Apple bets on radio splash in streaming bid

From what I have been reading, Spotify users are going to move to Apple Music massively for two reasons: the quality (Apple uses AAC which is far superior than MP3), and that the fact that Apple has 7 million more songs under tis umbrellan than Spotify. I currently use sky.fm, which costs me about $5 a month. But I am ready to jump boats if Music proves to be superior.

Sorry every shoutcast station since end of 1998 has been a "truly global" radio station. Stop it with your marketing BS apple you are not the first by a long shot.

AAC which is far superior than MP3

Vastly exaggerated claim. Most users won't be able to hear the difference on an iPhone+ cheap (<250 USD) headphones over a daily commute (99% of the use cases in Japan) anyway...FLAC beats them both, but that's not the point of this article...

@LostInNagoya

From what I have been reading, Spotify users are going to move to Apple Music massively

Hard to say at this stage. Spotify's paid users have doubled in just 12 months and the CEO himself said that he doesn't see Apple as a threat. It will just make things better IMO.

I'm a Spotify user (signed up when I was last back home and use it here in Japan - seriously you don't know what you're missing out on!) and it's just too good to even consider Apple Music. With the ridiculously archaic music industry here, it's simply criminal that the likes of Spotify aren't available here.

You really would have to be an i-Sheep to pay monthly for the i-Radio when you can get free broadcasts everywhere else.

What's next, i-TV? Oh yeah, they already tried that.

Isn't anybody is bothered with the fact that Apple is trying to monopolize everything into an i-Item?

But Google Play will only be available in the United States. Not really. VPN does the trick.

"Available in more than 100 countries" is not the same as global. Are they limiting access to some countries and, if so, why?

I'm with gogogo. Thanks to Shoutcast, Winamp and many others, streaming radio has been "global" for many, many years.

Spotify is probably available in Japan. You just cannot sign up from Japan. Find a VPN to fix that. Use the laptop/pc to sign up online with VPN one time. Then you can login by way of cell phone while in Japan. You could even get a friend in another country to create an account for you. My experience with these streaming services is only the signup process is region blocked.

AAC+ excels over MP3 with certain types of music. Female voices in harmony get trashed in MP3. I only give MP3 a thumbs up if it is 128 or higher. Anyway, streaming radio online has come a long way from the early days.