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Businesses Music The Almighty Buck

Amazon Is Ready To Take on Apple and Spotify in Streaming Music (bloomberg.com) 71

Posted by msmash from the up-next dept.
Amazon is turning up the volume in the music business. From a report: The world's largest online retailer will mount the first national TV campaign for its music-streaming service, featuring ads with songs from Ariana Grande, Kendrick Lamar and Queen. They're part of a larger effort that will extend to billboards, online video and radio, and to three countries -- the U.S., U.K. and Germany. Music has ascended the priority list at Amazon.com because of the popularity of the company's Echo speakers and the virtual assistant Alexa. Music is one of the most common requests of Alexa, and listening hours have doubled over the past year, the company said. "We're pouring fuel on the fire," Steve Boom, the head of Amazon Music said in an interview. "We have established ourselves as the leader in music services where voice is all you need to control it."
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Amazon Is Ready To Take on Apple and Spotify in Streaming Music More

Amazon Is Ready To Take on Apple and Spotify in Streaming Music

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  • oh boy (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    i cant wait to not subscribe to this
    and to have the neutered version i get free with prime removed to convince me

  • nope (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by slashdice ( 3722985 )
    if amazon music is anything like amazon, it will be full of fake chinese knockoffs, like Ramar Kendrick, Justin Timberake, and Birry Joer.

    • This is FAIRLY true. Amazon Video is OK, but there is no question the social aspect of Spotify will never work for Amazon. Their services are always bare bones.

      BUT THE COUNTERFEIT GOODS

      Fuck. I've gotten burned so many times. Every time I think they are getting better, nope. Ordered a $100 bottle of Chrome Azzaro. Looks like the real thing, smells like the real thing for 30 minutes. Then nothing.

      Fucking thieves.

  • Harbor for Rogue Sailors (Score:5, Insightful)

    by b0s0z0ku ( 752509 ) on Friday August 17, 2018 @01:10PM (#57145496)
    Why bother streaming when it's available commercial-free in a harbor for rogue sailors?
    • I fully understand this is going against the mindset of a few but maybe it'll help explain why streaming services are so popular.

      I'm a bit older and grew up in the days of Newsgroups, Limewire etc. Pirating music was the norm and man, everyone was doing it. Fast forward a couple of years and while pirating music is still real easy, I'm a good paying job and don't mind paying for music. In the grand scheme of things, paying $15/month or whatever (Youtube Premium subscriber here) for me and my family se
      • If you want to pay the artists, go to their concerts -- don't give most of the money to the middlemen and assorted pimps.

        • If you want to pay the artists, but don't like the loud noise and crowd of a concert, send them a few bucks with ApplePayCash (:

        • Whose got time to go to concerts? lol

          I'm not into music enough to want to endure a couple of hours journey to a stadium, pay inflated prices, and then have to suffer people around me screaming and shouting such that I can barely hear the band. None of that appeals to me.

          I have friends who LOVE going to concerts, especially 80's music but it's not my thing. Also, I don't want to sound mean-spirited, but when I say I want the artists to get paid, I don't mean I think they're under-paid and I need to g

      • I'm not going to pay $10/month for this, and $20/month for that, and $15/month for this other thing. Fuck that. My response to this trend has to just walk away from all of it.

        What I COULD be convinced to pay is, for example, $100 for "whatever" - where "whatever" includes music, movies, and whatever. So much the better if it includes movies in the movie theater, 3 packaged meals/week (think Blue Apron), etc. Could even make it different tiers:

        Music: $10
        Movies: $20
        3 meals/week: $50
        Cinema: $20
        TV: $10

        Mix and

        • You're poor. That sucks.

        • How do you survive paying one company for your electric, one for your water, one for your mortgage, one for your home insurance, one for your auto? How do you get around paying for gas, auto insurance, buying oil from the local autozone, tires from the tire shop? There's a shit ton of things that most people get that aren't bundled into one single price, why would all those things be bundled?

          • How do you survive paying one company for your electric, one for your water, one for your mortgage, one for your home insurance, one for your auto?

