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‘Oops, sorry about that:’ Bono responds to ‘Songs of Innocence’ iTunes deal

iTunes customers who didn’t watch Apple’s iPhone keynote last month were a bit surprised to discover that they suddenly owned a copy of U2’s new albumSongs of Innocence,” even though they’d never bought it. The band had partnered with Apple to add the album to every single iTunes account for free in what they called the largest album debut ever.

iTunes users were less than thrilled at the arrangement, noting that the album was being automatically downloaded to their devices in many cases and there was no way to remove it from their purchase history. Apple responded soon thereafter by releasing an online tool to remove the album, but thus far U2 has remained quiet on the issue… until today.

Today the members of the band released a video on Facebook in which they answered questions from fans about a variety of topics. Two and a half minutes in, a user named Harriet Madeline Jobson asked, “Can you please never release an album on iTunes that automatically downloads to peoples [sic] playlists ever again? It’s really rude.”

Bono took the question, opening his response with “oops, sorry about that.” He went on to call the plan “a beautiful idea” but noted that the band had probably “gotten away with ourselves.” The singer added that because there is so much “noise” in the music industry, the band “got a little noisy ourselves to get through it.”

[youtube http://youtu.be/t6x9LHKiSg0?t=2m20s]

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Comments

  1. Andrew Messenger - 9 years ago

    Did it download to peoples’ devices or did it just show up in their iCloud/purchase libraries?

    • MCPE news (@nawnp) - 9 years ago

      It showed up in purchases and they thought it was downloaded

    • iSRS - 9 years ago

      Depends. Some people have automatic download on. In this case it did download

    • lkernan - 9 years ago

      It did on mine due to the way my settings are set as normally I like to get my purchases straight away. Damn thing came down over the cellular connection too.

      • ɯıʞǝ (@ekim1406) - 9 years ago

        did you at one point allow downloads over cellular? thats the only way it would automatically download over cellular. otherwise it waits till it finds a good wifi connection.

      • lkernan - 9 years ago

        I know cellular downloads aren’t the default and that I knowingly turned them on.
        I was just annoyed that in this particular (and not likely to be repeated) case, they caused a download without my consent.

    • liquidnonsense - 9 years ago

      It automatically downloaded to my library. Normally I’d be upset too, but I thought the album was fairly good so I kept it haha

      • You’re 1 in a million or less.

      • Jonny Mack - 9 years ago

        It IS a good album. I enjoyed it. But I had to go find it, since we share our iTunes account in my family and I definitely have automatic downloads OFF. lol

    • Mr. Grey (@mister_grey) - 9 years ago

      It only downloaded to your devices if you set your preferences to automatic downloads, so it’s not really Apple’s fault at all, in any way.

      People today just can’t seem to live through the day without blaming someone for something. Stuff like this happening is like a flat tyre or a thunderstorm. But I’m sure if there was a way to blame someone else for those, most would attempt it as well.

      • Dean Har - 9 years ago

        The only files I want to automatically download to my devices are those that I myself downloaded or purchased… don’t think that’s such a crazy concept.

      • smigit - 9 years ago

        Sure, but people who set it to auto download prior to this knew what would be downloaded and what wouldn’t and when because they initiated the purchase and thus download themselves. The issue here was this control was removed from those users.

        I’m glad I got the album for free personally. That said, it could have been distributed in a manner that didn’t automatically associate it with an account, such as an email to customers with a redeem button. An email would have better informed customers that the album was available, as well as allowing those that didn’t want it to avoid it.

  2. Wes - 9 years ago

    Fiasco is an overstatement.
    Rude is also an overstatement.
    Imposing is even still a tiny bit of an overstatement.
    I’m not sure that I can overstate what a small issue this really was.
    If there was a background image or a ringtone on my phone that wasn’t to my liking, would I be offended? Would anyone be? Of course not. It would be ignored and unused.
    The amount of effort some people have put into figuring out how to be upset about this is monumental.

    • MCPE news (@nawnp) - 9 years ago

      there claim is when they have 1000 songs an extra 10 can make it harder to find things

    • irelandjnr - 9 years ago

      The rudeness is more about that it wasn’t asked for and thusly caused confusion for people who didn’t know about it. 2. There are others who didn’t know who you U2 were who were very confused. 3. There are people out there who dislike U2 who were angry that  would allow this to happen. It’s good that it was free, and it’s a nice gesture, but it smacks of a pretty un- move that it happened without user consent and given the reaction I suspect  hand learned their lesson this time round.

      • Wes - 9 years ago

        I certainly hope that they haven’t learned any lessons. The only lesson here is that some people are completely unreasonable and will be upset about something whether or not they have any reason to be, just because they like to be incensed.

