Taylor Swift Takes on Apple Music and Wins
After Apple revealed its new music streaming service called Apple Music at its WWDC recently, the company got a lot of criticism from independent musicians and artists because of its announcement that it will not be paying for music royalties during the three-month free trial period of the service.
Independent artists and musicians over the weekend gained an ally in the person of Taylor Swift. In a blog post entitled "To Apple, Love Taylor," Swift said that she found it "shocking, disappointing, and completely unlike this historically progressive and generous company" to not offer any compensation to writers, producers or artists during the free trial period. The blog post was posted so she could explain why she will not allow her album 1989 to be part of Apple Music when it launches next week.
She ended her blog post with this statement: "I say to Apple with all due respect, it's not too late to change this policy and change the minds of those in the music industry who will be deeply and gravely affected by this. We don't ask you for free iPhones. Please don't ask us to provide you with our music for no compensation."
Get Our Latest News for FREE
Several hours after Swift posted her protest, Apple quickly responded, according to a report in The Guardian. Apple's senior vice president for internet software and services, Eddie Cue, tweeted the company's change of heart, saying that "Apple will always make sure that artist are paid. #AppleMusic will pay artist for streaming, even during customer's free trial period. We hear you @taylorswift13 and indie artists. Love, Apple."
Apple, according to Cue, will pay a "per-stream" royalty during the trial period. He also revealed that he personally called Swift to share the news.
Cue also acknowledged that protests from various independent labels played a major role in the recent policy change. The Guardian report cited that independent label trade bodies in the U.S., Europe and Australia were "vocal against the plans not to pay royalties during the trial period, because their members would be most at risk from any three-month blip in earnings if a large number of people buying music downloads from Apple's iTunes store switched to the free trial."
Swift, on the other hand, tweeted her response to this piece of good news: "I am elated and relieved. Thank you for your words of support today. They listened to us."
