“DJ Zane Lowe has admitted he’s unsure if Apple Music needs the digital radio station Beats 1 as the enterprise is so new, although he hopes ‘there’s a place for it,'” Rhiannon Williams reports for The Telegraph.
“Speaking at the Radio Festival 2015 in London, Lowe was in conversation with his former boss, Ben Cooper, controller of Radio 1 and Radio 1Xtra,” Williams reports. “When asked by Cooper if Apple Music, the Californian tech company’s streaming service, needed its digital radio branch Beats 1, Lowe replied: ‘I’m not sure it does. We’re working this out, time will tell… We’ve been going three months, I don’t have the answers. I hope that there’s a place for it… This is in progress, and over time we’ll find out exactly why [it’s needed].'”
Williams reports, “New Zealander Lowe was announced as one of Apple Music’s digital radio service Beats 1’s three in-residence DJs, alongside Julie Adenuga in London and Ebro Darden in New York in June. Lowe left Radio 1 after more than a decade to relocate to Los Angeles with his family.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Beats 1 exists to provide a unique feature to Apple’s overall music efforts and to impart a just-out-of-the-mainstream edge to Apple and Apple Music. It’s marketing and branding positioning. It’s music discovery. It’s a living, breathing statement about Apple’s commitment to and love of music. It’s a vibe. It’s young and edgy without being too dangerous. It’s a genius reinvention/modernization of “radio.” It’s pure Apple.
Beats 1 is not a necessity, but it’s inexpensive with the added benefit of actually being good. Beats 1 is the result of a very successful experiment and is obviously well worth continuing for all of the positives it exudes.
iTools, Mobile Me, Ping, Beats…
Don’t take this the wrong way, but if that’s all you have to offer (and you couldn’t be more wrong), then you’re a fscking moron.
(Brought to you by Carl’s Jr.)
Welcome to Tim Cooks Apple, where everything is superficial, colorful, and gay… but works like sh*t.
Has anyone even noticed that nothing ‘just works’ any longer.
Would Jobs create a Macbook Uniport, an Apple Watch, a Mac Pro that looks like and belongs in a trashcan because it can’t EVER be upgraded, but still costs as much as an automobile when fully loaded?
Would Jobs have purchased and sold services like Apple Music, where the software is so abyssmally bad that even die hard Apple Fanboys admit to it breaking their iTunes libraries?
Would Jobs jump on a soap box to spout his personal views, using Apple as the platform?
Would Jobs have depleted Apple’s war-chest because he caved to greedy shareholders?
Everyone who ever supported or now supports Tim Cook is directly to blame for allowing this incompetent person to RUIN Apple!
… And then DOUBLE it’s value in 3 years…
Wrong.
Steve Jobs built the app store that prints Apple money by simply distributing 3rd party software.
Cook has been wandering without a vision ever since Jobs left us. Launch execution, software quality, shitty iCloud, and lack of Mac platform innovation are all proof that Cook can’t move the ball forward. Other than iOS hardware, everything Cook has touched has been a late, poorly executed disappointment. All fashion, no substance.
“Has anyone even noticed that nothing ‘just works’ any longer?”
I added the question mark because I assume you were asking a question.
Every single time I click or tap “Beats 1” it just works. Audio plays as long as I have a connection to the Internet. So, the answer to your misformed and misinformed question is “No.”
You also sound like a raging homophobe. perhaps you should look inside yourself to see if any hidden/unknown/secret desires are causing you to lash out so miserably?
I do agree that Cook should express his personal views as “Tim Cook” and leave Apple Inc. completely out of it. It’s bad business and it will backfire on him and Apple eventually.
ROTFL! The old “you oppose X, so you must be X.” Let’s take this closer to home. You oppose National Socialism, I presume? You must be a SS member! You oppose stupidity, I presume? You must be stupid! Do you think stealing is bad? You must be a thief! And on and on it goes.
Maybe next time you should actually refute his argument, however doing that means you must understand and unpack it.
Have you actually spent some “TIME” using Apple Music? Say over 2 hours? Well iHave & then some +++++ … @ this point with you TC, I call out user error or you are just a computer idiot savant.
Apple Music when FULLY understood is THE S$@!.
Get educated TC… Apple Music is in its infancy.
It is in its infancy? Let me know when it’s grown up.
Moron
Umm, you must be at least a part-time troll or just a very lazy full-time troll. I say this because you don’t seem to fully understand Apple or Steve Jobs.
Jobs would ABSOLUTELY approve a uniport Macbook. He was the guy who originally said that he’d prefer to have no physical buttons or switches on anything if it were possible. As for the Mac Pro being expensive: go try to create a Windows-based machine with the same hardware for less money. I f**king dare you.
After reading your posts, I have vowed to never walk into a Samsung infested Carl’s Jr. ever again. You seem to also have nothing to add here.
Beats may well join the failed services Apple has tried but I applaud them for exploring new devices and services.
Or just possibly iPod, iPhone, iPad, Beats…?