      • Mr. Grey (@mister_grey) - 9 years ago

        This makes no sense. If a person has automatic downloads on, then they would know right away when they see the album that this is how it got in their iTunes. The very idea that people were “confused” or “angry” or “shocked” or any of that crap is just ridiculous.

        I think U2 sucks and I had automatic downloads on, so when I saw it in my iTunes you know what I did? I selected the tracks, right clicked, and picked “delete.”

        It was pretty rough it took, like … five or ten seconds to deal with this “fiasco.”

    • houstonche - 9 years ago

      It’s spam. It’s not what was given but how it was given. I agree it shouldn’t have been a fiasco. But I think rude is appropriate. Make it available for free, but don’t load up my harddrives.

    • Billy Graham - 9 years ago

      All spammer in the world must love you so much… would you mind sharing your credentials here?

    • dawqi - 9 years ago

      I can’t believe how apologetic people are with Apple. Of course it’s rude. One should know that the only thing to be downloaded is what one wants. That’s what automatic download is for. It’s hardly the user’s fault if Apple shoves somethng onto your computer you never asked for. Is that too much? Size of harddrive etc. don’t even enter into it. Are you guys so used to being abused already? I don’t like anybody shoving things up my b. even if it “only takes 5 secs” to remove it. Duh.
      Moreover: What if malware is distributed that way? Oh, it’s just another Apple stunt, oooops, sorry, it wasn’t…

    • Thank you.
      You are exactly right.

      I think it’s both people needing to get upset and also the fact that it’s ‘cool’ to diss U2.

      I don’t like U2, I saw the album in my library with the cloud logo, I was like “hmmm that’s kinda weird” and I never pressed it. If I had had automatic downloads I would have simply deleted it.

      But I also thought “Well there is a lot of people out there who love U2 and they will be very happy to have that, so I guess even though it’s inappropriate for me, good for them”

      And stop saying it’s spam please, spams don’t give you music albums for free or anything worth $9.99.

  3. Israel Molina - 9 years ago

    The last time they give us anything. How rude of people. Just say thank you and move on with your life. It was a nice gesture, and that is what counts. I appreciated the album, even though I am not an avid U2 listener.

    • Max Mars (@devianter) - 9 years ago

      a nice gesture is putting in free on the front page of iTunes store, not in my purchases. i couldn’t care less about U2 and that pretentious motherfucker bono.

      • Jon Stahler - 9 years ago

        But how could it possibly have hurt you? I don’t understand why people are so put off by this. I don’t care for U2 anymore either, but it’s not like it was a huge imposition. It was put in your purchases and you weren’t forced to listen to it. This is the epitome of first world problems.

      • thisisasticup - 9 years ago

        Pot calling the kettle black

    • Bob Smogango - 9 years ago

      I thought the album sucked, free or not. For the biggest band in rock spending 5 years on this is just a joke, no wonder they suckered Apple into releasing it the way they did. They wanted to guarantee success, even though the album sucked.

      The Beatles cranked out classic albums with great songwriting, performance and production a lot faster and a lot better, which makes them more valuable. I know Apple wants to boost iTunes sales and this was a way to get people into iTunes as a promotion, that’s fine, but U2 sucks because they released a turd and kind of suckered Apple into spending a lot of money to get it to be the biggest download album, even though it sucked. That’s what I find offensive. There are much less known bands/musicians that have much better albums that don’t try this promotional stunt.

      I just hate these over processed rock albums, they just suck. Too much technical processing and less songwriting and less focus on musicianship. That’s not what real music is all about.

      • irelandjnr - 9 years ago

        I agree that it sucked big time. The whole album seemed like an unfocused, jumbled mess. It’s like U2 doesn’t know who they are musically. And the songs don’t even seemed to be arranged in an kind of organic fashion. Feels desperate musically. U2s worst album to date.

    • Billy Graham - 9 years ago

      if they really want to give us something, apple could just send $10 ITUNES GC instead of that useless album. I bet no one will protest if that $10 appear suddenly in their acc.

      • SilentMajority - 9 years ago

        I just can’t believe people are so upset over this. It’s such a small thing… Who cares.

      • driverbenji - 9 years ago

        ingrate

  4. Steve Aldrich - 9 years ago

    “iTunes users were less than thrilled at the arrangement” should say “Not all iTunes users were less than thrilled at the arrangement”. Many were happy to receive the gift.

    • irelandjnr - 9 years ago

      Yes, many were happy and many were not and thusly it should have been free but optional. Problem solved.

