Apple Music isn’t the best streaming music service — it’s just the least annoying::Competitors like Spotify and YouTube Music may be your first choice for music on Android, but you might want to reconsider
Yah no. Apple’s insistence on making everything a pain in the ass if you don’t own an Apple device makes it a nonstarter, and YouTube Music just works.
My kids have iPads because they’re both artists, but I’ll be damned if they’re getting any money from me for their craptacular - and yes, deeply annoying - music service. Hell, even setting up the iPads was annoying, because I don’t have any Apple devices of my own, and family controls require them, even though there’s no reason it couldn’t be done on a website.
Fuck Apple.
Hade you tried setting up an Xbox without being a Microsoft user?
Fuck Microsoft.
What kind of illogical comment is that? First, you bring in Microsoft to a discussion it is not a part of; second, just because Microsoft does it wrong, it doesn’t give Apple a license to do things the convoluted way too.
Apples and oranges. For all its faults (and there are lots), Microsoft doesn’t require you to own a Microsoft phone or tablet in order to set up an XBox’s parental controls. You can do it from a website with any device you want - including the Linux machines I use almost exclusively for computing.
Can you give me an example of where Apple requires you to have one of their devices to set up a different device? As far as I am aware this isn’t the case, and I believe that is actually illegal in the us.
You have to have a Mac or iOS device configured with a parent’s account to set up shared apps and parental controls on iPads for kids. That’s because there is no web interface to configure them.
That seems insane to me. Obviously using a parent account makes sense. I wonder if it’s just insanely difficult to find? I know I can change family settings on the website, but have no idea about parental controls. It seems like it’d be illegal to require a second device to set up the first device, no?
Believe me, if it existed, I would have found it. I spent hours searching, and basically all of Apple’s documentation said you needed to go to your own Mac or iOS device to configure it.
Yeah that’s insane to me.
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If you want to register a laptop with the apple business manager you have to use the configurator mobile app, so not even having another apple pc is sufficient, to set up a mobile device you have to use the configurator desktop app.
“Ive never used this service. I don’t intend to use this service. Having never tried, I will assert that this service is hard to use. The web interface is basically the same as popular competitor Spotify, but I have decided this company in particular is the worst. All of the companies that demand my loyalty suck, but this one sucks more because I don’t use it. Google and android are great because Apple sucks.”
They all suck. Companies are inherently greedy and selfish. But don’t confidently say something untrue because you don’t like the company that makes something. If your only input is based on biased hate, maybe just let that one go. Give input on things you have experience with and enjoy. Idk why you think Apple Music is so hard and deeply annoying. The website works fine and seems pretty basic as shit to me.
Spotify does have a terrible interface though.
lol I won’t disagree with you here. And I’m not saying Apple Music has a good interface. Just that it’s no worse than Spotify or Amazon.
I’ve never used YouTube music, so I can’t say, but if it’s anything like YouTube, I’m sure I’d hate it too.
I like YTM. The play button has never defaulted to random order, and it’s all pretty logical.
I’ve used Apple services. My kids have iPads. The parental controls and shared app library controls required for them was a pain in the ass to set up, because there is no web interface for it. You have to use the iOS or MacOS app store for certain steps.
I succeeded only because I managed to get a hold of an old, unused Mac from my work, which I could configure with my Apple account.
I can’t speak to parental controls, as I’ve not ever and hopefully will never set them up. That could be a completely valid point. I don’t know, and I wasn’t talking about that.
What I want to know is whether you’ve used Apple Music to come to the conclusion that it is craptacular and deeply annoying.
I’m not saying Apple doesn’t have some shitty services. I just think Apple Music isn’t one of them, and I’d like to know how you arrived to that conclusion.
Admittedly it’s been a few years since I messed around specifically with Apple Music, but my recollection is that its recommendations were mediocre, it made playing a full album unreasonably complicated, and its playlist tab was horrible (at least on iOS).
If it’s changed for the better, I’m sure there are plenty of genuine fans, but it lost me pretty permanently with the experience that was available around 2020 or so.
I use it because it came bundled with Apple one. I’ve found it to be really solid personally. I can’t speak to YouTube music as I haven’t used it, but Apple Music is just as good as Spotify and Amazon music in my personal experience.
