YouTube Red is being replaced by YouTube Premium, and it will cost extra

YouTube Red is being replaced by YouTube Premium, and it will cost extra(recode.net)

30 points by digisth 8 years ago | 12 comments

That same service will eventually also replace Google Play Music, a rival music service Google has inexplicably operated at the same time it was trying to get YouTube Music off the ground.

They got me again. I can't believe I let them get me again. I was subscribed to Play Music, then Youtube Red appears and okay, I get that in addition, now they're closing Play Music and forcing me into Youtube?

These motherfuckers.

magduf 8 years ago | |

Never buy into a Google service thinking it'll be around for a long time. There's only a small handful of things they do that have had real staying power, and they're all free (search, Gmail, Maps).

kankroc 8 years ago |

I'm a Google Play Music user and mark my words, the day they kill the service is the day I go to spotify. I'm not going to whatever Prime-like monster they're creating.

joecot 8 years ago | |

I just can't understand the choice to kill Google Play Music. Not only is it fantastic, it integrates perfectly into Google Home. Subscribing to Google Play Music also got you Youtube Red. If they want to charge $2 more for Youtube Premium, fine, whatever, but don't kill Google Play Music.

mafm 8 years ago | |

Honestly, no point in waiting. I paid for google music for a couple of years before switching to spotify. Spotify is a lot better - more music, better recommendations. about the same price.

some_account 8 years ago | | |

Deezer is also quite good and nice to have alternatives to Spotify that respects privacy.

lathiat 8 years ago |

I love YouTube Red but basically never use any of the Music features.

I’d rather have ads on Music and nothing else. Seems like a strange anti embrace of the creator community.

I can only assume they would rather make money off of ads (because they make more money than YouTube red?) and this needed a way to sell the popular YouTube Music (including the background play feature) and have a way to get more people watching ads that were casual users that mostly only cared about music (instead of having ad free YouTube thrown in).

Can’t see another reason to have structured it this way. YouTube Music is obviously an important business requirement to otherwise keep all the labels uploading their music videos onto the otherwise free site.

FollowSteph3 8 years ago |

I hope it comes to Canada. I'm willing to pay to remove commercials from YouTube. I don't really care about the extra shows, etc., I just want to be able to remove the ads. $12/mth is worth it for me.

cerberusss 8 years ago | |

On average, one country is added per year. So in roughly two centuries, it'll be available worldwide. Not that I'm bitter or anything.

But more seriously, since the rollout has been extremely limited, I have the feeling that Google is not really interested in offering it worldwide.

lathiat 8 years ago | |

That is also my motivation.

Luckily I’m in Australia where we have it already and I’ve been paying since it launched.

Waterluvian 8 years ago |

Amazon Prime Video plays commercials now. How long until they start slowly introducing commercials into YouTube Premium?

It's just like the history of cable TV. I'm very pessimistic that it will just keep repeating.