Amazon already does streaming music, albeit of people’s own collections stored on its cloud. Now tech site Recode claims the company is in negotiations to launch a full on-demand service to rival Spotify and the rest. The piece suggests the service would likely be tied to Amazon’s Prime membership scheme, like its existing video-on-demand service, but warns that “Amazon isn’t close to getting a deal done, because its executives are asking for a substantial discount on the pricing the labels have given to other services, like Spotify, Rhapsody and Beats”. Well, good luck with that demand. As Recode points out, Amazon has been hiring senior executives into its music team over the last couple of years, including former Sony Music digital boss Michael Paull. Reports earlier in the year that it was mulling upping the price of Prime membership may also be seen as a precursor to the launch of a streaming music service, although the rumoured $40-a-year spike would pale next to the $120-a-year charged for premium access to most rivals.
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Tools: Kaiber
In the year or so since its launch, AI startup Kaiber has been making waves,…