Google is merging its Google Play Music services with YouTube Red to create a unified music streaming app. The decision is partly due to the complicated ecosystem YouTube has created since launching YouTube Red in 2015, a subscription service that offers ad-free videos, offline saving and access to Google Play Music.

YouTube Red was followed by YouTube Music that same year, which offered songs with or without video for free but required a Red subscription to take advantage of its ad-free services. These services have seen very few takers when considering the population that visits YouTube on a daily basis and its limited availability.

Apart from this, Lyor Cohen, YouTube’s head of music reveals that the company also plans to collaborate more directly with music labels and right holders, saying: “In my mind, the missing piece on building these businesses is collaborating with the (music) industry, and not just making deals and going away just to see how it works,”

Merger talks began back in February when Google announced it was combining the teams behind YouTube Red and Google Play Music to create a single app. However the ‘how’ and ‘what’ of the eventual service turns out to be is still unknown.

Source: Gadgets 360

Image: The Mary Sue