While Apple Music’s content library may be plenty, there’s undoubtedly issues with the software behind it as the product is new and faces the hurdle of integration with lots of legacy iTunes cruft. Some may find that okay during the start of the three-month free trial period, but Apple’s streaming music service will have to shape up and quick if it wants to compete with Spotify and others in the same space. Oliver Schusser, iTunes International VP, tells The Guardian that Apple is currently working to clean up and improve the overall product:
“There’s a lot of work going into making the product better. Our focus is on editorial and playlists, and obviously we have teams all around the world working on that, but we’re also adding features and cleaning up certain things,” Oliver Schusser, vice president, iTunes International, told the Guardian.
Schusser is likely referring to improvements coming to the Music app in iOS 9, which Apple is expected to preview again next week and release later this month ahead of the iPhone 6S, but the exec also mentioned the upcoming Android version, Apple Music Connect, and Sonos support.
Schusser said the Apple Music Connect feature, which presents artist activity including sharing demos and lyrics, is “growing big-time” with more musicians taking advantage of it, but that Apple still has “a bit of homework to be done” this year on the product as a whole.
That of course includes Apple Music for Android, which is one of at least two new apps Apple has announced it is developing for Google’s platform in a first for the company, in addition to integration with the popular wireless Sonos audio system.
Schusser confirmed that Apple Music will launch for Android devices and Sonos-connected hi-fis “in the fall”, adding that “we still have some work to do there, but that’s coming”.
Beats Music, which Apple bought and used as the foundation for Apple Music, includes an Android version and Sonos support. Ian Rogers, who formerly lead Beats Music and headed the same team at Apple before recently leaving the company, publicly said earlier this year that Sonos support was in the works.
Schusser also added that the company is focused on the long-term picture for Apple Music and not day-to-day user numbers, saying that Apple Music launched in 110 markets and that the company is collecting a great amount of feedback.
While Apple Music and its fate turned out to be the focus of the interview, the upcoming Apple Music Festival in the UK later this month was probably meant to be the highlight. The Apple exec talked about the festival’s ability to spread the word about Apple Music as a product:
Schusser hopes the festival and ads will attract people who are new to streaming music. “Streaming still needs a lot of education in the market,” he said.
“We have more of a worldwide view: the UK is a little more educated than other markets, but nothing like the places where streaming is already the number one way to consume music.”
Notably, Apple renamed the iTunes Music Festival to the Apple Music Festival this year following the streaming music service launch. Still, Schusser discussed the importance of the iTunes digital music purchasing business in the age of streaming content and subscription services:
“If you follow the industry and look at the numbers, the download business has been really, really healthy. iTunes is a big part of our business, still, and will continue to be, so we focus just as much time and energy on maintaining that, editorially and working on features,” said Schusser.
“That [Compton] is a really good example of how streaming and downloads can be successful side-by-side. What we’ve proven is that when there’s great content, customers will buy as well as listen.”
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Apple Music needs to be more social. Apple Music is nowhere near Spotify when it comes to social features. Also lyrics are a big miss coming from Spotify.
I will not extend my subscription past the trial period untill Apple adds social features and lyrics.
But when it comes to pricing I cannot complain, the family plan is very cheap.
Just installing the version of iTunes that enabled access to Apple Music screwed up my library without even enabling the new feature and I’ve been working with Apple tech support for a month with no success. It broke iTunes Match and if I try to use it, the songs come over as 128 kbp/s protected and it downgraded a third of my library to 128 kbp/s and currently I’m left with no way of fixing it. All I get is a weekly call from tech support telling me that the engineers are working on the problem and there’s no solution yet.
Releasing a beta version incorporated into iTunes is staggeringly incompetent and the people responsible should be fired. It should have released as a separate app and clearly marked as a beta.
“staggeringly incompetent and the people responsible should be fired”
I agree. Just like the Maps guy. This is actually worse in my opinion. Everybody uses the Music App not like Maps App.
They did fire the Maps guy. Scott Forstall now works for SnapChat.
As far as UX goes, it’s a hot mess. They can learn a thing or two from Google Play Music. It’s super intuitive and easy to use.
It’s really a mess. I can’t believe it Apple has done it. It’s totally confusing and I am a technology guy who’s being using iPod/iPhone since 2002.
I was using my iPad with iOS 9 yesterday and I was wondering, why in hell you have the control buttons so small with lots of empty space? It’s beyond me. Look at the “Repeat” button. Why is it so tiny? I barely can see it on the iPad!
any idea which Beats headphone model is this? it looks more silver and less space grey
I think the TO-DO-LIST is very long. The UI (Music-App and iTunes) is not that intuitive, it could be. People don’t want to think about different things, when they’re using, for example the Music-App. They just want to listen to music, they don’t want to think: “Why is that so? “Why is this not like this” and so on. Thats what Apple had lost a little bit. No philosophy – just simple, easy and fast.
p.s.: Sorry for my bad english.
The U.K. is ‘more educated’ so they punish it by setting the most expensive price in the world for Apple Music. I won’t be paying for the service when the trial ends unless they put the same price there is in the US, or at least the same there is in the rest of Europe.
Too little too late. Most people’s trials will have ended by the time everything gets fixed and gone back to what they were using before Apple Music.
Honestly I really enjoy Apple Music for the ability to find new music/artists, but I will never subscribe until they find a way to allow the option to “manually manage music.” I have a very large music library, like many others, from my time before Apple Music and with the integration it makes it impossible to add music that is on my Mac that was not previously on my iPhone. Even when I select “Make Available Offline” in the Apple Misic App it rarely downloads the entire album and I have not been able to figure out how to correct this without selecting each individual song to be made available offline. Very frustrating. I wanted to enjoy this but just disabled it from my phone. An entire month before my free trial is over.
When I listen to Beats1 the ads annoy me. Of course nobody is paying yet, but will ads for MacDonalds continue?