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The extraordinarily cynical side of me wonders if this is all just a massive co-branding PR exercise to dominate the news cycle with "Taylor Swift", "Apple", "F

The extraordinarily cynical side of me wonders if this is all just a massive co-branding PR exercise to dominate the news cycle with "Taylor Swift", "Apple", "Free Music", "Apple Music." Highly unlikely because it's not the type of underhanded marketing that Apple engages in, but man - All I've been reading about, seeing in my twitter feed, is talk about the 90 Day free Music Trial with Apple coming up. This has been far, far better marketing exercise than their WWDC keynote.

socrates1998 11y ago
Wow, this analysis just seems right. They sign a deal with TS, get her to be "outraged" then Apple does a 180 and then says it will pay the artists. TS looks good and Apple gets a shitload of free press for their new music service. I feel dumber everyday I don't see this stuff happening.
- 001sky 11y ago
  Record labels attack Apple deals that would leave them 'completely screwed' Independents claim they could be forced out of business by free trial of new streaming service and withold popular artists such as Adele http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/digital-media/11679030/Record-labels-attack-Apple-deals-that-would-leave-them-completely-screwed.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnol... This was the british press about 5 days ago, so I don't think it was that cynical. TS seems to have been the straw tha nudged the issue over the top. Losing adele and taylor swift starts to give the product a black eye at some stage. Apple has $$$$ plenty in the bank to subsidze a 3 month operating loss (or whatever).
- jen729w 11y ago
  You don't really think this is the case, do you? It's like any conspiracy theory: think about how many people would have to be "in it" to make it work. Then think, what are the chances of none of them, ever letting anything slip. To anyone. Ever. The chances are almost zero. People talk. The damage - to Swift, to Apple - it's just too large. Therefore, this is not what you think it is. There is no deeper story here. Apple screwed up, Swift is influential, they probably thought they could get a bit of good PR from changing their minds, and they did. End of story.
  - chinhodado 11y ago
    > think about how many people would have to be "in it" to make it work TS, her lawyer, some top guys in Apple and their marketing division? It could very realistically be less than 5 people. I don't say I support the theory, just want to point out that it doesn't take much to write an open letter and then respond to it on Twitter.
    - _asummers 11y ago
      Does TS really have to know? I think her outrage would be more believable if she didn't.
      - sangnoir 11y ago
        How sure are you the outrage is 'hers' in the first place if it was in written form on a blog? Believe me, her tirade was edited, vetted and revised by multiple parties six ways to Sunday. It matters very little if the original author was TS herself.
        protomyth 11y ago
        And your proof of that is?
        sangnoir 11y ago
        No proof. This is the role of artist management companies. Taylor Swift has her own management company. All this gs being equal they managed her post. I could similarly claim "OS X El Capitan is being QA tested six ways to Sunday" without being in Cupertino. You could ask me for proof and I would have none.
        obstinate 11y ago
        > Believe me From what authority do you speak on this topic?
        11y ago
- mattmc 11y ago
  I mean, that sounds feasible, but I seriously doubt that is what actually occurred. I would give Apple the benefit of the doubt here, until WikiLeaks turns up some incriminating emails or something.
paulkon 11y ago
I wouldn't be surprised if this was a coordinated PR exercise with top artists and Apple.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
- walterbell 11y ago
  What does that say about Google's non-response to similar musician letters about YouTube Music terms?
themgt 11y ago
They even named their new programming language after Taylor as a co-promotional ruse. Wake up sheeple!!1
synaesthesisx 11y ago
It's not like Apple is affiliated with Swift or anything....wait...
- mamp 11y ago
  My first thought was they did it because they didn't want to rename 'Swift' to 'Drake'.
iiiggglll 11y ago
That's just silly. Apple doesn't need to do anything like that as they already have millions of captive eyeballs on their iOS devices. As soon as they put a nice big icon on the home screen, they'll have an audience. Case in point: a mere six months after it launched, iTunes Radio had more listeners than Spotify: http://www.cnet.com/news/itunes-radio-now-third-most-popular-streaming-music-service/ http://www.cnet.com/news/itunes-radio-now-third-most-popular... Once they unify everything under Beats & iTunes Radio and make it an in-your-face feature of iOS, they'll have all the visibility they need. No reason to engage in some weird false-flag PR campaign like you describe.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
jfb 11y ago
You're overthinking this. They're simply not that Machivellian.
smackfu 11y ago
I don't think Apple came out of this looking very good, even after they capitulated.

socrates1998 11y ago

Wow, this analysis just seems right. They sign a deal with TS, get her to be "outraged" then Apple does a 180 and then says it will pay the artists. TS looks good and Apple gets a shitload of free press for their new music service. I feel dumber everyday I don't see this stuff happening.

