Beats Music was a subscription-based

online music A digital music store is a business that sells digital audio files of music recordings over the Internet. Customers gain ownership of a license to use the files, in contrast to a music streaming service, where they listen to recordings withou ...

streaming service owned by the Beats Electronics division of Apple Inc. The service combined algorithm-based personalization with expert music suggestions from a variety of sources. Development began in 2012 under the name "Daisy". The service built upon Beats' consumer electronics line and its 2012 acquisition of the similar service MOG. The service was launched in the United States on January 21, 2014. Beats Music was acquired by Apple Inc. as part of its purchase of Beats Electronics in May 2014. Beats Music stopped accepting new subscriptions when

Apple Music Apple Music is a music, audio and video streaming service developed by Apple Inc. Users select music to stream to their device on-demand, or they can listen to existing playlists. The service also includes the Internet radio stations Appl ...

launched on June 30, 2015. Subscribers were moved to the new service. Beats Music was completely discontinued on November 30, 2015.

History

On July 2, 2012, Beats announced it had acquired the online music service MOG, reportedly paying between $10 million and $16 million. Beats officials said this the acquisition was part of the company's goal to develop a "truly end-to-end music experience." The acquisition did not include the company's blog and advertising network, the MOG Music Network, which was sold in a separate transaction to the broadcasting company

Townsquare Media Townsquare Media, Inc. (formerly Regent Communications until 2010) is an American radio network and media company based in Purchase, New York. The company started in radio and expanded into digital media toward the end of the 2000s, starting wi ...

in August 2012. MOG initially indicated that it would continue to operate independently with no immediate change in service. A few months later in December 2012, the company hired

Trent Reznor Michael Trent Reznor (born May 17, 1965) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, and composer. He serves as the lead vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, and principal songwriter of the industrial rock band Nine Inch Nails, wh ...

of the band

Nine Inch Nails Nine Inch Nails, commonly abbreviated as NIN and stylized as NIИ, is an American industrial rock band formed in Cleveland in 1988. Singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer Trent Reznor was the only permanent member of the band ...

to serve as its Chief Creative Officer, and to help develop a new music service codenamed "Daisy". As opposed to its competitors such as

Spotify Spotify (; ) is a proprietary Swedish audio streaming and media services provider founded on 23 April 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. It is one of the largest music streaming service providers, with over 456 million monthly active use ...

, in Daisy the plan was to use "personalization" based on user listening habits in combination with expert music curators to suggest tracks. The company initially announced a launch by late 2013. The company had hired

music industry The music industry consists of the individuals and organizations that earn money by writing songs and musical compositions, creating and selling recorded music and sheet music, presenting concerts, as well as the organizations that aid, train, ...

members, radio personalities, and songwriters to serve as a music curation team for the service, led by former

Clear Channel Communications iHeartMedia, Inc., formerly CC Media Holdings, Inc., is an American mass media corporation headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. It is the holding company of iHeartCommunications, Inc. (formerly Clear Channel Communications, Inc.), a company fou ...

executive and KIIS-FM music director Julie Pilat. In August 2013, a landing page was discovered for Daisy under its final name, "Beats Music". The service was officially unveiled in January 2014, for a launch in the United States on January 21. In February 2014, Beats Music reached a licensing deal with the Merlin Network, a group representing a number of major

independent record label An independent record label (or indie label) is a record label that operates without the funding or distribution of major record labels; they are a type of small- to medium-sized enterprise, or SME. The labels and artists are often represented ...

s. While no financial details were disclosed, Beats did indicate that it would pay the labels at the same rates as the major labels. On March 4, 2014, Beats Music acquired Topspin Media, a company which deals in the monetization of music and building relationships between musicians and their fans. Beats Music CEO Ian Rogers had left Topspin to join the service.

Apple acquisition and shutdown

On May 28, 2014, Apple Inc. announced it was buying both Beats Electronics and Beats Music for US$3 billion in a cash and stock deal. The ''Wall Street Journal'' reported that Apple had valued Beats Music at "slightly less than $500 million." Following the purchase, Dr. Dre and Iovine were hired as executive employees, and worked at Apple for years afterward; Beats Music CEO Ian Rogers would oversee both Beats Music and Apple's ad-supported iTunes Radio service. It was later reported by ''

Business Insider ''Insider'', previously named ''Business Insider'' (''BI''), is an American financial and business news website founded in 2007. Since 2015, a majority stake in ''Business Insider''s parent company Insider Inc. has been owned by the German publ ...

'' that Apple was planning to merge the two services. Apple had hired noted British radio DJ

Zane Lowe Alexander Zane Reid Lowe (born 7 August 1973) is a New Zealand radio DJ, live DJ, record producer, and television presenter. After an early career in music creation, production and DJing, he moved to the UK in 1997. He came to prominence thro ...

to serve as a music curator. It was also reported that, in negotiations with record labels for the new service, that Apple had been attempting to encourage record labels to pull their content from the free, ad-supported tiers of competing services such as Spotify in order to drive adoption of the new service, and offered an incentive to

Universal Music Group Universal Music Group N.V. (often abbreviated as UMG and referred to as just Universal Music) is a Dutch–American multinational music corporation under Dutch law. UMG's corporate headquarters are located in Hilversum, Netherlands and its ...

to pull its content from

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...

