Weekly updates:

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Weekly updates


As Apple releases iOS 8.4 for its iDevices, its Apple Music subscription streaming service has also officially gone live, alongside their Beats 1 live radio station broadcasting for the very first time. At the moment, a three-month trial for new subscribers to Apple Music is available for those wanting to try before buying, but unless you change your settings before the end of the period, be aware that you’ll be charged automatically going forward.

After that, the streaming service offers their library of 30 million songs for $11.99AU per month for a single user, or $17.99AU for a family of up to six. The library will include quite a few exclusives, including Dr. Dre’s The Chronic, which bizarrely has never been available for digital-streaming on any service, as well as Taylor Swift’s catalogue, after the singer managed to strike a solid deal for artists from the company after her Tumblr rant last week.

A variety of further features come with both the trial and the paid subscription, including unlimited skips for Apple Music radio stations, curated recommendations and playlists, Siri voice-commands, access to the Soundcloud-esque Connect feature, offline listening and the ability to upload your purchased and ripped library to iCloud. Apple Music also apparently has the ability to seamlessly link up with your iTunes library, allowing you to access those songs from the cloud. Apple have also redesigned their Music app, to include new control gestures, a global search, and an app-wide MiniPlayer.

Beats 1 Radio is currently commercial-free, broadcasts around the clock, and is available at no cost. It boasts music and interviews hosted by DJs including former BBC Radio 1 host Zane Lowe, Hot 97’s Ebro Darden, and Rinse FM’s Julie Adenuga. Apple is also said to be working on broadcasting celebrity shows hosted by artists like Pharrell Williams, Disclosure and Josh Homme of Queens of The Stone Age.

With Beats 1’s curation by real life personalities, and very credible ones at that, along with Apple Music’s internet radio employing actual music editors, the roll-out seems to be an effort to humanise the process of music streaming and differentiate the company from the other services using simple algorithms. If you want to give it a go yourself, you can sign up for the free trial of the service over here.

[Via.]

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