Given that Apple has a history of making products so intuitive that toddlers can use them, it’s probably somewhat embarrassing for the company that hardly anyone, child or adult, says that about Apple Music.
The company has been investing hugely in its music product recently, testing out everything from celebrity exclusives to live events sponsorship. Yet it still has a long way to go. ”Fussy,” “lousy,” and “a usability nightmare” are all terms that’ve been used to describe Apple Music in its single year of existence—and those are the nicer ones.
And so it seems for its birthday, Apple Music will be getting a major overhaul at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in June, Bloomberg reports. Sources told Bloomberg that Apple’s plans for the revamp to its music service include:
- design tweaks to make the user interface more intuitive,
- better integration of the company’s download business (iTunes),
- an expanded online radio service,
- a renewed marketing campaign to grab more consumers.
These changes come in tandem with a management shakeup. Apple’s purchase of Beats Music two years ago—and its clumsy integration of the business into Apple Music—reportedly caused a culture clash within the company that contributed to the streaming service’s flawed rollout. Beats creative director (and Nine Inch Nails frontman) Trent Reznor is in charge of the new design, while other leaders like Jony Ive and Jimmy Iovine are also giving input.
It couldn’t be a more crucial time for change. Though Apple Music has snagged around 13 million paying subscribers since its launch last summer, that number pales in comparison to Spotify’s 30 million, and the company at large is not having too great a time. Its stock is doing worse than it has in two decades.
And the Services part of its business—which includes Apple Music as well as traditional iTunes sales—is now the second-largest moneymaker at Apple.