Skip to main content

Google reportedly launching YouTube music subscription service


YouTube, whether intentionally or not, is the new MTV. Not long after the network once known as Music Television stopped playing music, Google’s video streaming service took its place as the preferred music video source for teenagers. According to a new report, Google is now ready to take the next step and sell subscriptions for its service.
According to Fortune, Google is preparing to launch a YouTube subscription service later this year. Rather than creating a paywall around existing YouTube content, though, the paid tier would simply let viewers enjoy copyrighted musical content ad-free.

Spotify for music videos?

The YouTube subscription service would be separate from – but overlap with – an (also-rumored) Google Play subscription streaming service. The Android version is expected to more closely resemble Spotify’s (and Rdio’s, Deezer’s, Rhapsody’s, etc.) on-demand audio model, while an ad-free YouTube would be more akin to a Spotify for music videos.
In its early years, the music industry viewed YouTube as an illegal threat to its business model that skirted around DMCA gray areas to make copyrighted content available for free. Today, though, record labels have resigned themselves to YouTube's inevitability, instead profiting from advertisements posted on copyrighted YouTube content.
An ad-free subscription tier could potentially work out for everyone. Labels get another way to make money off of their content, Google builds on its service’s status as a source of music, and subscribers get to enjoy their music videos without annoying interruptions.

Nothing official

Though Fortune predicts the service will launch later this year, it also adds that sources in the music industry are still wrestling with the pros and cons of advertising-based and subscription-based models.
Google hasn't announced anything official, but did grant Fortune the following non-denial:
    While we don’t comment on rumor or speculation, there are some content creators that think they would benefit from a subscription revenue stream in addition to ads, so we’re looking at that.
No matter what direction record labels (and customers) go, the digital age has rocked the music industry at its very core. Napster, iTunes and the iPod, smartphones, BitTorrent, and now YouTube have all played parts in radically altering how customers get music. It makes the MTV era of some of our childhoods feel like an eternity ago.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

NES robot mash-up competes in robo boxing tournament

In a move that brings back memories of the  R.O.B.  (Robotic Operating Buddy) that was available for the original Nintendo Entertainment System, Japanese hobbyist Izumi Ninagawa has simplified the controls of a modern fighting robot to work with a Famicom (8-bit NES) game pad – which has one of the most basic button configurations around. The NES-styled robot even competed in a robot boxing tournament earlier this year Ninagawa's XEMNES robot is based on a lightweight kit sold by De Agostini called  ROBO-XERO , which weighs less than one kilogram (2.2 pounds) and is powered by 24 Futaba servo motors. By attaching a Bluetooth dongle to the robot with a special micro controller, Ninagawa was able to take advantage of various wireless controllers, including the Nintendo Wii remote. The remote was then hidden inside the shell of a Famicom, and attached to the Famicom controller using an adapter to complete the set-up. Despite the NES pad's limited number of buttons, variou...
Post a Comment
Read more

Nanotubes boost potential of salinity power as a renewable energy source

In November 2009, Norwegian state owned electricity company Statkraft opened the world’s first  osmotic power plant prototype , which generates electricity from the difference in the salt concentration between river water and sea water. While osmotic power is a clean, renewable energy source, its commercial use has been limited due to the low generating capacities offered by current technology – the Statkraft plant, for example, has a capacity of about 4 kW. Now researchers have discovered a new way to harness osmotic power that they claim would enable a 1 m 2  (10.7 sq. ft.) membrane to have the same 4 kW capacity as the entire Statkraft plant. The global osmotic, or salinity gradient, power capacity, which is concentrated at the mouths of rivers, is estimated by Statkraft to be in the region of 1,600 to 1,700 TWh annually. Electricity can be generated through the osmotic phenomena that results when a reservoir of fresh water is brought into contact with a reservoir ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Sun will cause pause in Mars exploration in April

NASA is taking an enforced holiday of sorts in April as it suspends Mars exploration missions for 17 to 21 days. This isn't due to budget cuts, but rather because Mars will be in conjunction with the Sun during April, which will make direct communications with the probes difficult, if not impossible. During this time, mission control will place NASA’s unmanned Mars spacecraft on low activity and will not send any new command signals.In April, Mars and the Earth will be on opposite sides of the Sun. Because of the different orbital speeds of the two planets, this occurs every 26 months and because Mars is so close to the powerful radiation of the Sun, this can disrupt communications with spacecraft orbiting the Red Planet or on its surface. This is especially true this year because Mars will pass at an angle of only 0.4 degrees away from the Sun’s disk on April 17. What is worse, this is during at the peak of the Sun’s active phase of its 22-year cycle. Though the Sun isn...
Post a Comment
Read more