Opinions on the internet: a dime a dozen! But I figured there was an interesting thing about Apple buying Beats that not many people have touched on, purely by looking at it from an advertising standpoint. It’s professional bias of course but throwing it out there into the mix.

First off, there’s something to get out of the way: for me, this isn’t about the headphones, even though they’re a significant reason. I don’t think Beats are crap personally and have always taken issue with sound and how people interpret it, mainly because it’s such a subjective issue, despite the fact that sound quality can be measured and tested.

“If a tree falls in the woods, does it make a sound?”

Everyone likes the question, but they rarely seem to think about the answer: vibration turns into sound if there’s an eardrum nearby. No eardrum, no sound. We don’t all interpret sound the same, just like no two brains are alike or no two people taste wine the same. There’s a reason we have the term qualia to describe the individual instances of subjective, conscious experience. It’s not a romantic view of things, but not even two lovers looking at the same sunset see and feel the same thing.

You could be introduced to the World’s Best Audio by people who know quality and are able to hear the difference, but in the nicest possible way all you might be able think of is “good for you — I can’t.” Past a certain point, it really does all sound the same and you can’t will yourself to hear something you don’t. You could lie, though: after all, knowledge is usually entwined with someone’s sense of identity as music expert. To say that their level of expertise is moot even if it only applies to you is akin to social suicide.

Beats thought Apple headphones sucked too. They made headphones that weren’t ‘right’, but “were tuned to make the music sound more dramatic to recreate the excitement of being in the studio. That’s why people listen” (emphasis mine). Audiophiles think Beats suck too, while others hate them purely because of the aesthetics: they are this Ugg boot of headphones. Either way, millions of people never evolve from default Apple headphones, no matter how bad some might think they sound. It’s not that they’re stupid or not musically educated (though some might switch if they were made aware of this and cared enough), but as Ben says, “most people care more about style, brand, and what sounds good “to them” than they do technical quality.” Knowing your customer, in other words. So what do they know now?

The most exciting thing about the Apple and Beats marriage is the access it will have to people’s music, location, and patterns in listening habits.

The audience is great, the whole business is a smooth operation and having Jimmy Iovine is a fantastic thing, but context and behaviours are so much more interesting.

As Wired reported not long ago, your age, sex, the volume you play music at, the devices you use (it tracks what you send to Airplay speakers) and whether you’re at home or at work matters to Beats. The Beats music streaming service creates what they call a “music DNA” to determine which albums and tracks would be most relevant to you. It’s not just about dealing with the decreasing market for downloads though.

Apple now has all that information plus a lot of other data sources from devices themselves: your location and weather (do you listen to happy music when it’s warm outside?), your iTunes purchase history, listening history, what other apps you’re using, how often and how long and so much more. You’re then sort of able to predict when people are happy, when they are sad, and if you look at it through an advertising lens — you know whether they are receptive to messaging or not and when.

A lot of brands I know would kill for musical profiles.

They would love to know more about their users than a media agency could ever tell them. If you have a shop or network of shops, you can change the store music to match what is popular in the area or shoppers actually like listening to with data to back it up and encourage more checkouts. Bars have known this fuzzily for some time: loud music makes you drink more in less time because you can’t talk to others over it. For instance, if you’re someone like O2 Priority and offer exclusive access to gigs and content, you might rethink the kind of acts you sign up and what you offer.

There are endless possibilities: brand identity also revolves around sound branding: not only would you be able to change existing ones, but potentially create new brands that revolve only around this dimension. Someone’s value and lifetime value are also crucial: if you partner with the right people, you could find out if they spend money on tickets to see bands live, frequent some shops over others, and that’s only scratching on the surface.