001sky 11y ago
Record labels attack Apple deals that would leave them 'completely screwed' Independents claim they could be forced out of business by free trial of new streaming service and withold popular artists such as Adele http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/digital-media/11679030/Record-labels-attack-Apple-deals-that-would-leave-them-completely-screwed.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnol... This was the british press about 5 days ago, so I don't think it was that cynical. TS seems to have been the straw tha nudged the issue over the top. Losing adele and taylor swift starts to give the product a black eye at some stage. Apple has $$$$ plenty in the bank to subsidze a 3 month operating loss (or whatever).
jen729w 11y ago
You don't really think this is the case, do you? It's like any conspiracy theory: think about how many people would have to be "in it" to make it work. Then think, what are the chances of none of them, ever letting anything slip. To anyone. Ever. The chances are almost zero. People talk. The damage - to Swift, to Apple - it's just too large. Therefore, this is not what you think it is. There is no deeper story here. Apple screwed up, Swift is influential, they probably thought they could get a bit of good PR from changing their minds, and they did. End of story.
- chinhodado 11y ago
  > think about how many people would have to be "in it" to make it work TS, her lawyer, some top guys in Apple and their marketing division? It could very realistically be less than 5 people. I don't say I support the theory, just want to point out that it doesn't take much to write an open letter and then respond to it on Twitter.
  - _asummers 11y ago
    Does TS really have to know? I think her outrage would be more believable if she didn't.
    - sangnoir 11y ago
      How sure are you the outrage is 'hers' in the first place if it was in written form on a blog? Believe me, her tirade was edited, vetted and revised by multiple parties six ways to Sunday. It matters very little if the original author was TS herself.
      - protomyth 11y ago
        And your proof of that is?
        sangnoir 11y ago
        No proof. This is the role of artist management companies. Taylor Swift has her own management company. All this gs being equal they managed her post. I could similarly claim "OS X El Capitan is being QA tested six ways to Sunday" without being in Cupertino. You could ask me for proof and I would have none.
      - obstinate 11y ago
        > Believe me From what authority do you speak on this topic?
        11y ago
mattmc 11y ago
I mean, that sounds feasible, but I seriously doubt that is what actually occurred. I would give Apple the benefit of the doubt here, until WikiLeaks turns up some incriminating emails or something.

paulkon 11y ago

I wouldn't be surprised if this was a coordinated PR exercise with top artists and Apple.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

walterbell 11y ago
What does that say about Google's non-response to similar musician letters about YouTube Music terms?

themgt 11y ago

They even named their new programming language after Taylor as a co-promotional ruse. Wake up sheeple!!1

synaesthesisx 11y ago

It's not like Apple is affiliated with Swift or anything....wait...

mamp 11y ago
My first thought was they did it because they didn't want to rename 'Swift' to 'Drake'.

iiiggglll 11y ago

That's just silly. Apple doesn't need to do anything like that as they already have millions of captive eyeballs on their iOS devices. As soon as they put a nice big icon on the home screen, they'll have an audience. Case in point: a mere six months after it launched, iTunes Radio had more listeners than Spotify: http://www.cnet.com/news/itunes-radio-now-third-most-popular-streaming-music-service/ http://www.cnet.com/news/itunes-radio-now-third-most-popular... Once they unify everything under Beats & iTunes Radio and make it an in-your-face feature of iOS, they'll have all the visibility they need. No reason to engage in some weird false-flag PR campaign like you describe.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

jfb 11y ago

You're overthinking this. They're simply not that Machivellian.

smackfu 11y ago

I don't think Apple came out of this looking very good, even after they capitulated.