Apple recently announced their new music streaming service at their annual WWDC conference, with the Six God himself even giving a small presentation about the service. Apple Music looks to compete with Spotify, the popular on demand streaming service. Spotify is among many streaming services that have contributed to the decline in record sales, as more and more people opt to stream music than buy it.
Personally I'm not a fan of streaming services. I currently own a 128 gb iPhone, with music taking up a whopping 36 gb of my available storage. But I like the way I have it. I get to choose what I listen to instead of a service telling me what to listen to. I can skip to the next song whenever I want, without the pesky interruption of constant advertisements.
And most importantly, it is ON my device.
Streaming services have to connect to the cloud in order to get your "on demand" music. And that takes both data and battery power. I can't tell you how many times my friends have had to give up listening to music on a long road trip because their phone was about to die or they had to consumed too much data.
And what happens when you have to go on an airplane? You are forced to turn on airplane mode, cutting off all data. If you feel like handing over an exorbitant of money for wifi, then you gain access to music again. People enjoy listening to their music "offline."
Apple Music will stream at a paltry 256kpbs, lower than the standard 320kbps, and much lower than Jay Z's higher end Tidal service. However, that is the same quality as songs when you buy them on the iTunes Store currently.
Apple should have chosen to make Apple Music a standalone app, instead of taking the place of the current music player.
Apple Music is set for release in the upcoming iOS 8.4 update coming on June 30th.