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Apple Sets 100 Million Paid Music Subscriber Goal: What To Expect At Today’s #WWDC Announcement

image from wpuploads.appadvice.comThanks to a slip by Sony CEO Doug Morriswe're 100% certain that Apple will launch its much anticipated streaming music service today.  There were new leaks overnight, so here's our latest vetted roundup of leaks and substantiated rumors:

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100 Million Paid Subscriber Goal

Overnight reports leaked that Apple has ambitious goals for the streaming music service that its launching today. Apple is projecting that it will sign up 100 million subscribers to its $10 per month music service, according to the New York Times.

Currently there are about 41 million paid subscriptions worldwide across all services. Spotify has less than 5 million paid subscribers in the US and Tidal just over 300,000.

What To Expect

  • Name - Apple Music.  The Beats Music brand seems likely to live on only temporarily as a parallel service
  • Price - $9.99 per month for on demand streaming,  The labels rejected lower pricing and regulators, who are already sniffing around, could have seen it as a red flag.
  • 90 Day Free Trial – The rumor mill has swung from 90 to 30 and back to 90 days. Confirming the wisdom of the move, new stats show that 69% of free Spotify users decide whether or not to become paid subscribers within 90 days.
  • Expanded iTunes Radio - iTunes Radio will remain free and ad supported, but may add a paid 'drop the commercials' tier.  Expect a lot more curation and DJ driven stations and playlists, including offerings from  former BBC host Zane Lowe and artists Pharrell, Drake, Muse and others.
  • Artist Friendly Features - Beats and then Apple promised to be more artist friendly than Spotify and other competitors. Some kind of artist to fan social platform appears likely.  But will it launch next week for every artist – or just a select few?  And what about analytics? Apple has never been very good at sharing info… Heres one related report: "The app will also feature artist pages – mostly seen as being promotional – that they can use to host videos, songs and other things for free. This is part of a program called Apple Connect. Apple will compensate the artists and labels for songs it gives away, as it has done with iTunes’ “Free Song of the Week” feature," according to Bloomberg. 
  • Lyrics - Apple wants to add them, but the deals are rumored not to be done.  Sticking point? Money, of course.
  • Exclusive, behind the scenes video – Apple has reportedly hided videographers to go in the studio while bands are recording.

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