Is Tidal in trouble?

Condorsat

Audio Enthusiast
More bad news for Tidal from What Hi Fi

Is Tidal in Trouble? << link

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Still got my seat on board but sitting close to a lifeboat while still enjoying the band playing.

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I hope small and up-and-coming businesses can afford the pay to play for internet traffic like their established competitors can.
 
I canceled my subscription when they started pushing political BS on it. Looks like they should've just stuck to offering music.
 
Just saw this. The What hifi article seems strange in that it doesn't mention Sprint's acquisition of a big stake in Tidal last year. Maybe the writer is a Quboz fan?
 
These type of articles have been written every year. Nothing has really changed. They lose money hand over fist then investors bail them out. Spotify has been using this method for years and years.

When investors stop bailing them out, then there is a story to write. Right now, it is all just based on financials which have been awful since inception for most of these stand alone streaming services, yet many of them continue to survive.

Personally, I was surprised when Sprint put money into Tidal last year. It seemed like they were throwing money into a sinking ship. However, there must be some angle that I am not seeing.
 
These type of articles have been written every year. Nothing has really changed.
Exactly. I think I even mentioned this in another "Tidal is dying" thread here a few weeks ago--we saw a similar announcement in 2016 if I'm not mistaken. Yet they're still around. It was some media pundit who hinted at them being on the brink of bankruptcy.

As far as investors bailing Tidal out, this is small peanuts compared to Sears Holdings and hedge fund investor Eddie Lampert, who keeps dumping hundreds of millions into that sinking ship. (There has to be some ulterior motive, plus he did some janky manipulation of the real estate Sears/Kmart used to hold.) Not only that, he is stripping Sears of all of its assets like the Craftsman brand name. He's picking away at a nearly empty carcass at this point. The difference? People are still using Tidal; hardly anyone is shopping at Sears (which I saw for myself a few weeks ago).

Personally, I was surprised when Sprint put money into Tidal last year. It seemed like they were throwing money into a sinking ship. However, there must be some angle that I am not seeing.
My guess is Sprint will put in some sort of bid to take it over, when the timing is right. They own like 25-28%...? Thing is, Sprint isn't quite so healthy themselves. There were talks of them merging with someone (T-Mo?) last year.

The only fly in the ointment is that I read Qobuz may be making a move into the US, and they can stream lossless high-res without the smoke and mirrors of MQA. And there is always the back-burner idea of Spotify (or the others) adding lossless streaming. Plus, Tidal must have poor marketing--few know that you can buy both CD-res and high-res versions of albums as downloads from their store. Aligning themselves with the Hip Hop crowd IMHO is very detrimental also--a lot of people are turned off by that, being hit in the face with all that the moment they log in. It's almost as though they can't do much right these days! Digging their own grave, perhaps...but they're still here. Ideally we just need a better-managed Tidal. ;)
 
...throwing money into a sinking ship. However, there must be some angle that I am not seeing.
I had the same thought, uofmtiger. My wild guess: The executives and investors behind these services are probably presuming that the majority of listeners from the millennials forward have been conditioned to access music in a quick convenient, digital format at the click of a mouse/pointing device or via a smartphone or internet-connected device and will continue to do so indefinitely into the future. Despite recent talk of a resurgence in vinyl sales (driven primarily by retro nostalgia) and the supposed "death" of the Compact Disc, the overwhelming quantity of music today is consumed and listened to as digital singles presented primarily as .mp3s at an average bit rate of 256 kbps. They correctly surmise that this generation of listeners do not have the time, patience, or even attention span to actively listen to the average 45-50 minute album, use music as "background noise" during the course of their day-to-day existence, and simply may not deem it as important as previous generations of listeners. Since digitalization removes the tangibility of the product and thus reduces the desire to collect that historically has come with physical formats, music, from my point of view, has begun to lose its sense of "permenance" in regard to being something worth collecting for a lifetime. The majority of it has simply become short-lived streams of one and zeroes that are consumed in the moment and quickly forgotten about as they disappear into the ether of ever-cycling torrent sites and online file hosts or go up in smoke on crashed hard drives. This summer's "hot" single ends up being deleted from the SD card in one's phone to make space for this autumn's release.
 
I had the same thought, uofmtiger. My wild guess: The executives and investors behind these services are probably presuming that the majority of listeners from the millennials forward have been conditioned to access music in a quick convenient, digital format at the click of a mouse/pointing device or via a smartphone or internet-connected device and will continue to do so indefinitely into the future. Despite recent talk of a resurgence in vinyl sales (driven primarily by retro nostalgia) and the supposed "death" of the Compact Disc, the overwhelming quantity of music today is consumed and listened to as digital singles presented primarily as .mp3s at an average bit rate of 256 kbps. They correctly surmise that this generation of listeners do not have the time, patience, or even attention span to actively listen to the average 45-50 minute album, use music as "background noise" during the course of their day-to-day existence, and simply may not deem it as important as previous generations of listeners. Since digitalization removes the tangibility of the product and thus reduces the desire to collect that historically has come with physical formats, music, from my point of view, has begun to lose its sense of "permenance" in regard to being something worth collecting for a lifetime. The majority of it has simply become short-lived streams of one and zeroes that are consumed in the moment and quickly forgotten about as they disappear into the ether of ever-cycling torrent sites and online file hosts or go up in smoke on crashed hard drives. This summer's "hot" single ends up being deleted from the SD card in one's phone to make space for this autumn's release.
I don't disagree that streaming is the future. Though, I think having a library of 30 to 40 million songs instantly available no matter where you are or what you are doing has a lot to do with it. I think it has less to do with whether investors think the market wants to listen to an entire album or not. The 40 million songs are from millions of albums, so album only listeners aren't left out.

