Now that Apple’s new streaming music service Apple Music has officially launched, perhaps the biggest question remaining is how much the Beats 1 global radio station will add to it. If you haven’t checked it out yet (and you probably haven’t since it only went live early today), Beats 1 operates 24/7 from Los Angeles, New York and London and is said to eschew the used radio consultant data commonly used by just about every terrestrial radio station these days in favor of the tastes of the DJs playing the music.
So what does that mean exactly? If we look at the big picture for the success of the station there are a number of possible pros and cons.
Beats 1 Pros
-- Both terrestrial and online playlists are so tightly controlled today that you basically hear the same songs anywhere you go. Beats 1 can break this logjam with some fresh new music that can make listening to radio an adventure again as it was in the days before consultants ruled.
-- Beats 1 is free and available to everyone. You don’t have to be an Apple Music “member” to access the station, which is great for both exposure and an introduction to potential new customers for the service.
-- It differentiates Music from the rest of the streaming pack. At least at the moment, there is no other streaming service that offers a similar feature.
Beats 1 Cons
-- The big one is actually more of question as it’s the great unknown - Do people really care about curated content and music discovery from a non-interactive stream? And, do they care enough about it to make a difference?
History tells us that they do, with Sirius XM as a prime example with its dedicated channels and shows that come to us via real humans. That said, the environment where people listen to satellite radio is much different from how they listen online, since the typical Sirius customer is a captive audience either in the car or at work.
Beats 1 will be put to the test immediately as people will be listening in a variety of environments (like working out or traveling by anything other than a car) that satellite radio hasn’t penetrated yet.
-- How much does music discovery really matter? People talk a good game about not being able to find new music, but studies indicate that the average person’s music taste is frozen by age 33 (sooner if married with children), even reverting back to the music of their teenage years. That means that finding new music is either overblown or a figment of the music industry’s lust to break new talent.
What it all boils down to is that Apple Music will most likely be lifted if Beats 1 proves to be a rousing success, but the service might not feel much pain if it isn’t. Apple Music is rich with other features that the average user may find more useful in the long run, and Beats 1 may always be a runner-up to those primary elements. Let’s check back in a month or so to see where both stand.
