Google Play is slowly forcing streaming

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dunlopj

DJ Extraordinaire
Aug 14, 2008
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Belair MD
I've said before that I'm not a fan of streaming music. My OCD brain prefers to actually buy and own the music.

But over the past 2 years, Google has (at least for me) made it harder and harder to buy music.

First, they took away the ability to buy credit (add $$ to your account) on line and forced you to go retail and buy Google Play gift cards.

Second, for a few months now, I have to enter my password EVERY TIME I buy a track. PIA but OK...

Now this morning I find out that I cannot buy a Google Play gift card before 7am.

I leave the house at 4:45am and I went to 3 Wawa's and a Royal Farm store and was told they are not allowed to sell them untll after 7am.

I guess I (we?) are slowly being forced out of buying music and into streaming...?
 
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Eventually everything is going to be backed by 'the cloud'. With advent of low cost PCs and tablets with ridiculously low amounts of usable storage streaming just makes sense. It's been a race to the bottom with unlimited data plans. If this plays out anything like long distance calling did in the 90s-early 00s we'll all have very decently priced unlimited data plans within the next 5 years.

I see the security in having physically having a CD or MP3 especially for DJs. Speaking as someone of a different generation and who still has CD binders, I'm okay with streaming. Since 2005 or so I went digital downloads and bought < 5 discs in that time. A year or two ago I moved to a streaming service (Google Play Music) and haven't bought an MP3 since. It's just the natural progression of things, IMHO.

Most of the streaming services give you an option to cache playlists. Sure you don't have control of the actual files but you still physically have them on your device. GPM lies and tells you an entire playlist is cached but starts skipping songs when cell service drops out - not sure what the deal is there but it's strange.
 
Early cell service sucked ... you accepted it and moved on. Fairly seamless these days (with just an occasional lacking area). The internet WILL be ubiquitous .. it already is in many places. With unlimited plans most likely being the norm in the future, why buy when you can rent on demand.
 
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...why buy when you can rent on demand.

Dan and Steve,

I'd love to embrace and use streaming. I tried Spotify (love the fade between songs feature!) and Google Play.

It would save me much mouhlah as I normally spend $20.00 every Friday.

Unless I'm missing a critical feature, it seems they both require you to put all songs you grab into a playlist.

I have never needed nor made one.

And both make it tough (Spotify impossible) to incorporate my current BOUGHT AND PAID FOR 23,000 track music library into their phone software.

Yes I've downloaded all my music to my Google Play account, but the integration is still tough.

Plus I can't edit tracks to fit the genres I already have.

Any suggestions you can offer is well appreciated...
 
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Dan and Steve,

I'd love to embrace and use streaming. I tried Spotify (love the fade between songs feature!) and Google Play.

It would save me much mouhlah as I normally spend $20.00 every Friday.

Unless I'm missing a critical feature, it seems they both require you to put all songs you grab into a playlist.

I have never needed nor made one.

And both make it tough (Spotify impossible) to incorporate my current BOUGHT AND PAID FOR 23,000 track music library into their phone software.

Yes I've downloaded all my music to my Google Play account, but the integration is still tough.

Plus I can't edit tracks to fit the genres I already have.

Any suggestions you can offer is well appreciated...
That's today .. as Apple and others move there, things will change.

Plus, many of the DJ services will move in that direction as well. For the Googles and Apples, it means more revenue .. $10-$20 per month is better than 5 song purchases every 3 months or worse, ripping the music off of Youtube.
 
Streaming is where it's going but I still have times where I'm out in the sticks, and working inside a metal barn. There is ZERO coverage in some of these locations. I've also noticed that Amazon is making it more difficult to actually buy/download the tracks. More buttons to click and they're obviously trying to steer you towards just playing off their server. I hope they don't shoot us all in the foot.
 
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I've also noticed that Amazon is making it more difficult to actually buy/download the tracks. More buttons to click and they're obviously trying to steer you towards just playing off their server. I hope they don't shoot us all in the foot.

That's what Google Play is doing as well.

For streaming through Google Play, if I'm at an album and I want to stream just one song, I can't. There is only a "listen" button for the entire album.

What do I do if I only want ONE track off it?
 
