“Many record labels and artists who sell music on the iTunes Store direct their fans and customers to Apple’s store through links on their websites,” Kirk McElhearn writes for Kirkville. “However, since Apple Music went live, these links no longer work correctly.”
“Instead of sending someone to the iTunes Store, where they can buy an album, these links redirect to the Apple Music section of iTunes, or of the Music app on iOS (if the user has Apple Music turned on),” McElhearn writes. “As such, artists and labels may find that, instead of nudging people to buy their music on the iTunes Store, they are instead only offering an option for people to stream it.”
“There are two ways you can fix this. The first is to use Apple’s Link Maker tool. Search for a song or album, and you’ll see a series of links,” McElhearn writes. “The second method is to manually change your links, [replacing “&app=music” with “&app=itunes.”]
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Another thing about Apple’s iTunes Link Maker tool: It says “Create links for Apple Music, the iTunes Store, the App Store, the iBooks Store, and the Mac App Store,” but it no longer makes any links for the Mac App Store and, in the “Media Type” pulldown, there is no option for “Mac apps” at all. What’s the deal, Apple?
What I have found, is that you simply don’t touch the link. You have to long hold it and choose to go to the track in iTunes to make the purchase, from the alternate menu. I had to help my wife with this. It’s completely misguided. But I am at the least happy that there’s “a way”.
This is clearly by design, as it implores users to sign up for Apple Music. You may get the music you want to listen to, but if you want to buy the track, you should be able to do so without all the headache.
The link should be, “$1.29 to buy, but did you realize you can have this song for free when you sign up for Apple Music?” And the user response should be, yes yes, just take my money and give me my music.
They just can’t do services right. You need to fix this shit Tim.