Benign and/or sinister… Perhaps it’s a bit of both: Giving away 500 millions copies of a (now and for sometime, ‘Fortune 500’) band’s latest album had to be a mutually-crafted decision. After the commercial failure of their previous release, U2 has to be itching to reclaim their mojo (which unfortunately for them / longtime fans doesn’t seem to be the case). Conversely, the same thing could be said about iTunes (and in many respects about Apple in the post-Jobs era).
The end result? Thus far, the juries out. Nevertheless, it might’ve also been a flanking move to overshadow the fact that while potentially beneficial that the iWatch release is pending, it doesn’t overcome the simple fact that the eco-system for supporting it is (at this juncture) nascent at best.