Apple has changed its mind on the decision not to pay streaming music royalties to artists and labels during the three-month trial period of Apple Music.
Yesterday, Taylor Swift penned an open letter to the company arguing that, “We don’t ask you for free iPhones. Please don’t ask us to provide you with our music for no compensation.”
Swift publicly pulled her best-selling “1989” album from the service in protest.
“This is not about me,” she wrote. “… This is about the new artist or band that has just released their first single and will not be paid for its success. This is about the young songwriter who just got his or her first cut and thought that the royalties from that would get them out of debt. This is about the producer who works tirelessly to innovate and create, just like the innovators and creators at Apple are pioneering in their field[,] but will not get paid for a quarter of a year’s worth of plays on his or her songs.”
It didn’t take long for Apple to retract its original stance, which had been a major point of contention with record labels during negotiations. In a series of tweets, Eddy Cue confirmed that Apple will swallow the costs of the free Apple Music trial, noting that “Apple will always make sure that artist (sic) are paid.”
Apple will always make sure that artist are paid #iTunes #AppleMusic
— Eddy Cue (@cue) June 22, 2015
#AppleMusic will pay artist for streaming, even during customer’s free trial period
— Eddy Cue (@cue) June 22, 2015
We hear you @taylorswift13 and indie artists. Love, Apple — Eddy Cue (@cue) June 22, 2015
According to re/code, Apple will pay music rights holders on a per-stream basis for the three month period, as opposed to the percentage of Apple Music revenue (since there won’t yet be any), which is how the company will later pay artists.
“I did reach out to Taylor today, and talked to her, and let her know that we heard her concerns, and wanted her to know that we were making changes,” Eddy Cue said. “She was thrilled to hear from us and that we were making the change, and we were grateful for that.”
From Apple’s perspective it makes sense to change the policy. Although this means the company will have to foot the bill for three months’ worth of artist royalties — thereby making Apple Music more expensive to launch — Apple’s certainly in a position to be able to afford it.
What it can afford less is the potential negative publicity of major artists pulling their music from the service and accusing Apple of behaving like an evil empire. Particularly under Tim Cook’s leadership, Apple has portrayed itself as a “force for good” in the world, which behaves ethically while still raking in huge amounts of money.
More crucially, Apple’s plans with Apple Music rely on it cultivating relationships with artists for potentially lucrative exclusive deals.
Sure, many artists could still be cajoled to put out exclusive music thanks to Apple’s brand name, but if the company is serious about being an artist-friendly company (something it has had a reputation for going back to the 1980s), a headline-grabbing high-profile falling-out with an artist of Taylor Swift’s calibre makes very little sense.
Props to Apple for making what I think is the right decision here!
Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
10 responses to “Apple will now pay artists during Apple Music’s free trial”
If you want people to pay for a service that provides music I can easily pirate and/or there are myriad options, you’re going to have to get them hooked. That’s what the free-trial period is all about, “Taylor.” Your product isn’t tangible- just bits of data on a hard/flash drive. You make little money off the actual sales anyway, that’s why artists now publish free/unannounced albums to promote their touring. The audacity of this girl to challenge Apple’s business acumen is gross. “Apple doesn’t tell you how to write your putrid songs, don’t tell them how to conduct the business that has grown them to be the most valuable company in the world.” Boom, roasted. With regard to “indie artists,” you’re telling me 3 months of pennies-on-the-dollar for streaming of “newer or emerging artists” is going to break the bank for something they aren’t even getting now? And if you’re a “newer or emerging artist” no one knows who you are and plays your songs anyway. And if the service isn’t able to take off (a-la Ping) they will be taking a short-term profit and then they’re back where they started? Its about allowing the service to adequately gain a user-base. I, for one, will not pay $10/month, $120/year for something I don’t need. I need to get in the habit of using it and get hooked to a point where it becomes a part of my routine and second nature to use it- much like a drug-dealer might give out free crack to new users!. I never paid for Spotify or any other streaming service- and I won’t start now unless I’m shown I can’t live without it…
Apple dropped the ball on this and I’m glad they stepped up. Period. End of story.
Apple isn’t making anything on this, how are they dropping the ball? It’s give and take- if the service fails, you can blame these whiney “indie artists” who want Apple to pay them their pennies even though Apple isn’t making anything those three months. The access and exposure is going to be worth WAY more than 3 months of streaming royalties. “Period. End of story.”
Agreed. These ‘artists’ are going to regret crying and forcing Apple to pay them with money not generated by the service when it could have been used to cultivate and promote/market it. Taylor Swift is a winey little c u next tuesday who would benefit from a backhanding.
Do you really think Apple will take funds from the PR budget to pay the artists?
You sound like one of those whiney indie artists because Apple back tracked.. Even apple makes mistakes. So I’m glad you felt you needed to reply but the fact of the matter is Apple did something they should have done in the first place. Now it’s the end of the story…period.
Nah, they built in higher payouts after the 90 day trial period to compensate them. Now this is going to flop like every other streaming service not called Spotify and they’ll have nothing left to complain about. Now it’s now the end of story, period.
Shut the f*ck up “James.” You were definitely the kid in school no one could say anything around because you’d tell the teacher. hahaha.
Awwwwwe I hit a nerve. I don’t know why you guys are getting all @$$ hurt, it’s not your money. Don’t worry Apple will still be in business after they pay out…you’ll learn.
Now it’s the end of the story. You may proceed living again.
I’m glad Apple took the high ground. They should have done that from the start. Look back 30 or so years when some artists would pay to make a record and drive to local radio stations trying to convince the station to take a listen and then hope if they did they might actually play it! Things have changes hu?