Yesterday it was announced that Apple is acquiring Beats Music & Beats Electronics for around $3 billion. Apple doesn't really make many large acquisitions like this, so it has the sort of people who pay attention to these sorts of things really interested in what it could mean for Apple's future in music.
What we do know, however, is that Apple has stepped into the music video world (in a small way) by purchasing one of the largest music video product placers out there.
Remember when that guy was trying to warn LMFAO about the shufflin' epidemic in "Party Rock Anthem"? He gave them headphones to block out the music. Those were some Beats ear buds.
Remember when Miley turned up "We Can't Stop" at the beginning of the video on a little stereo? That was a Beats Pill stereo.
Lately, placement of the sentence-style playlist creator for Beats Music has shown up pretty often in videos:
It's worth noting that Apple has been doing this exact same thing for years now in tv shows and films with their computers and laptops. Clearly the two companies have similar views on brand building and where their target audiences want to see their products being used. I suspect that we'll see even more placement from Beats products now.
After all, Apple has been in the music video business for a while now. Over a decade ago when I was in college, I remember their archive of free music videos you could watch in iTunes. They started out with so few that they just had them in a list.
And now, iTunes is literally one of the few places anywhere where you can go and put down cash in exchange for a copy of a music video.
Some people are a little squeamish about product placement, but I say if companies like Beats can help support the production of music videos with non-obtrusive placement, productions that can should take advantage of it. Now with Beats being backed by one of the largest companies in the world that also happens to love product placement, I think there will be no shortage of opportunities to come.
