I opened Spotify this morning to be greeted by a modal popup with a “sponsored recommendation”.

Why am I seeing ads if I’m already paying for the premium plan!? 😑

  • Loom In Essence
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    3111 months ago

    Spotify is garbage. You pay them to basically pirate unlimited music (they pay table scraps). They have no values or integrity, but they do have a greedy business model.

    I buy albums off bandcamp instead. Or from the artist’s site directly.

    • TheProtagonist
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      2711 months ago

      A bit difficult if you want to just stream random music that somehow matches your interests.

          • @[email protected]
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            111 months ago

            Soundcloud is one! Some artists let you download their music and others don’t. Other than than Soundcloud isn’t open source, I don’t see what’s wrong with them.

          • @[email protected]
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            11 months ago

            I’ve been enjoying apple music on Android (the audacity, I know) mainly for family plan convenience. I used to use Tidal, back when it was the only one offering higher quality audio. Now that’s more common.

            However I do miss a few things from Tidal. It had full credits for albums and songs like a CD would have had. And when you’re on a track and go to the artist it will let you pick which one you want if there’s features or a collab. Apple Music will just automatically take you to the page of the first artist listed. So that’s something to consider especially if you’re into hip-hop.

            There’s many options though and they pretty much all pay artists more than Spotify does too.

      • Loom In Essence
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        -311 months ago

        If you’re going to p1r@te, you don’t have to pay sp0tify to do it…

        • @[email protected]
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          311 months ago

          That doesn’t really fix the “somehow matches your interests” part of their need. Your torrent software isn’t able to track your listening habits and recommend things that other people with similar habits also liked.

          • Cryptic Fawn
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            111 months ago

            Pandora is still around and does a decent job finding new music based off listening habits.

        • @[email protected]
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          211 months ago

          I’m not going to deal with a seed box and a ton of pain in the ass steps in between to listen to music. I’d rather pay Spotify or Amazon or Google or any of the other providers because of the convenience factor.

          Also owning music isn’t something I particularly care about. Games, maybe, but music is so broad that I’ll just listen to something else.

          • Loom In Essence
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            111 months ago

            WTF is a seedbox?

            I have no trouble listening to unlimited music, it’s literally everywhere.

            Plus it’s not just about owning the album (although I absolutely insist on listening on whichever device I choose). It’s also about paying the artist.

            Sp0tify pays peanuts. When I buy the album from the band’s site or bandcamp they get a hell of a lot more money from me. And I want to support them.

            You cannot support any artist through Spotify.

            • @[email protected]
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              311 months ago

              How I have to torrent cause my isp will cancel service over it.

              If you’re pirating you’re not paying the artist at all. Spotify is better than pirating.

                • @[email protected]
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                  011 months ago

                  You’re advocating for piracy explicitly

                  If you’re going to p1r@te, you don’t have to pay sp0tify to do it…

                  • Loom In Essence
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                    011 months ago

                    I’m advocating using Bandcamp where the artist actually gets paid. Spotify is piracy, and I’m discouraging that.

                    Go to bandcamp and buy the actual album.

          • @[email protected]
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            111 months ago

            There are patches like spicetify which can do that and way more than just adblocking with a ton of customisation if that’s what you’re looking for

    • @[email protected]
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      1511 months ago

      Bandcamp is DRM-free, so whatever you buy there, you truly own it. Unlike on most other platforms.

        • @[email protected]
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          11 months ago

          Wow, you are right! I was confused about iTunes, because it seems to require an app, but it is DRM-free and so is Amazon Music. That’s great! So I guess only Spotify has DRM.

          • @[email protected]
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            111 months ago

            All the streaming services use DRM, it’s just download stores that are DRM-free. Which makes sense, when you buy an album, you should own it.

            • @[email protected]
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              111 months ago

              I see, that makes sense. But I also think that every content that you have paid to access should be DRM-free, so even in a streaming service.

    • @[email protected]
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      1211 months ago

      It’s personally a catch 22 for me.

      I listen to an absolutely absurd amounts of different artists. A large portion of them simply don’t have albums available for purchase and if they did… I would actually go broke buying all the stuff I listen to.

      Every single day I type in a Combo of 2 random letters and numbers into spotify and listen to the first artist I don’t recognize.

      It really sucks that Spotify doesn’t pay the artists anything reasonable but I haven’t found an alternative that allows me to consume as much different music as I currently do.

      This isn’t even including the podcasts and audio books into the equation.

    • @[email protected]
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      311 months ago

      Honestly it’s a shame that most good music pirating sites have gone to the shitter, literally the only way to actually pirate and own music I could find via searching vigorously was through youtube to MP3 converters.

    • N-E-N
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      111 months ago

      Greedy business model seems slightly unfair tbh. Spotify struggles to remain profitable and they’ve only raised their prices by like $1 in a decade

      • Final Remix
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        411 months ago

        Maybe they shouldn’t’ve thrown so much money into the pivot to podcasts, then thrown a bunch of money at that meathead idiot.

      • Loom In Essence
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        311 months ago

        Just because they’re incompetent doesn’t mean they’re not greedy.

        Also, executives can still be cleaning up even as the company struggles to profit.

        • N-E-N
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          011 months ago

          Executives being greedy isn’t the same as a greedy business model

          • Loom In Essence
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            -111 months ago

            This makes no sense. Greedy execs are the ones who would implement a greedy business model to pursue their greed.

            • @[email protected]
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              111 months ago

              What part of the executive compensation package are you taking specific issue with exactly? From what I could see, they’re largely paid in stock and the CEO hasn’t taken a bonus since COVID.

              Or are you just talking executives in general and not looking at what Spotify does specifically?

              • Loom In Essence
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                111 months ago

                So they’re incompetent on top of greedy. They’re selling access to everybody’s music and paying peanuts.

      • @[email protected]
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        111 months ago

        yeah, it’s not spotify’s fault that splitting $10/month between all the music you listen to doesn’t pay the artists very much.

        • N-E-N
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          111 months ago

          Yea, companies that pay more typically either charge more (Tidal) or have the advantage of a massive profitable company backing them (Apple Music)