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Tag: Spotify

  • Here, Listen to the Bonnaroo 2014 Spotify Playlist

    If you’ve been a fixture on the Bonnaroo forums and reddit threads as of late, yesterday’s big lineup announcement (stylized as #BLAM) didn’t produce too many shockers–at least not in the upper echelon of acts.

    This year’s headliners include Elton John, Kanye West (2008’s pariah), Jack White, Lionel Ritchie (Hello?), and Vampire Weekend. Bonnaroo announced 100+ acts yesterday, and there are more to come. For the complete lineup as it stands, check here.

    But for now, per usual, the folks at Bonnaroo have prepared a Spotify playlist to help get you familiar with/re-familiarize yourself with all of the musicians coming to Manchester in June. It’s basically one popular track from each artist. Have a crack at it:

    Bonnaroo will kick off on June 12th and wind down on the 15th. If you can’t bear the 90ºF+ temperatures and sweaty campers, much of the festival will be streaming, live, on your Xbox.

    Image via Bonnaroo, YouTube

  • One Direction Named Top Band Of 2013

    One Direction Named Top Band Of 2013

    One Direction, the British boy band that took the world by storm after appearing together during the 2010 season of X Factor, was named the Global Recording Artists of 2013 by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, on Wednesday.

    The IFPI represents the music business all around the world, and, for the first year, included streaming numbers, along with downloads and physical purchases, when determining the winner of the award.

    “Streaming has become so much more mainstream within the music industry worldwide over the last couple of years we thought it was time we integrated the streams-on services such as Deezer and Spotify and YouTube as well,” Alex Jacob, the IFPI communications manager said.

    “Many congratulations to One Direction who topped a talented field to become the IFPI Global Recording Artists of 2013,” said chief executive of IFPI Frances Moore. “This is a global IFPI award for a new era of music consumption, based on a new metric of global success. Our chart for the first time measures the popularity of artists across the many different ways in which fans choose their music.”

    One Direction released their third studio album Midnight Memories last year, and it instantly rose to the top of the Billboard Top 200 chart. The band has also had success on YouTube. Their single Best Song Ever received more than 200 million views, while Story of My Life recorded nearly 100 million.

    “Incredible news,” band member Niall Horan said. “It’s great to have a chart that includes everything from iTunes and record stores, to YouTube and Spotify. Again a huge thank you to all of our fans for such an amazing 2013.”

    Eninem came in second, behind One Direction, with Justin Timberlake in third. Bruno Mars and Katy Perry rounded off the top five.

    Image via Twitter

  • Forgotify Wants to Get All Those Unplayed Spotify Songs a Listen

    Forgotify Wants to Get All Those Unplayed Spotify Songs a Listen

    Back in October, music-streaming app Spotify published a blog post celebrating its 5th birthday. That post contained a bunch of stats about the first 5 years of operation, and one in particular struck a chord (or failed to, I guess). We looked through the data and saw that Spotify claimed only 80% of the over 20 million songs available on the service had been streamed at least once.

    Do some incredibly easy math and you find that 20% of the songs on Spotify have never been streamed. Never. Not ever. Not even once. How sad, right?

    Well, a new web app is looking to change that and give all these perviously unheard tracks their one moment to infect someone’s ears.

    It’s called Forgotify, and it allows users to cycle through the roughly 4 million songs on Spotify that have never been played. Once it’s been heard, it’ll vanish from the Forgotify rotation.

    On reddit, one of the people associated with the site says that “essentially all the songs belong to a sort of playlist, and we’ll refresh that playlist daily (if not more frequently), to keep only the songs with 0 plays.”

    That means that if successful, Forgotify will give every song on Spotify at least one listen.

    Of course, some tracks are unplayed for a reason – they simply don’t have the fan bases of let’s say, a more culturally relevant genre.

    Taking a trip through the reddit thread on the service leads to to believe that people are stumbling upon some pretty obscure stuff. “African chants, obscure polka, and tons of opera,” says one user. “I just found a huge album of just machinery noises…” says another.

