Streaming Services - The Future Of Digital Music?

Music streaming increased by 96% in 2015 and has lead to a drop of 42% in 2015 in digital downloads from sites such as i-Tunes.It is predicted that music downloads will not exist by 2020.

In the news Spotify has announced that it now has 39 million paying subscribers - a figure made even more significant when you take into account the ad-supported free tier that it also offers.Apple Music in comparison had 15 million paying subscribers and was adding about a million a month.But then Apple launched in April 2015 and Spotify has been around since 2008.

Tidal,the Hi-Res minimum CD quality streaming service has 4 million paying subscribers.....and with ever increasing rumours of Tidal signing with MQA soon....that might increase significantly.

Today's music listener wants pretty much everything,ever recorded,on demand,on any device,for a smallish monthly outlay.Most streaming services offer over 30 million tracks for streaming.Spotify being the oldest and largest streaming service makes tracks easy to stream,gets many things right.It's easy to stream an artist's entire catalogue,browsing is quick and easy,and saving favourites is dead easy.Spotify creates a platform for creating,sharing and collaborating on playlist.It's simplicity is it's greatness.

Tidal,since being bought by Jay Z in 2014 has gone out of it's way to promote unsigned artists.Along with it's 40 million song catalogue,it also has a number of exclusive artists because it honours the artist.....an integrity seldom seen.It's promise of minimum CD quality is refreshing in the current supposedly lossless environment.As reviewed,Tidal is the best streaming service.It is no wonder Apple is sniffing around and looking to buy Tidal.And then there's MQA........the rumours abound about Tidal and MQA....watch this space.....double the resolution.

Apple Music....although Apple claim they are the best ever...lossless....it is buggy and a bit of a mess.It does have the human connection but it's playlists can have bugs.Progress has been slow on fixing the bugs....still  Apple lives with loss on many fronts.