My experience with Apple Music has been overwhelmingly positive. Student plan is dirt cheap, barely any more expensive than Spotify and has Hi-Fi included. And the app doesn’t connect to a disgusting amount of trackers like Spotify does. I’ll stay on AM for the foreseeable future
Same. It’s an impossible fight, with all this magical thinking about Apple biasing any discussion. So much blind hate and no way to debate it.
Apple pays much more to artists - period. That’s why I use it.
That’s the fediverse for you! I’ve had better software discussion outside of it tbh.
Anyhow, library management on Apple Music is also way less annoying than on Spotify, especially when handling tracks you import from your local library.
I’d not just blame the fediverse - I’d call out all social media. Popularity reigns there, not accuracy or facts.
Tidal pays artists even more, and has some features Apple Music doesn’t have for the same price (or cheaper if you’re Military/First Responder)
But of course Apple Music is better for some people for certain features it has. And Tidal’s hi-fi plan is more expensive. I get the knee jerk dislike of Apple, but nuance almost always gets lost online.
That being said, Spotify sucks lol
Everyone picks a streaming service for their needs. YT music has a large library bundled with ad free YT, Apple Music is a natural choice if you’re in the Apple ecosystem and Spotify exists too.
I recently switched to Tidal from Spotify and haven’t looked back. The UI is familiar enough, having lossless is really nice, and not having my phone lag whenever I open my library is great.
Then there’s the other factor of how much each streaming service pays it’s artists. To make 1000$ in revenue, this is how many streams an artist needs:
YT Music : 500,000 ($0.002 per stream)
Spotify : 314,465 ($0.00318 per stream)
Apple : 125,000 ($0.008 per stream)
Tidal : 77,882 ($0.01284 per stream)
Granted, musicians almost never make their money from streaming services. However, if an artist were to have that 314k streams on Tidal instead of Spotify, they’d make 4 times as much money.
The number you pulled for YouTube Music is based on free users watching YouTube videos. YouTube Music streams from paying subscribers are 4x that at $0.08 per stream.
The Spotify number is also averaged across free and premium users - I’m not sure the number for premium users only but it is likely closer to what Apple and Tidal pay since those are premium-only.
The other problem though is that none of the services have implemented user-centric payments. So your money on any of the services is going to Taylor Swift, Drake and Bad Bunny no matter who you listen to because everyone gets paid based on their percentage of the total streams.
The artist rates continually decline for every platform. In the not-to-distant future Tidal will be as shit as Spotify is now.
I also switched to Tidal and agree it’s a huge improvement over Spotify. The improved quality alone is worth it but I also like not having the podcast stuff pushed all the time (Tidal has none) and also the Tidal algorithm seems “worse” in that it’s weirder but it also makes it better. The Spotify algo is great if you want to hear exactly the same sounding thing all the time, but if you like to branch out and be surprised it’s terrible. Listening to Tidal radio kinda feels like listening to college radio. Weirder, not always great, but certainly more varied.
Also your top listened to artists on Tidal get a direct cut of your monthly fee if you have the top plan.
Why is this ad not removed?
I buy DRM free music to own it
Neat, I don’t like any music enough to want a permanent copy of it.
I don’t understand how it would be convenient at all to have your whole collection just online, restricted to a single proprietary site/app. I do use musical streaming, but it’s for discovering new tracks. All the actual listening happens locally on my computer and player. I cannot afford to actually buy the music, but if I did, I probably would pay for the albums I listen to the most, not the whole library.
I buy around $10-$20 a month. Not much but it adds up my collection fairly quickly
I listen to music and podcasts all day, like minimum of 4-5 hours a day. No way I could afford to do that if I was paying per item and not for the service.
My podcasts are free RSS feeds. As for music - you not only pay, but are restricted in what you can do with your music, not to mention stuff from your collection can just disappear. So as I said, if I was dead set on paying, I would rather pay for one album at a time and pirate the rest, maybe pay for what I have downloaded later.
But what can you do with your music that I cant? I can listen to ten albums tomorrow but I can’t buy ten.
The point is Spotify may remove your favourite album and then you can access it. It’s a stupid point though because if their hard drive breaks or they otherwise lose access to the file they have to return to whoever they bought the music from and hope they can still download it.