    There are even some reports of “hippo sex noises.” Someone found an actual AA meeting on record.

    Give it a shot. I know you’re just thinking about spinning Yeezus for the 457th time anyway.

    Images via Forgotify

  • Spotify Lets Artists Hawk Merch, For Free, Directly on Their Pages

    Spotify has just announced that artists can now list their merchandise directly on their artist pages, allowing them to link to any existing merch site – all for free.

    Through a partnership with Topspin, Spotify is looking to attract more artists to the service by letting them generate additional income with no additional cost. The Spotify/Topspin merch feature also allows artists to continue selling their t-shirts, posters, vinyl, etc. in the way they’re used to doing it. All artists have to do is create a Topspin ArtistLink account and verify the merch URLs. Now, when a listener is on an artist’s page, they’ll see links taking them to whichever merch site the artist wants.

    There is currently a limit – only 3 items of merchandise can be listed on Spotify at any given time.

    “We’ve been testing this merchandise functionality with a number of artists over the last month and the response from fans has been fantastic. We’re really excited that Spotify’s 24 million music-loving users can now see merchandise and concerts while listening to their favorite artists, and that we, in turn, can provide additional revenue opportunities for artists of all sizes,” says Spotify’s Mark Williamson.

    Those “additional revenues” that Spotify talks about could be the difference in whether or not a new artist chooses to make their music available on the service – as you’re surely well-aware of the reputation Spotify has in some circles concerning how much they actually pay artists per song.

    As of now, merch listings are only available for English-speaking countries. That means the U.S., U.K., Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Iceland. Additional language support will come eventually, according to Spotify.

    Image via Spotify Artists Blog

  • Rdio Goes Free (Ad-Supported) on the Web

    Rdio Goes Free (Ad-Supported) on the Web

    In a move to boost its competitiveness in a crowded field of streaming music services, Rdio has just announced that anyone can stream any song in its library for free on the web.

    “[S]tarting today Rdio is free in the U.S. on the web. That means you can listen to 20 million songs plus all the albums, playlists, and stations you love anywhere there’s a computer. Absolutely free,” says Rdio.

    It’s important to note that this is only for web streaming. If you want free mobile streaming, you’re going to have to opt for Rdio Unlimited, the company’s paid option that gives you mobile on-demand streaming and is ad-free (it’ll run you $9.99). Rdio Free allows you to listen to music via mobile, but only stations.

    Of course, with “free” streaming services come ads. Here’s how Rdio explains theirs:

    “As part of this update, we’ve added in-stream messaging to Rdio on the web. These new ads are short and sweet. Free listeners will hear a mix of new feature announcements, messages from partner brands, notifications about exclusive content, and other helpful tips.”

    Nothing you’re unfamiliar with.

    The timing of this announcement seems deliberate when you know what rival Spotify recently unveiled. Yesterday, Spotify got rid of streaming time restrictions in all markets across all platforms, and just last month they decided to offer free mobile streaming for the first time ever.

    Image via Rdio

  • Spotify Gets Rid of Streaming Time Restrictions in All Markets Across All Platforms

    Spotify Gets Rid of Streaming Time Restrictions in All Markets Across All Platforms

    if you’re a Spotify free user in some markets, you’re most likely well-aware of time limits on streaming. After you pass that 6-month “grace period,” Spotify begins to limit your listening time – at least until now.

    Spotify has just announced that there are now no more time limits – this applies to all markets and runs across all platforms.

    “There have never been any time limits in place in the U.S., but in some other markets, we had to restrict your listening time to some hours a month once a 6-month unlimited grace period had passed. But now, if you haven’t noticed, there’s no more time limit if you are using Spotify for free. We have removed these caps completely across all platforms – you can listen to your favorite songs as many times as you like, for as long as you want…That’s right, no more time limits,” says Spotify’s Diego Planas Rego.

