Due to what muses. the service of the largest video host is going to compete in the streaming market

To become a full-fledged rival of Spotify and Apple Music, even a site with endless possibilities and resources will have to make a lot of efforts.

What’s happening

The need for epidemiological restrictions is not discussed, but they – in one way or another – caused a lot of inconvenience not only to ordinary people, but also to musicians… The latter were forced to abandon tours and spot performances in clubs and experiment with online gigs. However, the bulk of the authors and performers, of course, did not have such experience. Therefore, in the end, only a select few managed to conduct streams and live shows on the network.

One of the central venues for the performances of such artists was YouTube, whose team did its best to help the musicians organize online performances. The platform’s interest was not only in making money on advertising, but also in drawing attention to its own music service. Today, the management of the corporation has big plans for him – he is not satisfied with the situation when listeners find new music on YouTube, and then go to other platforms and pay them on a regular basis for the opportunity to listen to it.

Late or not

The answer seems to be obvious. The lack of consistency in the development of their own music product hits the positions of the platform managers. At first they were engaged in the service Music Key, developed in parallel Play Music All Accessand then we ran YouTube Red, after that – combined everything into YouTube Premium, but at the same time developed YouTube Music…

There is nothing surprising in the fact that for a couple of years the audience of the site has finally got confused in numerous options and subscriptions, and the management now has to work hard to build a consistent strategy for the development of muses. subdivisions.

All these difficulties are well known to specialists, and there are many places about them. write… However, experts also express arguments in defense of YouTube music. So, Mark Mulligan, analyzing the development of muses. industry, believes that the platform has unique opportunities to work with representatives of generation Z. In his opinion, this slice of the audience cannot imagine their life without video content, and in terms of the availability of remixes, covers and remasters of popular tracks, YouTube is the undisputed leader. The diversity of the platform library in this respect surpasses what can be found on Spotify and Apple Music.

The question is in algorithms

The extensive library is a significant advantage. But the content still needs to be delivered to the listener and to determine exactly what he wants to receive here and now. The site has some difficulties with this. Take at least recommendation system – only the lazy does not criticize her, although YouTube reflects the blows well, does not try to argue with the audience and to a certain extent takes the initiative into their own hands, launching new functionality for the main video service.

Time will tell whether he will be able to achieve similar results with a music product, but for now we would suggest voting for the scenario that seems most likely to you, in our small poll right under the “additional reading”.

What else to read on the topic in our Hi-Fi World:

We have on Habré:

What will indie music be like if the majors control distribution?
The end of independent distribution or a new indie market – discussing prospects
Why indie music won’t go mainstream – talking about the situation