In the latest report of corporate scandal, Apple has apparently been in talks with major labels in order to get them to remove their music from free streaming services like Spotify, and even YouTube.
The Verge learned from unnamed sources that the Department of Justice is looking into the business practices of Apple after it reportedly approached various labels to remove their music from free streaming services in order to bolster the relaunch of their Beats streaming service later this year. And according to the New York Post, “Apple is being probed by the European Union’s Competition Commission to find out if the company is working with the labels to rid the industry of freemium services.”
Spotify currently has 60 million users. Of those, only 15 million pay for a monthly subscription. In the eyes of Apple, that’s a lot of lost revenue.
Sources for The Verge “also indicated that Apple offered to pay YouTube’s music licensing fee to Universal Music Group if the label stopped allowing its songs on YouTube.” This is not just some half-baked attempt to simply bump up their numbers. This is a full assault on the current model of music distribution and consumption.
Reddit user gindc probably put it best, “If Apple gets rid of low cost competition for music, people will go back to using other free services like torrenting. It doesn’t matter how big Apple is or how much money they throw at this problem, people will find a way to get low-cost music.”
Source: The Verge