Jay Z’s App Problem

Hova’s new album, Magna Carta Holy Grail, had a corresponding application that was downloadable to Samsung smartphones.

It was available five days before the record dropped and allowed the user to get the album at midnight July 4. Pretty simple stuff, and approximately 1.2 million copies of the app were downloaded, according to the Wall Street Journal. However, there were delays downloading the music, and frustrated users reopened the app repeatedly, causing data requests to swamp Samsung’s servers, the paper said.

But that wasn’t all. The app drew criticism for mining a nearly NSA level of information.

For instance, to download the music, the app requested the user’s physical location and data related to their phone calls. It also asked users to sign on to Twitter or Facebook, then would send out information to the social networks whenever the user accessed app features, like song lyrics.

One of Jay-Z’s managers said it was much ado about nothing, and Jay Z’s spokeswoman had no comment. However, Hova himself sent out a tweet that said “must do better.” The tweet was removed.

The music industry is reportedly keeping a close eye on the situation because apps are believed to be the future of music distribution, and Lady Gaga is next on the list to give it a shot.