Today’s (9/13/2016) Wall Street Journal:
Title of article is:
Jay-Z’s Music Streaming Service Tidal Posts Huge Loss in 2015
Cash burn shows the challenge the music-streaming service faces in competing with rivals Spotify and Apple Music
I suspect something will have to happen with Tidal over the next 6 months…what that will be I have no idea.
IMO, aside from offering lossless playback, Tidal is outclassed by several other streaming options. And at roughly 2x the subscription price for lossless playback, they may be the most expensive option too.
Hopefully someone else will take over and fix Tidal, or another company (like Deezer) will offer lossless playback AND integration with Roon. If Roon’s radio feature worked with a streaming service’s library, I’d be one happy camper!
But at the moment it’s the only streaming service working with Roon.
So, as long as Roon didn’t integrate another streaming service - “long live Tidal” 
PS: I don’t really like Tidal, especially because they recomment music THEY like and not Music I like. But I love the way it is integrated in Roon.
I’d love to see Tidal tie up with Pono, offering hi-res downloads and CD quality lossless streaming, but I think that’s far too much to hope for at this point. Spotify doesn’t have the cash to buy Tidal, at least until a successful IPO occurs. If Apple were to cut a deal for Tidal, I expect that they would migrate the subscriber accounts to Apple Music and EOL Tidal like they did Beats Music. I’d love to be proven wrong, but I just don’t see Apple getting beyond “good enough” AAC lossy streaming without a legitimate lossless / hi-res competitive threat emerging.
If true, this is kind of scary:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3787181/Jay-Zs-streaming-service-Tidal-posts-huge-losses.html
Sorry, just saw this was already posted. Should have scrolled up.
I have been reading lately that Tidal is losing money big time. I am sure that there is a limit as to what Jay-Z is willing to pour into the company before calling it quits. So what happens to Roon and the type of service provided with the help of Tidal IF Tidal is liquidated? Is there a Plan B?
I bought a lifetime membership (I treated it more as a “kickstarter” contribution in my mind) purely as a mechanism for playing my own music. It’s worth it for that purpose. (I’m an old guy, so “possessing” my music collection is part of my psyche.) But when I try to use streaming services, I get burned all the time. One month, I’ll have albums from an artist and can play, etc. Next month, some of the albums aren’t available or only one or two songs from the album. For me, I can’t get past this idea of sometime you have it, sometimes you don’t. Plus I’m about 99.9% convinced that none of these streaming services will actually survive long term (more than 5 years). But that’s why I have about 7,000 CDs (ripped to FLAC) and still by a few dozen every month.
All the streaming services are losing money. Spotify is hemmorhaging the stuff by the bucketfuls. Love Tidal, but if it goes away I will just buy more CDs. Long live Roon.
Deezer might be a good integration. Their Elite service is CD quality.
I also read that Pandora is going to update their services, and offer music selection options versus just being a radio station. Having some options other than Tidal is important given the potential for Tidal being sold off.
PS: I don’t really like Tidal, especially because they recomment music THEY like and not Music I like. But I love the way it is integrated in Roon.
Yeah, this. Exactly this. I get stuck with what I call “music/artists Jay-Z likes”.
Pandora has (in my experience) a pretty good radio. If they had CD quality and an extensive library, that could work. Same with Deezer, but I think Deezer CD quality is tied up for a while longer with Sonos exclusivity.
As we’re talking about the general streaming landscape, I’ll state my general position which is that I think it’s a flash in the pan. It’s not economically sustainable in the way it’s currently thought of, neither for streaming companies, record companies, nor artists.
If you care about your music, buy it in some form.
While having to accept the sense of that general position, in particular as to artists, I have to say it has been terrific fun to have the equivalent of a cd shop in my lounge. I fully intend to go on enjoying the heck out of it while it lasts. My list of cd purchases should Tidal integration cease will be quite different from what I previously purchased.
For those looking to discover new music with Tidal; forget the new releases etc. it’s a lost cause. I find going directly to Tidal/Genre or using Roon’s “similar to” and “influenced by” links very productive. Also what people are listening to in our own Roon user’s thread has always been a great starting place to find music for me.
Sure, having Tidal is great, and I use it loads. But it just needs to be considered in the right perspective.
I hope that if Tidal were to disappear, that Roon would have a contingency plan not just for a new service, but for a means by which we can transfer our Tidal libraries over to an alternative in one click (as far as the services provide the same material).
exactly!
and this is one more reason why I like Qobuz: my annual subscriptions largely pays by itself with the discounts I get when purchasing hi-res material 
Deezer Elite would be the perfect alternative to Tidal assuming they move away from their exclusive with
Sonos.
That’s exactly the way i use qobuz aswel listen and buy with a discount 
the best part is that it’s a lot cheaper then hdtracks aswel.
So it’s almost definitely going to happen then 
then they’ll either:
