Apple Music will offer exclusive streaming of pop star Taylor Swift’s 1989 World Tour Live concert video beginning Dec. 20, the iPhone firm tweeted Sunday. Apple’s radio station, Beats 1, will broadcast an interview at 9 am Pacific (1700 GMT) discussing the video, Swift informed fans via a tweet.
Swift did hint in June
Swift, who turned 26 on Sunday, tweeted a trailer for the concert video and thanked her fans for the birthday wishes, saying she had a little surprise for them all. Jonas Akerlund is listed as the director of the video in the description of the trailer.
Swift decided to put her hit album 1989 on Apple’s music service in June within a few days of Apple bowing to pressure from Swift and some independent music groups and labels to pay artists even during the free trial of its music service.
In November 2014, Swift pulled her entire catalog of music from Spotify and refused to offer her new album 1989, citing a drastic fall in the numbers of paid album sales. After this entire episode, Swift made the decision to offer 1989 on Apple Music.
Big victory for Apple over rivals
Apple introduced its music streaming service in June. In October, CEO Tim Cook said the service had acquired more than 6.5 million paid users and 8.5 additional users in the free trial. With the dedicated music service, Apple made an attempt to carry its dominance of digital music through its iTunes store into the era of music streaming. According to John Jackson at market research firm IDC in Boston, this wins holds a lot of significance for the iPhone firm.
“It’s on the order of a coup for Apple in as much as we all know that Apple is late to this party and the competition is fierce, the market is heavily subscribed with services,” said Jackson.
Spotify and Songza are examples of competing streaming music services. Spotify has over 20 million subscribers and over 75 million active users, according to its website. Apple’s iTunes enjoy a vast installed base of users, and this will help Apple’s music service find a strong following. There are many who believe that Apple’s music service has the ability to eclipse other music streaming companies.