    • driverbenji - 9 years ago

      I agree, that was not written well, I’m an iTunes user, and I was fine with it, free U2 album, yeah!. Should have read “SOME iTunes users were less than thrilled…” as it was a few making a loud noise about it, as everything on the internet these days.

      I worked customer service for years and one thing talked about in training is that customers that are happy will not voice it, but they will tell others about their experience, however it’s the ones that are not happy that are more likely to fill out the survey cards, and complain to the manager and etc. It’s only a few that make loud noises, which is amplified by the internet today in ways it wasn’t, even 5 years ago. Ridiculous.

  5. Harold Irizarry - 9 years ago

    I don’t find it rude Even tho i didn’t know such band existed. I never thought saying this, but im so hooked with this album…. it pissed me off at the beginning bc the songs would play automatically, but after getting used to it, i started liking the songs. OMG… lol.. i never thought it would happen but it happened. free stuff are always welcome :)

  6. Christine Infanger - 9 years ago

    Wes- I agree with you entirely. People with no problems wanted something to whine about. Using words like ‘victim’ and ‘violated’ to describe being given a free record, which could easily be ignored or deleted, is a gross exaggeration to put it mildly.

  7. b9bot - 9 years ago

    Some people just don’t appreciate anything even when it is given to them for free. If they forced you to buy it then I would complain, but not when it was free. You could easily remove it from your playlist and move on instead of whining like little babies. I’m not a fan either but it was a nice gesture on there part no matter what you think of them.

  8. Christine Infanger - 9 years ago

    Irelandjnr- Everyone *did* agree to it. When you clicked ‘Agree’ to Apple’s and iTunes’ terms and conditions you agreed to it.

  9. I’d bet so many of the people complaining about this were the very people who took full advantage of Napster and the like back in the day. And who probably continue to do so with torrents and whatever other options are available.

    We were happy to steal music before, but when given it, we whinge?

    Be at least thankful that it wasn’t with one of these modern processed bullshit ‘pop’ machines.

    • houstonche - 9 years ago

      its spam. Regardless of what it is. If it’s pushed on my without my consent, it’s spam. It’s like that roommate that moves out and leaves stuff because “they were thoughtful and thought you might like it”. Bullshit. ask, give the option, but don’t load it up on me.

      • houstonche - 9 years ago

        As a response to my initial post: To be fair, if it was an iPod few would complain. But people are weird with their music.

      • Mr. Grey (@mister_grey) - 9 years ago

        You sound like a real prize roommate and a wonderful human being. Christmas is soon, you will be able to complain about all the presents that are given to you by people who “didn’t ask you” first.

        Please take a video when you throw that sweater in your Mum’s face and yell SPAM! at the top of your lungs and then post it here. We’d all appreciate the laugh I think.

      • houstonche - 9 years ago

        wow I’m shocked that you completely missed the point there. I am an awesome person. I just don’t like being forced to take people’s trash. And I don’t want to be spammed by a company I love.

  10. theewolf - 9 years ago

    Mine was just in my iCloud library and though I am not a big U2 fan I downloaded it. No cuts, blood or blisters incurred when performing this action, with a bonus being its not a bad album!! People can blow things out of proportion. Take a breath, listen and chill!!

  11. PMZanetti - 9 years ago

    Making album freely available on iTunes woukd have been nice. Clogging up people’s libraries without asking was ridiculous.

    • standardpull - 9 years ago

      Funny, I didn’t think of the people that have a thin music library. With 2000+ songs in my library, a set of 10 tracks went completely unnoticeable. But I can see how people would definitely notice if they had a small music collection.

    • scumbolt2014 - 9 years ago

      You’re a dumbass.

      • houstonche - 9 years ago

        He’s right Don’t see what’s difficult for people to grasp. Whether it’s music or a virus, I don’t want it on my computer unless I explocitly said yes to it.

  12. scumbolt2014 - 9 years ago

    Sorry we gave everyone with an iTunes account our new album for free. Maybe it was a test to see how many whining bitches there are on the internet and in the world. If I were Bono I’sld tell everyone to fuck off.

  13. jedwards87 - 9 years ago

    My God people. It was a free album. It is not like Apple killed a family member. People get so worked up over the stupid stuff. I am not sure I have ever complained about getting something for free, but then again I work hard for everything I have so when someone wants to give me something, I appreciate it whether I wanted it or not. The younger crowd has the world owes me something with their entitlement mentality so you would have though they would have appreciate this offer by Apple and U2.

  14. Mr. Grey (@mister_grey) - 9 years ago

    What I get from this is basically just confirmation that U2 are a-holes as well as mediocre musicians. Way to back up your partner Apple that just made you a sh*t-ton of money.

