It’s fair to say that U2’s latest album won’t be to everybody’s tastes. Thankfully, based on a rather strong reaction to Apple’s latest giveaway the company has published a one-click solution remove it completely.
Last Tuesday there were a number of big announcements on stage at Apple’s big presentation. We met two new iPhones, a new smartwatch and just when we thought that was it, Tim Cook pulled a fast one on us all and wheeled Bono and his merry band of U2-ers out on stage. The final ‘surprise’ of the morning was the promise of the band’s latest album, ‘Songs of Innocence’ would be released, for free to every iTunes customer in the “largest album release in history”.
Well it turns out you can’t even give U2 away; the initial reaction in the auditorium was a round of forced applause, followed by a wave of displeasure hitting social media channels like Twitter.
Even I can’t delete this frigging U2 album from My cloud.
— God (@TheTweetOfGod) September 16, 2014
I can’t believe the #U2 album was automatically added to my phone without my permission…I don’t even want it. How can Apple do that?
— Savannah Wall (@sosavy) September 12, 2014
I think that U2 album still needs to be cheaper for me to download it.
— Trevor Moore (@itrevormoore) September 12, 2014
Part of iTunes customer’s disgust came from the fact that the album would automatically add itself to their music libraries and download to their iOS devices on the sly without question. Some might consider this an issue in privacy or user control, others just don’t want to listen to U2 and we can understand that. Really.
Eventually catching onto the collective disdain, six days after the album’s release, Apple published instructions on how to remove the album from user’s iTunes libraries, accounts and iOS devices, but as of today they’ve streamlined the process into a one-click solution.
On removing Songs of Innocence, you should be able to re-download it for free should you wish up until October 13th, after which it’ll become a conventional paid album purchase on the iTunes store.
Are you holding onto U2’s latest offering or sending it packing back to Apple? Who would you have liked Apple to partner with instead, let us know in the comments below.
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