. The U.S. Department of Justice and

Federal Trade Commission The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is an independent agency of the United States government whose principal mission is the enforcement of civil (non-criminal) antitrust law and the promotion of consumer protection. The FTC shares jurisdiction o ...

launched an investigation into this alleged

cartel A cartel is a group of independent market participants who collude with each other in order to improve their profits and dominate the market. Cartels are usually associations in the same sphere of business, and thus an alliance of rivals. Mos ...

in May 2015.

was unveiled during Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference on June 8, 2015, and launched on June 30, 2015. Concurrently with the public launch of Apple Music, Beats Music was immediately discontinued; users could migrate their Beats Music subscriptions, including their account, saved playlists, and songs, to Apple Music.

Features

Beats Music offered a library of over 20 million songs that could be streamed on-demand by users. Users could download songs for offline playback, which remained accessible for the period of their subscription. The service used a personalization system combining recommendations based on listening habits and algorithms with human curation and playlists from music professionals and publications such as ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first known for its ...

'', ''

Rap Radar Elliott Wilson (born January 14, 1971) is an American journalist, television producer, and magazine editor. He is the founder and CEO of '' Rap Radar''. In the past, he has worked as editor-in-chief of ''XXL Magazine''. While there, he became know ...

'', and ''

Pitchfork A pitchfork (also a hay fork) is an agricultural tool with a long handle and two to five tines used to lift and pitch or throw loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. The term is also applied colloquially, but inaccurately, to ...

''. Song searches prioritized the original,

master recording Mastering, a form of audio post production, is the process of preparing and transferring recorded audio from a source containing the final mix to a data storage device (the master), the source from which all copies will be produced (via meth ...

s of songs over other versions (such as covers). A feature known as "The Sentence" allowed users to generate playlists by filling four blanks in a sentence with words describing various activities, moods, and genres. The basic subscription plan allowed access to the service on three devices for US$9.99 per month, or US$99.99 per year. Along with a web-based interface, apps were available for Android, iOS, and

Windows Phone Windows Phone (WP) is a discontinued family of mobile operating systems developed by Microsoft for smartphones as the replacement successor to Windows Mobile and Zune. Windows Phone featured a new user interface derived from the Metro design lan ...

Sonos SONOS, short for "silicon–oxide–nitride–oxide–silicon", more precisely, " polycrystalline silicon"—"silicon dioxide"—" silicon nitride"—"silicon dioxide"—"silicon", is a cross sectional structure of MOSFET (metal-oxide-semicondu ...

announced that Beats Music would also support its wireless speaker systems on launch. A family plan with support for up to 5 people and 10 devices was also available for $14.99 per month, exclusive to family plan subscribers on

AT&T Mobility AT&T Mobility LLC, also known as AT&T Wireless and marketed as simply AT&T, is an American telecommunications company. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of AT&T Inc. and provides wireless services in the United States. AT&T Mobility is the th ...

. AT&T subscribers were also able to access a longer free trial period.

Marketing

advertisement Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a product or service. Advertising aims to put a product or service in the spotlight in hopes of drawing it attention from consumers. It is typically used to promote a ...

for the service starring Ellen DeGeneres was aired during Super Bowl XLVIII in February 2014. Spoofing the

fairy tale A fairy tale (alternative names include fairytale, fairy story, magic tale, or wonder tale) is a short story that belongs to the folklore genre. Such stories typically feature magic, enchantments, and mythical or fanciful beings. In most cult ...

'' The Three Bears'', the ad featured Ellen playing the role of Goldilocks.

Personnel

* Jimmy Iovine – Co-founder and chairman of the Board *

Dr. Dre Andre Romelle Young (born February 18, 1965), known professionally as Dr. Dre, is an American rapper and record producer. He is the founder and CEO of Aftermath Entertainment and Beats Electronics, and previously co-founded, co-owned, and w ...

– Co-founder * Luke Wood – President *

Bozoma Saint John Bozoma "Boz" Saint John (née Arthur) is an American businessperson and marketing executive who was the chief marketing officer (CMO) at Netflix. Previously, she served as CMO at Endeavor, and chief brand officer (CBO) at Uber until June 2018. ...

– Senior Vice President, Head of Global Marketing *

– Chief Creative Officer * Ian Rogers – chief executive officer * Matthew Costello – Chief Operating Officer * David Rotenberg - Vice President of Finance

References

External links

* {{Authority control American music websites Music streaming services Dr. Dre Internet properties established in 2014 Internet properties disestablished in 2015 Products introduced in 2014 Entertainment companies based in California Technology companies based in Greater Los Angeles Companies based in Culver City, California American companies established in 2014 Entertainment companies established in 2014 Companies disestablished in 2015 2014 establishments in California 2015 disestablishments in California Apple Inc. services Defunct companies based in Greater Los Angeles Discontinued iOS software