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About a year ago, Beats Electronics CEO Jimmy Iovine announced that the company was working on a subscription music service. A few months later Iovine sat down with Apple CEO Tim Cook to discuss the service, dubbed “Project Daisy.” According to Iovine, while Apple was interested in Iovine’s idea, former Apple CEO Steve Jobs was unimpressed with the terms. He didn’t want to pay the amount of the licensing fees that record companies were asking.
As we all know, Apple finally came to some kind of agreement with major record companies because iTunes Radio launched last fall, when iOS 7 hit the streets. Iovine’s baby is following in the footsteps of iTunes Radio, but the music producer is not afraid of the competition, claiming that his service will offer something different than everyone else.
Beats Music, which launches Jan. 21, will be a subscription-based streaming music service that will provide currated playlists from experts in the music industry. According to the New York Times, Beats Music does more than just use an algorithm to play the music you want to hear. The human element will make this service better than the rest. Beats Music chief executive pointed out that other automated music streaming services inevitably fail because they rely too much on data collection instead of real life music fans.
Beats Music uses algorithms, but peppers it with editors and guest programmers from Rolling Stone, Rap Radar, Pitchfork, and more to add human recommendations to your playlist.
Unlike other subscription services, Beats Music will not offer a free tier. This business model is interesting considering Spotify recently opened up their on-demand listening on their mobile app to free listeners. With services like Pandora, Rdio, and now iTunes Radio offering advertisement supported free music streaming, it will be interesting to see how a paid-only music service will perform.
Visit the company’s website to find out more information on how to sign up for Beats Music.
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