The re-implementation yesterday of a two-year old policy which reduced the number of de-authorisations of devices attached to your Google Play Music account to a mere 4 per year, certainly caused a stir. Understandably, the policy is not at all popular in most users who regularly flash ROMs on their devices on a regular basis. itechtriad did a little digging overnight and discovered the reason behind the change and also what the future will bring.
While unfortunately Google hasn’t released an official statement, the team spoke to Google Play support who had some interesting things to say on why the policy was enacted – basically, it’s the music labels, or Google’s music partners as they called them. According to a Google Play support representative, the new policy is to limit abuse of the service – possibly to stop multiple people from sharing a single account across multiple devices. The rep advised :
We limit the number of times you can swap out new devices at the request of some of our music partners in an effort to limit abuse. We understand this has caused some issues for users who often deauthorize and reauthorize the same device, and we are currently re-implementing the solution in a way that works for our users and music partners.
But, all hope is not lost. Google is apparently working on a fix which they hope will appease Google Play Music users who have been affected by the new policy. The representative went on to say :
I can see how it can be frustrating. Just know that we are working on a fix for it, we just don’t have an estimated time of when that will be implemented.
I know we all just sharpened our pitchforks and lit our torches, but don’t go storming the castle just yet. There is a change to the policy coming. Exactly when the change is coming isn’t known, but it appears the Google mothership is aware of the unrest the change has caused and is looking at it. Hopefully the fix includes something that will make both users and the record labels happy.
What do you suggest would be the best solution which would appease both users and the record labels?