  15. nwmike - 9 years ago

    How sad of people. They set up their account for automatic downloads and then they complain with a free album. So petty. You don’t deserve U2’s album.

    • Dean Har - 9 years ago

      Yes, an album they never consented to download. Automatic downloading allows the content you download on one device to be conveniently downloaded to all your other Apple devices. It’s suppose to be a personal tool

  16. Philip Vaticano - 9 years ago

    What’s this?…you get something for free worth $30-$35 from one of the hottest bands on Earth and your complaining?…If you don’t like it, just delete it and shut the hell up you pack of ungratefull Whingers…I don’t here anyone complaining when they get IOS or OS X for free…Go grab yourself a PC and pay hundreds for an inferior program you can’t get your head around…I’ll never go back…P.S: Thankyou U2 for an awesome album…I appreciate it…

    • houstonche - 9 years ago

      Then difference is when I come home iOS and OSX still requires me to say yes to updating before it does.

  17. Alex (@Metascover) - 9 years ago

    Except Harriet is a cunt since the album doesn’t download to playlists…

  18. Well at least he said sorry. Though it was a “fuck you asshole” smirk.
    Calling himself an artist and to use that ‘card’ as a pretence to “get carried away” just shows poor self control.

  19. Ken BigBear Morey - 9 years ago

    Am i the only person on the planet that didn’t mind the U2 album just showing up in my iTunes library??? Get over yourselves!!!

  20. DO NOT GET MAD FOR GETTING SOMETHING FOR FREE! IF YOU DON’T LIKE IT JUST SAY THANK YOU AND GO ON!

  21. driverbenji - 9 years ago

    “Did it download to peoples’ devices or did it just show up in their iCloud/purchase libraries?”

    “Depends. Some people have automatic download on. In this case it did download”

    “It did on mine due to the way my settings are set as normally I like to get my purchases straight away. Damn thing came down over the cellular connection too.”

    In the case of giving an album out for free, I think the solution would be for a prompt “do you want to download this album?” somehow added to an announcement that apple is giving the album out for free for a limited time, this needs to be somehow done with a popup or something next time they open the music app or iTunes.

    In reality, if someone is watching their cell data very closely so they don’t go over their monthly limit (so they won’t get overage charges), they should have cell data turned off for music downloads. Otherwise, they shouldn’t be complaining about something they are getting for FREE!

    Actually, part of the problem is that the default is for cell data to be on and automatic downloads I think is also on, this should be the opposite or explained or popup when first setting up the iPhone.

    The situation isn’t simple, unfortunately.

    IMO U2 did not need to apologize, not one bit, for giving away their album. Apple should have distributed it a bit differently, and they are the ones that should apologize, not for making it easy to get the free album, but, for anyone that it automatically downloaded over cell data without any prompt, that should not have happened. Apple should have at least announced the album would be available for free, and, I guess not put it in everyone’s iTunes library automatically. Not everyone watches or hears about Apple events, so only those that did knew ahead of time.

    People make a big deal of little things these days. My grandmother used to say God gave you two ears and one mouth for a reason. No one listens or tries to understand anymore, they just react.

  22. You know that free 10 pound phone book that gets thrown on your doorstep every year whether you like it or not that you have to pick up and dispose of yourself? Pain in the @ss isn’t it?

    U2 is that phone book.

  23. Michael Wright - 9 years ago

    You’d think of few of the complaining assholes had contracted Ebola from their iPhones instead of a great album by one of the biggest groups in the world…..[sic]

    Thank you (U2)

    I absolutely love “Songs of Innocence” and appreciate the marketing genius behind the launch.

    My only question is how did you guys get a percentage of the data fee’s used to download the album to someones Cell Account? If so, how delightfully evil.

  24. Rocky (@rockyguido) - 9 years ago

    You Know, this is why i cant stand some humans. You go ahead and try to do something nice by giving an Album (for free) by one of the most popular Rock bands in today’s modern time. And somehow by doing the kind gesture some Schmuck or C*!%$t always seems to find a wrong in it on how or why their rights got violated. These type of neanderthals would be complaining even if someone broke into their house and left them a million dollars. Damn clowns.

  25. vkd108 - 9 years ago

    Q: Why doesn’t Knobbo, sorry Bono, and his “buddys” get a one way ticket back to Northern Ireland and become a tireless activist in the Protestant-Catholic controversy, in a publicity- and propaganda-free way?

  26. Miguel Simoes - 9 years ago

    people should not claim to Apple for giving away music free to everyone. mostly they should claim to U2 to release such lousy CD, which in the stores would sell ZERO units