It’s like how people point out that when you buy games from steam you don’t actually own the game. Well, yeah no shit, if steam shuts down I can’t download the game anymore, steam is about convenience not ownership.
There is nothing wrong with talking about the benefits of possessing digital files that cannot be taken away from you, it’s just completely irrelevant to a conversation about streaming services. They are two separate products with their own advantages and disadvantages.
It’s a stupid point though because if their hard drive breaks or they otherwise lose access to the file they have to return to whoever they bought the music from and hope they can still download it.
Proper backups are your responsibility anyway.
Also I do use streaming - for discovery of new tracks. I was talking about a) paying for this service only to be restricted more than if you didn’t; and b) people who have their WHOLE collection depend on a streaming service.
But what can you do with your music that I cant?
I can use whatever player I want, I can use whatever device I want (like an mp3 player, now I drag a smartphone around until I find a replacement one and it’s super inconvenient, can’t imagine doing it all the time), I can not depend on an Internet connection for any amount of time, I can not worry about the service retroactively removing features/adding ads/etc, I can still have my music if I end up unable to pay for streaming (not like I am paying right now)…
I can listen to ten albums tomorrow but I can’t buy ten.
For a price of a subscription, I could buy an album a month, for example, and download the rest. And maybe pay for some of the downloaded ones later. Same money, more worth out of it.
Good for you. I buy/torrent music sometimes too. Streaming is popular because it’s convenient and the convenience is more valuable to many people than the benefits of “owning DRM free music”.
Your comment is entirely pointless and pretty fucking pretentious.
I’ll admit it sounded a little showy to me too, but a lot of the nicher things with their own benefits sound pretentious when just being said in plain wording. I like fountain pens because they’re pleasant to write with but are more expensive and less convenient. Always sounds pretentious just saying I like them and why if I don’t throw in the caveats like I did here.
There’s the chance he is trying to, of course. I try to assume the best these days for my own sake though
I don’t think his post is meant to be hostile. It’s not pointless, but it would add more of a discussion to elaborate on the topic.
On the topic of choosing to own (download (without DRM)) your music, one of the benefits is that it allows you to have all your music available in whichever music player (app/program/streaming service) you like. You can access the music while offline, without being required to pay some subscription fee. If downloading, it’s generally also very easy to switch between different players if you so desire to in the future. You can control the metadata (swap album art, edit track info, etc.) You can sometimes even use owned media in tandem with streaming services to put all your media in one place within a streaming service’s app/program. Usually, doing this requires less purchases/downloads to get all your media in one place, but still requires a sub.
On the topic of using Apple Music as a player… I’m not sure if it’s still this way, but you needed to use iTunes (on a PC!) to import local MP3 files to Apple Music, which, iTunes, love it or hate it, requires you to not only own a PC, but it has its limitations such as FLAC files being unsupported… That being said, Apple Music does provide a great convenience for many people and it’s often cheaper than legally purchasing all of your songs. You can even add your downloaded songs from a PC (but not locally from an android device for some reason??)
I prefer to own my music. For anyone who likes the idea but doesn’t know where to start, I can give some recommendations for convenience.
For music acquisition, use a legal website like Bandcamp to purchase your music, most of the money goes to Artists, compared to some other platforms. Alternatively you could pirate… (illegal! I don’t care if you pirate, but I’m not gonna write a tutorial.)
If you want to sync owned/downloaded files, use: SyncThing - free software that lets you automatically mirror file directories between your devices, syncing your libraries with no fees required. Available on Android/Win/Linux/Mac
For players, I recommend:
Android:
PowerAmp - trial & one time purchase, has theming support, massive customization options
Oto Music - lite version or one time purchase, supports downloading & embedding lyrics
PC:
MusicBee - free, has theming support, allows loading network files (local or remote)
Plenty of players available for different functional needs and/or aesthetics, but these are what I currently use.
Well put. I typically use 7digital and sometimes HDTracks. Bandcamp confused me but I need to give it another go.
Purchasing music also gives a much higher percentage of money to the artist compared to streaming platforms.
Retro Music is my favorite player for Android and Elisa for Linux (maybe Windows too).
