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According to folks in the know who've spoken to Bloomberg and The New York Times, Apple's oft-rumored streaming radio service is set for a late arrival. The reason is because of snails-pace negotiations with the publisher Sony/ATV for music licensing deals. As the Times notes, Sony no longer lets outsiders like ASCAP (http://www.engadget.com/2004/10/20/web-radio-gets-ascap-deal/) dole out licenses, leaving itself as chief point of contact for such agreements on its content -- this apparently got Pandora (http://www.engadget.com/tag/pandora/) locked into a twenty five-percent increase on royalty payments to Sony. Prior to today's reports, Bloomberg stated that Cupertino was aiming for a Q1 release for this year (http://www.engadget.com/2012/10/25/apple-nearing-deal-with-labels-for-internet-radio-service/), and the NYT notes Apple hoped that launch would've happened near the Grammy Awards. If you'll recall, Apple's service is said be direct competition to others like Pandora (http://www.engadget.com/2012/09/06/wsj-apple-developing-pandora-like-radio-streaming/) rather than Spotify, as it would be ad-supported for revenue. As usual, take all of this with a grain of salt, and don't get too thirsty for an Apple-curated streaming music service just yet. More info at the source links.
Filed under: Portable Audio/Video (http://www.engadget.com/category/portable-audio-video/), Internet (http://www.engadget.com/category/internet/), Apple (http://www.engadget.com/category/apple/)
Comments (http://www.engadget.com/2013/03/07/apple-internet-radio-service-delay-sony/#comments)
Source: New York Times (http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/07/apples-internet-radio-service-said-to-be-delayed/), Bloomberg (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-07/apple-radio-service-said-delayed-after-label-talks-stall.html)
Via: Engadget