Apple Music has secured new deals for songs from major record labels that include Universal Music, Sony Music, and Warner Music, reports Financial Times.
The licensing deals, which have been signed "in recent months," will allow for music from popular artists like Taylor Swift, Lizzo, Adele, and others to continue to be streamed on the Apple Music service.
There are no terms in the deals for bundling Apple Music with Apple TV+, so despite rumors that Apple is working on bundling its subscription services, such a bundle does not appear to be in the works at this time.
Apple revisits deals with major record labels every few years to determine royalty rates and renew rights to songs. Apple has inked multiyear deals at this time, but Apple Music competitor Spotify is said to be having a harder time.
Spotify has been in licensing talks with Universal Music and Warner Music for approximately a year and the record labels have been extending existing agreements on a month by month basis as they work to agree on new terms.
As of last summer, Apple Music had 60 million paid subscribers. Apple hasn't released updated data since then, but Spotify in October said that it had 113 million paying subscribers.
Top Rated Comments
thank you for any hint
In the old days... artists would be lucky to make $1 for each $16 CD sold. The other $15 went to labels, producers, songwriters, distributors, manufacturing, retailers, etc.
The artists were getting screwed long before we had MP3s and streaming.
I'm assuming it's the same today... where the artist still only gets a tiny portion.
We know Apple and Spotify pay royalties for every song streamed. But I'm guessing it then gets split among of those entities listed above.
I, too, would love to know the intricacies of how this all works.
(Probably when they release a 1tb iPhone.)
If artists aren't getting enough money... I'd think it would be the labels' fault (Universal, Sony, Warner)... not the distribution mechanism (streaming services, record stores, etc)