Friday, May 17, 2013

Google Play Music, Spotify and Deezer: What if the future of streaming c ... - Le Nouvel Observateur

Google, Gmail, Picasa, Youtube ... so many applications that you & # emp XEA;. Chent to concentrate office (René Fluger / Sipa)

The Google environment could be a huge value to this new platform (R.FLUGER / SIPA).

Google announced Wednesday at its conference Google I / O, the launch of its streaming music service “Google Play Music All Access”, a direct competitor to Spotify, Deezer and other Pandora.

The offer presented consists of unlimited access to “millions of songs” for a monthly subscription of $ 9.99 per month available on all platforms (smartphone, tablet and web ). “Google Play Music” Will it revolutionize the market for online music? Analysis through three key issues.

1. Why Google, he says on the music streaming market

Because the number of subscribers and revenues associated with streaming are in full boom: the search engine hopes to benefit by getting him as the pie

.

So what if offers like Deezer and Spotify are already well established in this market. Google places these pieces having good hopes of gaining substantial profits, mainly advertising. In 2012, are the streaming services that have experienced the highest growth of the market for online music: according to the IFPI report, market won last year more than 20 million paying subscribers worldwide and growth of 44% over the previous year. Percentage compared to the more modest 12% generated by the direct download.

The search engine also a good card to play: if it launches its service with a train delay facing the launch of Spotify in 2008, for example, the platform can rely on its other services to create synergies and to switch users.

services as very popular YouTube video in terms of music (one billion and a half to see “Gangnam Style”), but also its music download platform “Google Play”, the contents of its users will be directly integrated into the new platform “Google Play Music All Access.”

But Google may suffer a great competition: in addition to the well established service Deezer type, other majors web will certainly launch their own music streaming services. Apple has already signed with several record labels such as Universal Music to launch its iRadio service expected in the summer. Amazon should also be in the game as announced by the end of March The Verge reveals the ongoing negotiations between the merchant site and major record labels. Twitter has finally launched its mid-April Music Service Twitter mainly based on musical excerpts and highlighting pieces by the community.

2. The fee may replace it free

It may well be that in any case the proportion is reversed in favor of subscription offerings. If Google launches exclusively offers a paid (U.S. $ 9.99 per month) music streaming without free alternative, other platforms should follow a similar direction by coexistence of two types of offers (free and paid), but by highlighting the by subscription.

This makes sense: the “premium” offerings are those that generate the most revenue for the sites, but also for artists and labels. If these offers are more profitable for the industry so it is not the only reason: after years where users were bathed in worship (fake) the “all free”, they are now ready to pay a few euros for a better service, ie without advertising, including an extensive catalog of artists and songs and a good listener

.

If Internet and the development of MP3, piracy and other offers “unlimited everything all free” had left audiophiles (but all music lovers) on their hunger in terms of quality listening, they could find their happiness with unlimited subscription offers better quality.

logo Spotify, which offers listening to streaming music with a premium service (DR).

logo Spotify, which offers listening to streaming music with a premium service (DR).

The various players in the streaming market rely on anyway, hoping to convert the maximum number of users to the “premium” offerings. Spotify has stopped in January its purchasing department (download) music to devote himself entirely to streaming and increase its conversion rate to paid offers. A strategy partly successful because it allowed the Swedish platform to go last March the course of the 6 million premium subscribers, an additional one million users in the first quarter of 2012.

Offers streaming subscription that could become the new digital standard: we find the same process with the boom of video subscription offers and the success of Netflix across the Atlantic, which already has 33 million ‘paying users.

more balanced negotiations between the majors and artists

Google Play Music All Acess is he going to participate in a better distribution of income between broadcasters and producers / artists? After years of imbalance, a new, more balanced trend could again be profiling, analysis defended by Raphaële Karayan journalist to “Expansion”: “Finally, Google could stand to Apple by offering higher royalties to rights holders . “

It is no secret that the revenue sharing on the Internet was largely biased towards sites broadcasts, ie mainly the U.S. majors, at the expense of creating and artists. Release and confirmed last Monday that “ultraconcentration the economy downloading (iTunes), the music streaming (Spotify and Deezer) or video (YouTube) imposed tariffs that fail compensation works for the benefit of owners of the technology . “

But negotiations on the rights of new offers music streaming not pass, such as Google Play Music, seem rather go in the right direction, namely an increase in the share of income that has donated their . Even Apple has also negotiated to increase the royalties paid out to artists for its future iRadio Service …

We’re talking about 12 euro cents per 100 pieces streamed: not yet Eldorado but still better than the 6 cents previously proposed. Go a little dream and hope that these new platforms, who leave the “all free”, will allow independent artists to reach a better return from their musical creations: income that seemed so far a sweet illusion for them in the era digital.

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