Apple Has Terminated This Apple Music Feature For This Reason

Apple has finally bid goodbye to Apple Music Connect, a feature on its music and video streaming service that not a lot of people know about and used.

On Thursday, Apple (AAPL) issued a statement to artists who have accounts on the streaming platform to notify them about the removal of Apple Music Connect. “Today we’re streamlining music discovery by removing Connect posts from Artist Pages and For You,” an excerpt of the announcement shared online by 9to5Mac read.

Apple went on to say that all previously uploaded Connect content will remain on the platform until May 24, 2019. However, artists are no longer allowed to post updates from now on. In lieu of Connect, Apple said it is looking for new ways to help artists better connect to their fans.

Connect debuted with Apple Music when the service launched back in summer of 2015. It was intended to be a dedicated social feed where artists could post music, videos and photos, as well as directly interact with their fans.

Unfortunately, the feature did not gain ground from artists like what Apple initially hoped for. Tim Cook’s company consequently deemphasized Connect’s presence on the streaming platform by moving it from its dedicated tab to a more generic recommendation location within the app, as per Variety.

At launch, Connect was flooded with numerous content from various artists. However, only a few artists to update their accounts from time to time. Most haven’t updated their feed since the feature debuted. This also explains why the feature hasn’t been developed much since then.

Alongside the announcement that Connect is no more, Apple revealed that it has given Artist Pages an all-new design and that it has added a personalized Artist Radio to its Apple Music app. Moreover, the latest version of the app still allows users to create Artist Playlists.

This isn’t the first time Apple killed off a music-focused social networking feature from its apps. The tech giant notably shut down Ping, its previous social network for music, and removed it from iTunes back in October 2012, as pointed out by MacRumors.