Popular European music streaming service Spotify today announced a major new initiative to take on Apple's iTunes, launching a new download service and software support for syncing music to non-iOS iPods.
You've been telling us how much you love discovering, sharing and talking about music in Spotify - and you've created well over 200 million playlists to prove it. But you've also said you're listening to a huge amount of music on your iPods, and that getting your Spotify playlists onto them as MP3s has been a serious hassle, forcing you to juggle multiple music players. That's until now...
As of today, Spotify is making it possible for everyone to take their playlists with them in one lean, green music machine.
The new download service allows users to purchase entire playlists with a single click, bundling tracks to lower costs to as little as 50p per song. The Spotify software also now directly syncs with all iPod classic, iPod nano, and iPod shuffle models, with the device simply showing up in the Spotify sidebar when connected via USB.
Finally, Spotify has opened up its iPhone and Android apps to all Spotify users, expanding on the original Premium access to offer to all users support for wireless syncing of playlists.
Spotify has missed a number goal dates for launching its service in the United States as it has struggled to reach agreements with major music labels. The company has, however, finally struck deals with EMI and Sony, moving it closer to securing the consent of the four major labels essentially required to debut in the U.S. Universal and Warner Music represent the two major labels not yet on board with Spotify's plans.
Top Rated Comments
Back in the day, I used to buy a lot of CDs - probably 8 a month. It was a pretty hefty financial outlay and, to be honest, a pretty big waste of money. Very few CDs got more than a few listens and only the odd track here and there became a real favourite. Sometimes I felt I was only giving a CD repeat listens to justify the money spent.
With Spotify, I can listen to whatever I want, whenever I want. I can listen through the week's new releases on a Monday morning, check out stuff that gets good reviews when I stumble across them, listen to the whole of a track I heard a snippet of in an advert etc. Mostly, they get one listen and are forgotten but a few make it to a playlist and a few of those become proper favourites.
The cost is 10% of what I used to spend on CDs in a month and I listen to far more music than ever. Played through my hi-fi it sounds pretty indistinguishable from CD quality, it's easy to copy albums and playlists to my iPhone to carry around with me and it works abroad when I travel.
I just can't imagine going back to buying a couple of CDs or downloading 10 or so tracks from iTunes each month for the same money.
Until spotify changes its business model or closes altogether, after which all the money you put into music has now disappeared and you have no music.
Do you pay for Cable/Satellite TV?A lot of people do.
Paying for Spotify is like paying for Cable TV instead of buying shows on DVD.
You don't get to keep anything after you cancel your subscription with either model - you are paying to use the service for one month, nothing more.
1) Support for non iOS devices is limited to songs you've bought through the download service or MP3s you already own, i.e. you can only sync songs you've purchased, not offline streaming playlists like you can on iOS if you are a premium member
2) Although non premium members can now access the iOS application, they'll only be able to play songs that they've purchased through the download service or MP3s they already own (i.e. no streaming or offline playlists)
So all this update really does is allow users to buy music from an alternative source to Amazon, iTunes, etc and then sync it to an iPod or iOS device. Hardly revolutionary ;)
Which, essentially, makes it Pandora that you don't need an internet connection for.
It's nothing like Pandora.I'll stick with the free service.
For starters Pandora isn't available where Spotify is and vice versa.
You don't get any control over what Pandora plays (Spotify lets you choose specific songs to play).