            If I had the option of getting one bill for all of my household utilities, instead of separate bills for gas, electric, water, sewer, internet, and alarm service, I would gladly take that option, even if it meant an extra fee. One bill, one due date, one amount, one account, one login, one entity to deal with. Sign me the fuck up and take my money.

            But the difference between household utilities and entertainment services is that I need the household utilities, and I have to buy them on the terms that are of

      • 100% with you... often left the computer connected overnight to draw down whatever I could from napster and got behind the argument of the time that I should be able to watch/listen on my terms when I buy media, therefore I won't buy until I can. Now we have damn near everything on almost any terms we want... on your phone, on your roku, on your desktop... download it to your tablet to take it on the road or stream it from the hotel. Movies, music, tv shows, whatever. $15/mo for that convenience is quite

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      Why bother streaming when it's available commercial-free in a harbor for rogue sailors?

      Why do we prosecute GPL violators so harshly? I mean, information wants to be free, right? And violating the GPL, or more correctly, ignoring the GPL is a copyright violation. The same thing that you do at the harbour for rogue sailors.

      Yes, the GPL is completely optional. If you don't agree to it, The license to use the software reverts to all rights reserved as covered by standard copyright law. That's why we call these

  • Welcome to future dystopia, Amazon users! (Score:3)

    by DogDude ( 805747 ) on Friday August 17, 2018 @01:10PM (#57145506)
    So, does *nobody* really care that one giant MegaCorp is trying to own everything? Even a formerly anti-corporate message board is full of sycophants who can't get enough of Amazon. Me and my family are the only people that I know that don't give any money to Amazon. What happened to everybody else?
    • Slashdot has been taken over by a bunch of prosperity-gospel preachin' Trumpatarians. If Bezos makes money, it must be his reward for being a good person. TESTIFY!

      • Slashdot has been taken over by a bunch of prosperity-gospel preachin' Trumpatarians. If Bezos makes money, it must be his reward for being a good person. TESTIFY!

        Um ... Bezos is anti-Trump, and he is left wing in general.

        But don't let that get in the way of your TDS.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by DogDude ( 805747 )
          Um, you don't understand this discussion.

          1. Your use of "TDS" or "Trump Derangement Syndrome" tells me that you're a real prick. Trump is an insane, stupid, mean, lying piece of shit human being. People who dislike him aren't "deranged". People who support him, however, might be.
          2. The parent post you ignorantly replied to was saying that Trumpafarians tend to worship money above all else, and since this is a discussion about Amazon, Trumpsters must love Jeff Bezos (and Amazon), because he's very ric

    • I think they care, but the problem is Amazon hasn't done anything that would really betray our trust in the company.
      There seems to be nothing stopping other companies from competing with them, except for the fact that Amazon is so big, that it is impossible to try to compete with them.

      • Betraying trust? How about...
        1. Pimping facial recognition systems to authoritarian governments and law enforcement.
        2. Echo "bugs" which made them always listen "by accident."
        3. Coming out with cloud cameras, and no doubt leveraging this to hoover up surveillance data for posterity. Once it's in the cloud, it's never really guaranteed to be deleted.

        That's just for a start...

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by DogDude ( 805747 )
        I think they care, but the problem is Amazon hasn't done anything that would really betray our trust in the company.

        Interesting perspective. Amazon hasn't done anything to earn my trust.

    • Re:Welcome to future dystopia, Amazon users! (Score:4, Interesting)

      by 110010001000 ( 697113 ) on Friday August 17, 2018 @01:50PM (#57145780) Homepage Journal
      As opposed to what? Giving your money to other music streaming mega-corporations like Spotify or Apple? Amazon has built the infrastructure to stream content. I would expect them to use it. Amazon music streaming is cheaper than the other monthly alternatives. Maybe this will force the others to lower their prices.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by DogDude ( 805747 )
        Or just... don't stream music? We happily lived for decades without streaming music. You can still purchase and listen to your own music (I do).