On a thread discussing the various streaming options all of this information is entirely irrelevant. Managing a digital library is not appealing to 99% of people.
You may as well tell people to cook their own food in a thread discussing the various food delivery options.
Managing a digital library is not appealing to 99% of people.
I wouldn’t say that’s true. Probably 99% of people who use a streaming service still manage their library on that platform in some capacity (playlists, etc.)
Now if you’re talking about “owning and managing your entire library” then yeah, I’d say most people probably don’t care or are too lazy to bother with it. (and I don’t mean that as an insult)
Still, for people who like or listen to music that isn’t included in their primary music streaming service’s library, owning portions of their library will often give them the capacity to mix in the rest of their music to their platform of choice. I wouldn’t say that’s irrelevant when talking about streaming services. Sadly, Apple makes this process more difficult than it needs to be.
I looked into that as I listened to my playlist most of the time. And then I realize nano.RIPE after 10 years still unable to be purchased outside iTunes Japan or Japanese speaking websites.
You realized what? I don’t understand
Uhmm it’s pretty clear to me.
He says that after 10 years “nano.RIPE” music still cannot be purchased outside Japan.
I guess his point is that sadly that is not always a solution (outside piracy) as sometimes you cannot actually buy certain music, but I am guessing is actually available to be played on the streaming subscription service.
Oh, “nano.RIPE” is a name. I thought it was a spelling mistake.
Same
I didn’t know what nano.RIPE was and still don’t really (maybe a musician or store), but I understand enough to know what he’s saying now. I know not all music is available but quite a bit is (this was surprising to me). Maybe the outlying songs are left to pirating. That’s a personal predicament.
This is the way
The best streaming service is my selfhosted Jellyfin. I serve me no ads and I’m 100% sure I don’t do any shady business with my data.
Does it have a Linux app? no
Does it have a duo plan? no
Does it have a good rating on Google Play? no
Does it have a decent Windows app? last time i checked, itunes looked like an app from 2005
Try Cider, it’s a FOSS and it works on any platform including Linux. There are others, but they are mostly just wrappers around the web app, and Cider is not.
Windows app is pretty good these days, as is the Android app.
I use AM mainly on my PC and my Samsung Fold
Didn’t apple overwrite people’s music with different versions of their songs or something?
Regardless, fuck Apple. I’m happy with Jellyfin.
Yepp - all my bootleg and vinyl rips was suddenly replaced with other versions. Even some of my ripped albums ended up as songs from different albums.
Only reason I still have the Apple Music app is because when I connect my phone in my car with usb, the stereo will give errors if it’s not there. Also starts auto playing when connected even if tidal is playing while connection is made.
My experience with apple music has mostly been around being incredibly annoyed at the account management and signin process for people who don’t have any apple hardware. So I would probably disagree there.
Not to be pedantic but why on earth would you use Apple music if you aren’t in their ecosystem instead of one of the many other options for music?
I try out different things, they have apps on other platforms so the expectation is for those apps to not be a hateful cluster fuck on those platforms
If Microsoft made a thing for Mac I wouldn’t want or expect it to suck either.
Nah, InnerTune is the best. Has the library of YouTube music, no ads, free, can download songs as actual files (at least in a previous version, which is still available on F-Droid archive)
Everyone I know uses Spotify
Apple Music is the best music platform by far due to clean and simple focus and UI, performance, and also lyrics. Unfortunately, it still sucks in all the ways that streaming inherently sucks though, combined with its intention to suck you into the Apple world.
Apple Music is prob the only Apple service that you can sub to while mostly avoiding the rest of the Apple world
True
Google Play Music died and was resurrected as Plexamp.
I much prefer Spotify, interface is definitely more intuitive than Apple Music.
I switched to Android a few months ago and expected to want to switch away from Apple Music, but their Android app is excellent. Plus they have lossless quality. Oh, and you can upload your own music to their cloud for streaming anywhere.
Same, I prefer the Android app to Spotify’s. I was glad I didn’t have to switch streaming services when I moved to Android
Spotify and YT Music both support uploading your own files.
I don’t think Spotify supports uploading your own music files. It can indeed show local files, but i’m not aware of a upload mechanism such as YouTube Music has.
