Taylor Swift to launch her own streaming service?

After past squabbles with Spotify and Apple Music, Taylor Swift might have found a way to conquer the music industry after all. Reports overnight claim that the singer is about to launch a streaming service to be called Swifties.

She has made a trademark application for it, says the TMZ site.

It reports Swift has “filed docs giving her the right to brand a website ‘featuring non-downloadable multi-media content in the nature of audio recordings.’"

TMZ says that streaming is just the start of this empire building.

It will include music products as “guitars, guitar picks, guitar straps and drumsticks,” as well as merchandise covering handbags, and apparel. organized retreats, online educational courses, and more.

Swift has long emphasised the need to control her art to be suitably rewarded financially.

In 2014, when she famously pulled her music from Spotify, she penned an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, saying: “It’s my opinion that music should not be free, and my prediction is that individual artists and their labels will someday decide what an album’s price point is. 

“I hope they don’t underestimate themselves or undervalue their art.”

In 2016, Swift, along with Paul McCartney, Vince Staples, and the Kings of Leon, signed an open letter to Congress negotiating with YouTube over the rights to their music.