        Or, stream your own music? There used to be lots of technologically-saavy on Slashdot who used to do this kind of stuff (I do).
        • Sure. But that is a different answer. You can also say "stop buying books" or "stop buying anything" because Amazon sells everything. My point is what is the difference if you were going to stream music (I dont), to pay Apple or Spotify? I would rather pay Amazon because they are cheaper.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by DogDude ( 805747 )
            You don't care that Amazon owns everything? All you care about is what's "cheapest"? That was my point of this thread... I don't understand why nobody cares that Amazon is trying to own everything.

        • Or, stream your own music? There used to be lots of technologically-saavy on Slashdot who used to do this kind of stuff (I do).

          Icecast [icecast.org] works quite well for this.

    • Re:Welcome to future dystopia, Amazon users! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by lgw ( 121541 ) on Friday August 17, 2018 @03:06PM (#57146272) Journal

      So, does *nobody* really care that one giant MegaCorp is trying to own everything?

      What are they trying to "own"? In retail, they're the second largest player, with less than 10% market share. Definitely not the biggest in movie streaming. The only thing I can think of where they're the biggest player is "cloud", and better them than Microsoft!

      Me and my family are the only people that I know that don't give any money to Amazon. What happened to everybody else?

      We enjoy convenience and low prices more then pointless self-flagellation?

      • ... and Slashdot, as a community that used to care about corporate overreach, privacy, and personal freedom is dead.

        That's a fucking shame.

    • I've often wondered that very thing. Way back when the One-Click patent was issued, slashdorks were enraged by it. Now... say something less than glowing about scAmazon or the Elongated Muskrat, and your /. karma takes a big hit.

      I've unwittingly given money to Bozo twice via eBay resellers. Otherwise, none.

    • So, does *nobody* really care that one giant MegaCorp is trying to own everything?

      Actually, I do care. But to a large degree, it seems to me that the areas Amazon keeps trying to move into are already dominated by giant MegaCorps - almost all of the truly local retailers were already driven out of business before Amazon even existed.

      I still do shop a fair bit on Amazon. Also, I currently am a Prime subscriber (I wanted to dump it, but my wife objected - gonna keep bringing it up though). But I do look for alternatives more nowadays; I stopped all my "subscribe and save" subscriptions; an

  • play Original Nuttah by Shy FX...

  • I purchase things a few times per week on Amazon. I have the Prime card which is basically a perpetual 5% off discount forever. On the flip side, I walk to an actual mom and pop market in my town. Anyway, despite my interest in the online marketplace when it comes in handy, I don't care about this since I already have Spotify and I'm happy that Spotify does one thing and does that one thing very well. With the family plan it comes out to like $3.00 per month, to have synced playlists across all devices,

  • I'd be happy if they could arrange things so that Prime Video would play without issues on my FUCKING GIGABIT CONNECTION, thank you very much.

    • Oh, and here I thought you were going to comment on the fact that the majority of actual desirable content on Prime Video is not available to Prime subscribers unless they're willing to pay more money.

  • I am a subscriber to Amazon music. It was great, probably the best streaming performance with sketchy wifi/cell coverage when I compared to Google/Apple/Spotify (ironically: In my testing about 15 months ago, Google Play was hands down the worst streaming performance.) But the latest updates to the app seem to have this fucked up Alexa bullshit built in, and no apparent way to disable it. It takes my Lenovo t450 and pegs the fucking CPU's all the time as it waits for me to give it a voice command. Fuck that

  • Amazon has gone after food, consumer products, logistics, Internet services, content production for media, and more. Their team is enormous and it is perfectly within the realm of Amazon to go after music. Have you ever seen their Amazon affiliation program? It's perhaps the best and simple program to use for people around the world. You've got millions of websites [redditrecommend.com] linking to Amazon for a commission. Their management is solid and their tech team is fierce. I strongly believe that Amazon will continue to be
  • The world is a large place, navigating copyright laws is hard and Spotify and Apple have been doing it for a long time. They have barely expanded their prime video service abroad, so I'm not too worried. In most places Spotify is unbeatable and gaining speed.

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