Marketing
What Was Apple Thinking When They Decided to Offer a $4.99 Apple Music Subscription?
Maybe rethink that one?
Part of Apple’s October 2021 announcements was that they are now offering a $4.99/ month Apple Music subscription. That’s cheap, but there’s a big catch: it’s voice only.
It took me a beat to realize that they meant Siri only. That is, with this subscription you can’t browse Apple Music or search by typing in songs or artists; you’d have to ask Siri to play what you want. Plainly this is intended to help sell HomePod Minis, though Apple didn’t say that you couldn’t use it with your phone or iPad.
$4.99 is a lot less than the ten or fifteen bucks most people pay Apple or Spotify. There’s another catch too: the $4.99 subscription doesn’t get you spatial audio, lossless, playlists, and more.
My instantaneous reaction was “Good luck, you’ll need it!” I have read too many stories of people who were frustrated when trying to ask for music. Most of them were trying more complicated searches like “Sonata I. D Major for Two Pianos, K.448” which I suppose is a bit harder than “I Got You Babe”, but still: Voice only Siri sounds like a bad joke.
I’ve experienced Sir’s poor understanding while driving. Just yesterday I had an urge to hear…
