Photo Credit: Patrick Tomasso Payments company Square buys a majority stake of Jay-Z’s streaming service Tidal. Here’s what could happen. Jack Dorsey, the CEO of both Twitter and Square, announced the deal via a Twitter thread. “Square is acquiring a majority ownership stake in TIDAL through a new joint venture. The original artists [are] becoming […]
Photo Credit: Apple Apple has officially retired its Music Memos app, a useful music creation tool for musicians. Users who installed the app prior to March 2 can still use it and re-download it. But the Music Memos app is no longer available from the App Store. That means anyone who didn’t use it before […]
Photo Credit: Thomas Kolnowski Apple says it will never offer an Apple Music free tier supported by ads like Spotify does. Here’s why. At a British government hearing into music streaming economics, Apple’s music publishing head Elena Segal confirmed it. The British government is investigating whether artists are receiving enough compensation from streaming services for […]
Photo Credit: Spotify Spotify has confirmed it will test paid podcast subscriptions using Anchor later this year. Spotify acquired Anchor, a podcast creation platform, back in 2019. Now it will test a new feature on that platform to allow U.S. creators to publish paid podcast content aimed at dedicated fans. The signups for the beta […]
Photo Credit: Spotify Spotify is launching a new ‘Spotify HiFi’ tier as a premium add-on for subscribers, embracing lossless audio. Spotify’s paid subscriber count hint 155 million, according to the latest report. That’s a 24% increase in new subscribers year-over-year. Apple Music has pulled ahead once or twice, but Spotify remains the most popular paid […]
Photo Credit: 9to5Mac The first iOS 14.5 beta preview was released, bringing new features to the Apple Music app – like lyric share. Some of the new Music app changes include a new way to share lyrics and revamped menus. Apple already overhauled the Music app in iOS 14 to bring several new features. That […]
Triller CEO Mike Lu has barked back against claims that the short-form video-sharing app inflated its monthly active user (MAU) totals. The Triller founder and head recently took aim at the inflated-usership allegations in a widely circulated statement, after Billboard earlier this week reported that the TikTok competitor had misrepresented its MAUs in public releases. […]
Photo Credit: Spotify Spotify is hoping to dominate the commute when it returns with a voice-activated device to control music and podcasts while driving. The device is tentatively called ‘Car Thing,’ and it’s in an experimental stage of development. Spotify is using prototype devices to learn how people listen to streaming services while driving. For […]
Photo Credit: YouTube Music YouTube is testing a ‘TikTok button’ for creating short-form videos in-app, but it’s exclusive to India for now. India’s ban on TikTok has provided a playground for YouTube, Instagram, Triller, and other competitors. Now YouTube is experimenting with a create button to allow users to make short-form videos inside its app. […]
The Clubhouse icon. Photo Credit: William Krause Audio-driven social platform Clubhouse, which counts many well-known members of the rap community as users, has reportedly been banned in China due to uncensored content. Multiple Clubhouse users have detailed the reported ban on Twitter, but at the time of publishing, the quick-rising app’s founders hadn’t commented publicly […]