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posted by Fnord666 on Friday July 28 2017, @05:46PM   Printer-friendly
from the sing-a-song-of-six-pence dept.

Two music-related Google subscription services, YouTube Red and Google Play Music, are going to be merged:

Right now, YouTube's music ecosystem is unnecessarily complicated. There's YouTube Red, which removes ads from videos and lets you save them offline, while also giving you access to Google Play Music for free. Then there's YouTube Music, which anyone can use, but it gets better if you're signed up for YouTube Red. And YouTube TV is also a thing — an entirely separate thing — but it's not available everywhere yet.

The merger has been rumored within the industry for months, and recently picked up steam after Google combined the teams working on the two streaming services earlier this year.

In a statement to The Verge, Google said it will notify users of any changes before they happen. "Music is very important to Google and we're evaluating how to bring together our music offerings to deliver the best possible product for our users, music partners and artists. Nothing will change for users today and we'll provide plenty of notice before any changes are made."

It doesn't look like YouTube's users want to pay for what they can get for free a click or two away:

The comments came after [Tom] Silverman raved about his experience using YouTube Red, but said that when he mentions to people how much he likes the service they "look at me like I have two heads. They didn't even know you can subscribe. How come people don't know about it?"

"You probably don't know there is Google Play Music either, and people really love that, too," [Lyor] Cohen replied.

That exchange gets to the heart of the existential issue facing Google's two streaming services: identity. Neither service has gained much traction in the music-streaming marketplace despite their best efforts and Google's massive user base. While Google hasn't released subscriber numbers,YouTube Red, which launched in Oct. 2015, was estimated to have 1.5 million as of late last year; Google Music Play has more than double that number. One industry source put their combined paid user numbers at 7 million -- far behind Spotify's recently-announced 50 million and Apple's 27 million subscribers.

The lack of identity for Google's music services in the marketplace may also be due, in part, to the runaway success and ease of use of both YouTube's ad-supported tier, with more than 1.5 billion monthly users, as well as Google search's ability to surface free music with minimal effort

Related: Metallica Manager: YouTube is "the Devil"
Study Claims That YouTube Avoids $1 Billion in Music Royalties Using DMCA Safe Harbor
All Your Bass are Belong to Us: Soundcloud Fans Raid Site for Music Amid Fears of Total Collapse


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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Geezer on Friday July 28 2017, @07:46PM

    by Geezer (511) on Friday July 28 2017, @07:46PM (#545948)

    You make a lot of excellent points, but I respectfully submit that as long as **advertising** exists, the web will exist, even if it's just a TCP/IP version of QVC or HSN.

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