1. You’re wrong.
2. Your reply is as meaningless and wrongheaded as: “Zune, Kin, Fire Phone, iPhone…”
3. Your comment vs. MacDailyNews Take is like 1+1=3 vs. E=mc^2
In short: In the future, don’t be stupid, stupid.
Wrong, dummy.
I like Apple Music. I will keep paying for both Apple Music and Music Match.
But I never listen to Beats 1. And I still dislike the iTunes UI.
Here’s an alternative to Beats 1, lots of new music discovery, consistent but very wide format with over 5500 titles. You might think this is spam, but its commercial free and I pay for bandwidth and rights. Would like to be Beats 2 someday.
http://www.live365.com/stations/hollywalkprod
Probably it doesn’t need it directly.
The real question is why is it there, in my opinion is because it is a platform for artists, live interaction with music, having the connection between artist-them-users, like in the beginning of radio. and to complete the way we listen to music
-I have 55,000 sings, 2500 CD purchased since the first one came to be, 400 LPs, i use to hate radio (long ads, over repeating music, etc…, they play what they like not what i wanted)
-I spent a lot of time on brick & Mortar stores to listen new music, or ones i did not know
-Hated streaming because it was limited and made me pay rent instead of owning
-Now I have music Match, still have lots of my own play lists
-Streaming stations give me some discovery variety on my limited mobile storage .
-great curated playlists now let me learn, re discover and find music, so introduction to xxxx artist, or guitar duos, or things like that, it is like visiting a friend that knows music you like.
-but BEATS 1, gave me a new way to listen to live radio, good comments, and be part go the front end of music, i have listened to it and found ads are limited, short, and it is an entreating way to spend some driving time
so why is it there, well to give a more complete environment to enjoy music, not to make money or to mark a checkbox of features. Apple is trying to understand us and the artists.
Finally the SW needs some fixing, need to take care of classic music listeners, provide simple usage, for people that listen music with little interest on all features possible, but also an advanced mode were we can customise the app, the behaviour. But I believe Apple can keep iterating to improve this, just don’t kill features when simplifying, move them to customisation. some people grow on liking some features
The problem is that Beat 1 is a schizophrenic mess. My college radio station jumped from Sex Pistols to Lawrence Welk to Krokus…and no one listened to it. I feel the same about Beats radio. Apple doesn’t need ONE. It needs a dozen so I can listen to the genres I like and, more importantly, avoid the ones I know I DON’T like.
Yes, that is true, as I said I don’t follow it for long, but did notice that being world wide, and targeting all audiences might actually finishing alienating all.
We actually need Classics 1, Jazz 1, and ++++, but runing like Beats 1 with a selection of people who understand that music.
This will then actually reach let this specific audiences meet on a common ground.
Try my new station, Bungalow. It skillfully blends Rock, Alt, Dance, Standards, Pop and more. Its commercial free and you just might like it.
http://www.live365.com/stations/hollywalkprod
I like Beats 1. If the question -asked anyway- is, “Does Apple Music need Beats 1?” I say, not particularly.
Apple Music
Beats 1, 2, 3, 4 etc.
They don’t have to be bound together, but are sister products that feed off each other.
Apple needs, um, we want both products.
Haters are going to hate. There are too many personalities, to please everyone.
I listened a lot for a little while, then a little while for a longer period (weeks), also sampled BBC1, and meh. Not really for me 99% of the time. It’s a hodge-podge, kinda interesting – tho’ I fully recognize I’m not in the target demo… ….so it might work…. …as might a network of more targeted Beats 2, 3, 4…. …n…..
But I’m back to trainable streaming stations that better fit my needs (and provide discovery) (and have few ads and are offered free) (from Apple, and I heart Radio and Spotify and Rhapsody and Google and…..) (and my own collection uploaded at no cost on G).
I feel kinda guilty about the rates the artists get from most of these services, but I didn’t create the system and I’m not “stealing”…..
I LOVE BEATS 1
Give it a try – I have heard and discovered more music in 3 months than in the past 5 years!
MDN’s take on this story is pure crap. Beats is crap, and Apple’s decision to buy Beats Music for the astronomical sum of $3 billion is crap. 😀
Why do you think Beat1 is crap? You don’t like the music they play? Fine. Lots of people don’t like Apple…. does that mean Apple is crap?
“I’m not sure that Apple Music needs Beats 1”
– delete ‘Music’
– delete ‘1’
While Beats1 is not the mainstay of my listening time, I do enjoy Beats1 as an “entity” and for its… how do I say this…. originality and mix of traditional radio with the ‘internet/digital/the future’. All three of the DJs Lowe, Julie Adenuga and Ebro Darden provide listeners with a lively and interesting listening experience.
Maybe you don’t care for the music they play (which is actually quite broad), but you have to give the DJs, Beats1 and Apple props for a professional service. This is only beginning and I hope in the future we might see a wider range of “Beats” stations that might suit a wider range of listeners.
Rock on Beats1!