Obviously, the streaming market is growing:

"BuzzAngle Music found that nearly three times as many songs were streamed on an average 2017 day in the United States -- 1.67 billion -- than the 563.7 million tracks that were downloaded over the entire year.

Audio streaming grew overall by more than 50 percent in 2017 from the previous year.

In more good news for the industry, BuzzAngle Music said that 80 percent of audio streams came through subscription sites, as the music business encourages listeners to pay monthly rates rather than seek out songs for free online."

https://www.yahoo.com/news/music-sales-soar-us-streaming-takes-over-market-162651898.html


I am not making an argument against streaming. However, these stand alone companies like Spotify and Tidal are fighting an uphill battle when Apple, Google and Amazon are using their streaming services to help them make money elsewhere (hardware, ads, or easy purchasing of products...or a combination of those things). When you never make a profit and losses grow as they grow subscribers, it makes you wonder when the investor well of money will dry up. Maybe there is a break even point that these investors are banking on? If Spotify hasn't hit that number with their number of subscribers, then I am not sure how Tidal will.
 
I wonder sometimes how much the MQA adaptation has cost Tidal. It seems to need this to differentiate it's services, perhaps in order to survive the competition and just how many are subscribing to MQA to pay for it considering most people who are streaming would likely never be able to tell the difference.
 
I wonder sometimes how much the MQA adaptation has cost Tidal. It seems to need this to differentiate it's services, perhaps in order to survive the competition and just how many are subscribing to MQA to pay for it considering most people who are streaming would likely never be able to tell the difference.
I admire Tidal for wanting to tap into the audiophile market, but as others have mentioned, the app itself is built around rap and hip hop music. I don't know that many people that prefer that genre are as concerned about accurate sound as they are about big bass. They seem to be trying to connect with audiences that are typically polar opposites. If you look at the vinyl sales "resurgence", the albums that are selling are rock and older titles. I have seen on this forum and others, Tidal audiophile users complain about constantly having rap music on the main page when they have no interest in it. However, building a service on just the audiophiles would require them to charge even more per month.

Personally, I think they would be much more appealing to the mainstream audience if that lossless tier was not twice as expensive as the compressed audio tier. As you said, many would never be able to tell the difference and it isn't a " no brainer" situation to just get the higher tier for the occasion you might be listening on a system that might be able to resolve it. If you spend a lot of time listening on earbuds, in the car, at work, you are paying twice what you would pay to listen to other services and you aren't getting your money's worth. The number of people that sit around their stereos and listen intently is shrinking.

Heck, a while back, I was telling a coworker about SACDs because she had no clue what they were. I explained it and she said "I can't believe you have time to sit around and just listen to music". The guy that introduced me to this site (the late, great Russell Kishi), used to say we were "audio mutants". Hard to compete against Apple, Google, and Amazon if you only care about "audio mutants".
 
I have seen on this forum and others, Tidal audiophile users complain about constantly having rap music on the main page when they have no interest in it. However, building a service on just the audiophiles would require them to charge even more per month.

I'ts not that hard to go to the Genre one is interested in, 2 clicks from the splash page.
Since it's a music service for everyone, I fully expect to see stuff I'm not interested in and I don't mind the front page as It has no sound :p

Eric
 
I'ts not that hard to go to the Genre one is interested in, 2 clicks from the splash page.
Since it's a music service for everyone, I fully expect to see stuff I'm not interested in and I don't mind the front page as It has no sound :p

Eric
Yeah when I was a tidal subscriber that rap front page never bothered me either. The reason I left was the same as for the others. The interface was way too primitive for the way I like to listen. Coming from JRiver, with its sophisticated playlist/smartlist features, volume leveling, use of tagging etc, I found them all lacking for the way I like my music presented.

I have since come to realize that I probably like to listen a bit differently than most. I don't often listen to background music. I actually like the quiet when I am doing other things, but I suspect most streaming listeners just want something new always playing in the background.
 
I'ts not that hard to go to the Genre one is interested in, 2 clicks from the splash page.
Since it's a music service for everyone, I fully expect to see stuff I'm not interested in and I don't mind the front page as It has no sound :p

Eric
I see your point, but I have seen that mentioned several times. While it doesn't affect sound, it can affect the user experience.

Personally, I don't subscribe to Tidal because of the (double) price for minimal difference in sound, especially where I listen to most music. Also, I prefer Siri integration which makes it easier to choose music when I drive or I am out working in the yard. I have a 6 month trial right now, but I still mainly use Apple Music.
 
Personally, I don't subscribe to Tidal because of the (double) price for minimal difference in sound, especially where I listen to most music.
Would it be any more appealing if they had a tier priced 1/2 as much? Oh wait, they do. ;)
 
Would it be any more appealing if they had a tier priced 1/2 as much? Oh wait, they do. ;)
The only compelling feature for Tidal (for me) is lossless. Their cheaper plan loses that one compelling feature that offsets such an ugly app. No thank you!
 
The only compelling feature for Tidal (for me) is lossless. Their cheaper plan loses that one compelling feature that offsets such an ugly app. No thank you!
You preachin' to the choir brother. Thanks for clearing up that price is not the only reason you personally don't like Tidal.
 
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