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Apple Music’s billions of streams, billions of dollars in fines, and one failure

On June 30, 2015, Apple launched Apple Music that has brought music pleasure to millions, a social media feature you probably don’t remember and cost Apple billions in fines.

Red circles with white text list music genres like country, pop, hip-hop, blues, reggae, and more. Instructions above suggest clicking on preferred genres.
It’s fine to be nostalgic for red blobs.

If you joined Apple Music when it first launched and have stayed with it since, you have easily paid out more than a thousand dollars. The price has gone up over the years, too, plus there are more expensive tiers with a family plan, cheaper ones with the student offering, and Apple Music is also part of the Apple One bundle, but you’ve been paying something for over a decade.

What won’t have happened during that time, though, is that you’ve ever had the service for free — at least not other than some limited-time trial periods. Unlike its rivals, specifically Spotify, Apple Music does not offer a free ad-supported version.

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