Given Apple's domination of music hardware, it was only a matter of time before the company made the leap into streaming services.
Following weeks of rumours, streaming service Apple Music was formally introduced at a lavish ceremony last night (June 8th). Apple CEO Tim Cook told the assembled crowd: "It will change the way you experience music forever."
Jimmy Iovine – who has worked with the likes of Sir Paul McCartney and Bruce Springsteen – then added: "In 2003, the record industry was a ball of confusion. We had Napster, we had Limewire, we had Bittorrent."
"Technology and art can work together, at least at Apple," he continued. "The music industry is a fragmented mess. if you want to stream music, you can go over here. If you want to check out a video, here's some more places. if you want to follow an artist, there's more confusion for that."
Apple Music will allow users to stream any song on iTunes on demand, alongside a host of other services. The platform will host global radio station Beats1, which will be helmed by Zane Lowe in LA, Ebro Darden in New York and Julie Adenuga in London.
Zane Lowe: "We have real music fans running this place. We have real artists in the studio right now. We're called Beats1, we're always on playing the music that we love."
The ceremony closed with The Weeknd performing brand new track 'I Can't Feel My Face' – stream it below.
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