{"id":1067883,"date":"2022-10-24T01:33:06","date_gmt":"2022-10-24T05:33:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.prime-wow.com\/?p=1067883"},"modified":"2022-10-24T01:33:06","modified_gmt":"2022-10-24T05:33:06","slug":"bono-says-you-can-blame-him-for-that-free-itunes-u2-album","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.prime-wow.com\/?p=1067883","title":{"rendered":"Bono says you can blame him for that free iTunes U2 album"},"content":{"rendered":"

Remember back in 2014 when U2 gave away<\/a> an album’s worth of songs to every iTunes user in the world? And it turned out that a large number of them didn’t want said album anywhere near their music library \u2014 to the point that Apple had to release a special tool<\/a> to remove it? That was completely my bad, U2 lead singer Bono wrote in an article for The Guardian<\/em><\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When Bono approached Tim Cook, along with Eddy Cue and Phil Schiller about the idea, he was met with some incredulity. “Are you talking about free music?” Cook said, according to Bono. “But the whole point… is to make sure musicians get paid.”<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

“‘No,’ I said, ‘I don\u2019t think we give it away free. I think you pay us for it and then you give it away free, as a gift to people. Wouldn\u2019t that be wonderful?'” Bono wrote.<\/p>\n

“Tim Cook raised an eyebrow. ‘You mean we pay for the album and then just distribute it?’ I said, ‘Yeah, like when Netflix buys the movie and gives it away to subscribers.’ Tim looked at me as if I was explaining the alphabet to an English professor. \u2018But we\u2019re not a subscription organization,'” Cook said in the excerpt. “‘Not yet,’ I said. \u2018Let ours be the first.\u2019 Tim was not convinced. \u2018And this is just to people who like U2?’ \u2018Well,\u2019 I replied, \u2018I think we should give it away to everybody. It\u2019s their choice whether they want to listen to it.”<\/p>\n

It was clearly a humbling lesson for the band when they realized that many people not only didn’t want to listen to it, but didn’t want it there in the first place.<\/p>\n

“As one social media wisecracker put it, \u2018Woke up this morning to find Bono in my kitchen, drinking my coffee, wearing my dressing gown, reading my paper.\u2019 Or, less kind, \u2018The free U2 album is overpriced.\u2019 Mea Culpa,” he wrote. “‘I take full responsibility. Not [U2 manager] Guy O, not Edge, not Adam, not Larry, not Tim Cook, not Eddy Cue. I\u2019d thought if we could just put our music within reach of people, they might choose to reach out toward it. Not quite.'”<\/p>\n

Bono also recalled a happier tie-up with Apple on the iPod, which feted its 21st anniversary just yesterday. It was U2 that convinced Steve Jobs to let them be in those famous iPod silhouette ads for the first time, and also talked him into building the U2 edition iPod in black with a red click wheel \u2014 marking the first time it wasn’t white. Amusingly, they also asked Jobs for some Apple stock, even a symbolic amount \u2014 which he refused, in his typical direct style. “‘Sorry,'” said Steve, according to Bono. “‘That\u2019s a dealbreaker.'”<\/p>\n


\n
\nSource: Engadget – Bono says you can blame him for that free iTunes U2 album<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Remember back in 2014 when U2 gave away an album’s worth of songs to every iTunes user in the world? And it turned out that a large number of them didn’t want said album anywhere near their music library \u2014 … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[99,110],"tags":[98],"class_list":["post-1067883","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-engadget","category-unfiltered-rss","tag-engadget"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.prime-wow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1067883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.prime-wow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.prime-wow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.prime-wow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.prime-wow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1067883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.prime-wow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1067883\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.prime-wow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1067883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.prime-wow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1067883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.prime-wow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1067883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}