) to allow streaming of all the 'paid for songs' from iTunes Store, yes I would consider, but it will never happen!
There is no reason why they'd cut off this revenue stream. It would actually harm apple considerably as it gives them significant clout in the music business.
Downloads aren't going away. I bet Apple will have the buy option baked into a future version of Apple Music.