That's what Google Play is doing as well.

For streaming through Google Play, if I'm at an album and I want to stream just one song, I can't. There is only a "listen" button for the entire album.

What do I do if I only want ONE track off it?
Tap on the little hamburger menu next to the song and tap play next. It adds it your queue
 
As Steve mentioned it will take time for the DJ services to catch up and deliver the kind of apps or services that DJs want. Right now - it's all about selling songs to listeners hence the playlist mentality. Eventually, someone will get around to people like us who have an organizational interest in how the tracks are managed.

Making a change like this is a lot like stepping off the dock onto a boat. You want to time that just right. :) There's no point to abandoning my hard drive collection for streaming unless and until streaming provides me with everything I need and more. Why rent what you already own? In the meantime, I consider streaming an important compliment to what I already do.

By the time streaming is the top dog - I think mobile DJs as a viable business will be obsolete and the final nail will be put in this chapter of music DJ history.)
 
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Pro-f...well said and thank you for that last comment. It had to be mentioned!

And I think I will "jump in" as late as possible....unless the changes you listed are implemented sooner...
 
Pro-f...well said and thank you for that last comment. It had to be mentioned!

And I think I will "jump in" as late as possible....unless the changes you listed are implemented sooner...

Honestly, I think sooner is NOW.

The changes are not being made by or for DJs. They are being produced for and utilized by end users. Most of our traditional customers are already making and end run around us or displacing us with their own talents and ingenuity. It is more probable that what the traditional DJ wants from a streaming music service will never materialize. The services will simply cut out the middle man and go straight to the consuming public.

This has big returns on two fronts. The streaming service gets a customer base many 1000's of times larger than the DJ community, and the customers are no longer constrained by the controlling egos of the middle man DJ.

We've already seen this happen during the CD era. Compare a given Promo Only disc to same period of retail Now That's What I call Music volumes. They are almost identical save for the stuff on Promo Only that never becomes a chart hit.
 
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Plus, many of the DJ services will move in that direction as well. For the Googles and Apples, it means more revenue .. $10-$20 per month is better than 5 song purchases every 3 months or worse, ripping the music off of Youtube.
I think YouTube is changing as well, with the choice of a subscriptiion service, or advertisement(S) buried in everything.
 
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Eventually, something will have to change. Our entire media culture is centered around getting people to "click" on an advertisement. The reuslt is that 80% of everything produced is absolute rubberneck garbage.
 
Eventually, something will have to change. Our entire media culture is centered around getting people to "click" on an advertisement. The reuslt is that 80% of everything produced is absolute rubberneck garbage.
Agree 100%. Since I've been using Yahoo Mail forever, I've seen a lot of changes to Yahoo over time. My computer's Homepage is now Google, because Yahoo's Homepage is now almost entirely "click bait". Unfortunate situation.
 
The changes are not being made by or for DJs. Most of our traditional customers are already making and end run around us or displacing us with their own talents and ingenuity. It is more probable that what the traditional DJ wants from a streaming music service will never materialize.

Had to re-read this again. Whoa....this does not bode well for the DJ industry.

Where will our business likely be in only five years? I don't like the chances....:cry:
 
Had to re-read this again. Whoa....this does not bode well for the DJ industry.

Where will our business likely be in only five years? I don't like the chances....:cry:
It will be fine for those that engage and entertain .. won't be for those that "play with their controllers". Computers and artificial intelligence still can't do the former very well, but excel at the latter.
 
The Dj business has always changed and always will. People that have gotten stuck in the "ways things used to be" have a tough time adapting.

If it becomes more effective to stream and I can count on it, I'll stream. No big deal. Music is easy to get these days. Has been for a while now. In years past, a music collection provided some value. Today it does not.

Sure, perhaps there's been an uptick in the do-it-yourselfers. But those people were really not going to spend good money on a Dj anyway. .

I don't spend much time thinking about my media choice. Whichever is going to make my job easier. Today its mostly mp3s

For me, understanding what my clients and their guests need to make the event the go the way they want is what I spend my time with.

I've been told for over 20 years now that the Dj business is on its last leg because of some upcoming media shift.

It's changing. Just like it always has