Whether you wanted it or not, U2’s new album is in the purchased section of your iTunes account.
Apple inked a $100 million deal with its favorite band to put Songs of Innocence in the hands of over 500 million iTunes users, and now the album has seen over two million downloads as a result—or about 0.4% of the iTunes Store’s user base.
At the end of Apple’s otherwise-newsworthy keynote earlier this week, Tim Cook brought U2 on stage to play a couple songs and have an awkward exchange about giving away their new music. By pressing an invisible button and touching their raised fingers together like that scene out of E.T., Cook and Bono put the album Pitchfork calls “a blank message” on all our iPhones.
Since then, Apple has been promoting Songs of Innocence heavily through iTunes Radio and big banners on the store’s homepage. Whether it’s latest offering is a dud or not, U2 is certainly getting some mileage out of this deal. 17 of its old albums are on the top 100 chart in iTunes right now.
Many iTunes accounts are set to automatically download new purchases, so it’s unclear how many middle-aged white males actually sought out Songs of Innocence of their own free will.
Source: Recode
Alex Heath is a journalist who works for Tech Insider. He’s the former co-host of The CultCast. He has been quoted by the likes of the BBC, KRON 4 News, and books like “ICONIC: A Photographic Tribute to Apple Innovation.” He lives in Lexington, Kentucky. If you want to pitch a story, share a tip, or just get in touch, additional contact information is available on his personal site. Follow him on Twitter.
19 responses to “Less than 1% of iTunes users download U2’s freebie album”
How do I get it off there? Just seeing it as I scroll through my mdic makes me want to smash my phone.
Settings > iTunes and App Store > disable “show all”. Simple as that.
What an overreacting clown. Learn to use your iPhone and get a life!
I don’t understand the hate. Just delete it if you don’t want it. Not like they came and stabbed you in your home. Some people overract.
Besides, I would have paid for this album anyway when it came out, so I’m grateful for the gift.
Speak for yourself and leave the rest of the planet alone, thanks. U2 rhymes with U-spew.
Actually I had to go look up how to download it because it’s not in our computers but in the Cloud. Once I found it, I got it right away. Perhaps peeps don’t know where it is…
so it’s unclear how many middle-aged white males actually sought out Songs of Innocence of their own free will… So i guess you listen to One Direction
<1% is still about 200,000,000. Thats nothing to put your nose up at.
Maybe you should read the article next time so you don’t look like an idiot. It says about 2 million people have downloaded it, not 200 million. That’s actually less than HALF of a percent. Your number requires that there’s 20 BILLION iTunes users; there isn’t anywhere near that many people on the planet!
Somehow I’m not surprised and this is my reason why. The current generation like modern day artists such as 1D (god help me), Katy Perry and other artists of the sort that revolve around 2011-12 era. U2 have only done tours spanning up-till 2011 and with the recent keynote, they just announced basically saying “oh yeah, we have a new album called Songs of Innocence, meanwhile everyone else has been putting their name out there and gathering followers with EP’s and singles and U2 have become one of those groups that used to be good, but know are yesterdays news to the current generation of iTunes and iDevices (in general) users.
I myself I’m one of those <1% but they need to be more active before they or Apple do this again. I mean perhaps this is the start of a come back, or maybe its a one off thing. I don't know.
“Less than 1% of iTunes users download U2’s freebie album”
I downloaded it, and love it. But hey, if you don’t want it, then don’t bother. And certainly don’t complain about U2 and Apple making it available… for free.
Agree with you
They could also make Jason Donovan’s music free and available, he’s past it and irrelevant too, so why not?
I’m somewhat baffled at the idiocy of this article, and u actually don’t even mean that to be harsh. But you should not have a show if this is representative of your knowledge of technology.
1) you don’t “download” a free album that is made available to you to stream. It’s just there. There’s no need to download it, you can just play it. So people not downloading it actually means nothing in this instance.
2) the album, as stated very clearly on the iTunes site, was available immediately gis iTunes ON A COMPUTER, but not immediate on iOS devices. It would show as purchased originally on iOS devices, but not in your library for another day after. Since most people access their music on their devices, t makes sense that they’d not download it right away.
3) how exactly does COM know how many albums were downloaded?
Insanity momentarily overcame me and I downloaded it, maybe as a test. Thankfully I came to my senses and immediately deleted it without listening to even one song. As for U2, I saw a show they filmed “live at red rock” long, long time back, which was entertaining. Other than that, a big blank empty nothing, just like the new sleeve.
Wait, you deleted a free album without listening to a song on it? Um… why would you do that? Hipster much?
One would do it because one prefers to use one’s time usefully, hope you get the hint. Regarding your second, two-word question, it unfortunately does not make any sense whatsoever. Thanks.
How was it taking up your time, and how did you know if it wasn’t useful if you never even listened to one song? Just curious.
Guessing you never watched any Joss Whedon shows, or you’d get the syntax and inflection of the last question, which would translate to “Are you a ridiculous hipster?” No biggie. It was rhetorical, anyway.
Apple and U2 giving away the album for free…a nice gesture, good for them, thank you.
Apple forcing the album onto my phone without my approval…a little creepy, not appropriate, no thank you.
I think people here are a little confused. No one is mad at the opportunity to get a free album. We’re mad because it was forced into our libraries. If my kids can’t add something to my iTunes library without my password, neither should Apple. IMHO.
It’s like the difference between someone saying “Hey, you should try a bite of this” or just shoving a bite in your mouth.