Thereās absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to give away music, whether youāre a superstar or some band no oneās heard of. Itās really on Apple for not realizing, after more than a decadeās worth of experience in the digital music experience (which, in turn, propelled the company to a level of success that practically no one but Steve Jobs even dreamed theyād reach), that people consider their music collection to be very personal space and can be quite fussy about what is and isnāt in it.
Not a big U2 fan, but getting a free album is always nice.
Iām always slightly baffled by Appleās seemingly emotional attachment to Bono, despite the mediocrity of their ācollaborationsā, as well as the fact that āLetās make a compulsory change using the power of our fully armed and operational ācloudā infrastructure, for no particular benefit!ā didnāt set alarm bells ringing all over Cupertinoā¦
Yes, Apple has nearly discretionary power over every iDevice that isnāt jailbroken good and hard; but it would seem counterproductive to spook the users by exercising that power except when it benefits them. Why push Bonoās latest drivel when they could just give a big āFreeā button front-page space on the ITMS?
Also, how did every member of U2 not get punched when they described using the digital command-and-control infrastructure of their corporate partner to perform a compulsory distribution of their album as āreally punk rockā?
Iām not one of those who was offended by the compulsory āgiftā but I do understand that a person could, very legitimately be quite miffed about it.
At least it was a decent apology, not one of those lame non-apologies often offered by corporations.
Even free it was wildly overpriced.
How do we know it was Apple and not U2 that came up with the idea of making this gift opt-out instead of opt-in? Bonoās apology makes it sound like at the very least U2 knew and agreed to that fundamental aspect of it.
And thatās really the only source of controversy. A freebie should always be opt-in, simple as that.
I sincerely apologize if anyone took what I said out of context and got offended because theyāre too stupid to understand what I really meant to say. Iām really, really sorry about that. You may now forgive me and pretend I never said anything that could possibly offend anyone. - about 90% of celebrity and corporate āapologiesā
Bono didnāt do that here, good on him.
seems like a case of code re-use/mis-use. add the album to everyoneās itunes acccount, then if āautomatically download purchasesā is turned on, boomā¦ itās on your device. itās possible they didnāt really think it through, and perhaps even thought they were being clever.
but yeah, itās certainly possible for them to put an item in the music store thatās free, and you are right, thatās what they should have done.
[quote=āhalloween_jack_, post:2, topic:43035ā]that people consider their music collection to be very personal space and can be quite fussy about what is and isnāt in it.[/quote]I am struck by the contrast with game libraries in Steam. The way things are going, we probably will reach the day when some of their offerings might get crappy enough that people will start clamoring for the ability to remove things from their libraries, including things they might have gotten for free ā but I donāt think weāre there yet.
āDrop of megalomania.ā
How many gallons are in a drop?
about 7 +/- 2 chunks.
As a guy who spent way too much of his life hunched over used CD bins, the āfailureā of the U2 album launch fascinates me.
I get that itās a significant interface error. Getting songs you donāt want in your living collection of music forced down your throat is not fun, especially when youāre at a time in life when music is everything. This isnāt U2ās screw-up, itās Appleās. They took a really cool idea- āHereās our new stuff, people, we donāt even want any money, itās FREEā- and butchered it. I had no interest in listening until I saw, of all things, the music video (more like a 30-second commercial, but still).
But stillā¦if you tell me from 20 years ago that Bonoās going to use my phone to give me his new album for freeā¦my mind would have, like, EXPLODED. Itās such a pre-Internet idea.
Oh ok, Bono. I forgive you. Itās ok, donāt worry about it.
As U2 wasnāt ever a punk bandā¦ Iām not sure that criticism lands.
Always nice to see a celebrity admit to a ādrop of megalomaniaā though. All is forgiven Bono.
Again, how do we know U2 didnāt sign off on the opt-out nature of this promotion ā or suggest it or even insist on it?
Apple unquestionably deserves some of the blame, because there were problems with the execution going beyond the faux pas of making it opt-out (it was too hard for less-than-power-users to get the gift off their devices), but we donāt know for sure Apple deserves all of the blame.
Ah, but weāre talking about a megalomaniacal gallon, those are quite different from the usual sort.
Full disclosure: This entire post is an excuse to type the word megalomaniacal.
a drop of megalomania, a touch of generosity, a dash of self-promotion and several truckloads of pompous ego.
ā¦
Help make Bono History
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