Peter Griffin and Emily Wang discuss apps designed to monitor your digital wellbeing, new cloud storage services launched by Google and Facebook, and YouTube's bid for an even bigger slice of the streaming music pie.
Scrolling while strolling? Photo: Photo by Zach Meaney on Unsplash
YouTube is taking on Spotify, Apple Music and Tidal as it aims for an even larger portion of the music streaming market.
According to the BBC, YouTube is already the most popular platform for streaming music in the world (excluding China) and accounts for 46 percent of all listening, with the site attracting more than one billion music fans every month.
But the music industry has never been all that happy about this, claiming that YouTube enables users to upload videos that infringe copyright, and the labels and the artists miss out on any royalties.
One billion monthly users sounds like a lot, but Google Play and the existing YouTube Red service reportedly have a combined user base of 7 million paying customers. This compares to Spotify with 75 million subscribers, Apple Music with 42 million paid subscribers with a further 8 million taking advantage of its free three-month trial.
New Zealand is one of five countries where YouTube's streaming service YouTube Music will launch - alongside the US, Australia, Mexico, and South Korea.
The existing paid-for YouTube Red service will be rebranded as as YouTube Premium, which will include access to all YouTube Originals as well as YouTube Music for US$11.99 a month. The price paid by current YouTube Red subscribers won't change.
In other news, with Google and Facebook launching new cloud storage services, the fight is on to host your photos, videos and even your voice messages.
So why is this important? We find out. You can check out a good comparison of the pricing on offer here.
And Emily looks at apps designed to monitor your digital wellbeing. How long are you actually spending on Instagram or Facebook (the results may astound you!), and why is Silicon Valley rolling out tools to help you monitor your tech usage?
The apps and services we discuss are at: Forest, RescueTime, AntiSocial, Circle with Disney and Google Family Link.
