Demand for an increase in music on Amazon Music has prompted the giant to add 100M+ songs to the platform. However, Prime members (already paying $139 a year) will have to listen to the songs on shuffle unless they fork over another $9 a month for “Amazon Music Unlimited.”
The change sparked outrage on the Internet as users took to Twitter to air their grievances against the company’s new policy.
Amazon expanded its music catalog to capitalize on an increased demand for a wider music selection among current members, Jamil Ghani, vice president of Amazon Prime, told the Wall Street Journal.Launched in 2007, Amazon Music jumped from 2 million to more than 68 million users globally, which is 10% of the total music streaming market, according to data from Earthweb.
Amazon Music performs well below its competitors like Apple Music and Spotify and this latest move won’t be closing that gap any time soon.