Lies, damn lies and statistics

33 million people have ‘accessed’ U2’s free album, according to Apple

That’s equivalent to the entire population of Morocco. Not actually the entire population of Morocco though. That would be odd.

16th September 2014

33 million people have ‘accessed’ U2’s free album ‘Songs of Innocence’, according to Apple.

The number, taken from a statement from Senior Vice President of the company Eddy Cue, includes users who downloaded the album from their iCloud account, streamed it or listened to it via iTunes radio. That means, of the 500 million plus people given the record, around 6.6% have actually accepted it to date - a number pretty close to the population of Morocco.

Not actually Morocco. Everyone in Morocco doesn’t listen to U2.

Another way to look at it - more people than currently live in the United States haven’t taken Apple up on their free U2 offer.

Apple has also released a tool to scrub ‘Songs of Innocence’ from your iTunes library with a single click.

Speaking to the BBC, spokesperson Adam Howorth explained: “Some customers asked for the ability to delete ‘Songs of Innocence’ from their library, so we set up itunes.com/soi-remove to let them easily do so. Any customer that needs additional help should contact AppleCare.”

“People who haven’t heard our music, or weren’t remotely interested, might play us for the first time because we’re in their library,” Bono wrote on the band’s site. “And for the people out there who have no interest in checking us out, look at it this way… the blood, sweat and tears of some Irish guys are in your junk mail.”

Tags: News, U2