Apple Music – Hitting the Wall Before Hitting the Shelves
Apple Music under antitrust scrutiny
「The attorneys general of New York and Connecticut are now investigatingwhether the deals struck by Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) for its new music service violated antitrust rules.
The joint investigation will probe whether Apple pressured music labels – or whether the labels conspired with Apple and one another – to withdraw support for popular “freemium” services like Spotify in favor of its new paid streaming music service.
Eric Schneiderman and Connecticut’s George Jepsen were also among a group of attorneys generals who in 2013 sued Apple for conspiring to raise the prices of e-books. Apple agreed to pay $450M as part of that settlement.」
http://seekingalpha.com/news/2571016-apple-music-under-antitrust-scrutiny
在我的〔Apple Music 來勢猛暴〕裡就提到這個產品可能會有違反公平交易相關法令的問題，然後就看到這則新聞了。
紐約州和康乃迪克州的檢察總長聯手，對Apple啟動反壟斷的調查，要瞭解Apple有無壓迫唱片公司（或唱片公司有無與Apple共謀）撤回對於如Spotify之業者的廣告支持的免費音樂（freemium）模式，以利自家的付費音樂串流服務的發展。這兩位檢察總長也在2013年時對Apple在e-book抬價案起訴，該案中Apple賠了4.5億美元的和解金。
姑不論iPod的精神意義，Apple這局玩很大（在100個國家要同時開台）、錢砸很多（光買Beats就花了美金30億，而我從Spotify付給Sony的數字來預測，光為美國加拿大的兩地授權，Apple每年的預付權利金恐怕也得接近美金1億），會不會隨便做一做看看沒啥起色就收攤？如果不會，那它可能祭出的手段難道只有把freemium給殺了嗎？
再加上，Apple裡主導這個產品的都是重量級的資深音樂人，他們與唱片界的淵源，遠比大多數的串流業者要深。聚在一塊兒，不多搞些小陰謀，你信？