    This news comes on the heels of the company’s decision to offer free mobile streaming for the first time. Before December, Spotify free users could not stream music on their mobile devices.

    Although today’s announcement doesn’t change much for users in the U.S., it does make a huge difference to Spotify users in some of the company’s other 54 markets. The company is, without a doubt, making their free service more attractive to potential users in a crowded field that’s quickly becoming more crowded.

    Take for instance Beats Music (yes, the headphones people), which is set to launch in just a few days.

    Spotify has just over 24 million total users, 6 million of which pay for the service.

    Image via Spotify

  • Spotify Welcomes Led Zeppelin and New Streaming Options

    Spotify is spreading some Christmas cheer a little early this year with their newest announcement welcoming Led Zeppelin’s iconic music to their vast, public library.

    The exciting news was first announced Dec. 11 by Spotify’s Daniel Ek at a press conference in New York City.

    This is huge news for classic music junkies considering they’re one of the last major bands to agree to streaming services. Zeppelin released their catalog to iTunes in 2007 and have been diligently holding on tight to their rights through song streaming.

    The Led Zeppelin release commenced two days ago and will continue through Dec. 15th. The 15th is is devoted to six album stream drops: The Song Remains the Same, Coda, BBC Sessions, How the West Was Won, Mothershipand Celebration Day.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iN5XevNGuus&list=PLD9A088010D2CCE99

    Along with the Zeppelin streaming news, it was also announced that mobile devices will now have a free streaming option just like desktop users do in hopes of extending the site’s musical impact as well as usage.

    Don’t have a tablet or iPad? Ask for one for Christmas because Spotify is now allowing its users (with a tablet computer) to listen to music on demand for free. That means all those personal playlists and favorites can be taken with you and listened to everywhere.

    On cell phones, free users can listen in shuffle mode to their playlists and to songs by any artist available in the Spotify library. The only difference between paying users and free users is that subscribes can listen without shuffling. Not a bad deal at all.

    Hey Christmas, thanks for coming early.

    Photo Credit: YouTube

  • Led Zeppelin’s Entire Catalog Comes to Spotify

    Led Zeppelin’s Entire Catalog Comes to Spotify

    Today, Spotify made a big announcement – free mobile streaming. Starting right now, Spotify users who opt for the free tier can stream playlists and “shuffle” artists’ entire catalogs on their smartphones and stream any song they want at any time on their tablets.

    As part of this announcement, Spotify also added the entire Led Zeppelin catalog. Hell yeah.

    “Led Zeppelin and Spotify today announced that the band’s legendary Swan Song/Atlantic catalog is now available for streaming on Spotify. Nearly 45 years after the band’s groundbreaking debut album catapulted them to rock superstardom, Led Zeppelin’s full album catalog is now available to stream on-demand for the first time, exclusively on Spotify,” says the streaming service.

    Spotify’s decided to make an event of it – releasing a couple of albums each day for the remainder of the week. Today you can stream their first two albums, Led Zeppelin and Led Zeppelin II.

    Here’s the rest of the release schedule:

    Thursday, December 12 – Led Zeppelin III (1970) and Untitled fourth album (1971)
    Friday, December 13 – Houses Of The Holy (1973) and Physical Graffiti (1975)
    Saturday, December 14 – Presence (1976) and In Through The Out Door (1979)
    Sunday, December 15 – The Song Remains The Same (1976), Coda (1982), BBC Sessions (1997), How The West Was Won (2003), Mothership (2007), and Celebration Day (2012)

    The last time Spotify made a big production of an entire catalog release was back in June with Pink Floyd.

    Image via Spotify

  • Spotify Launches Free Mobile Streaming with Restrictions for Smartphones (but Not for Tablets)

    Spotify Launches Free Mobile Streaming with Restrictions for Smartphones (but Not for Tablets)

    As expected, Spotify has just announced that for the first time, the company will offer free mobile streaming.

    Until today, Spotify users who chose the free, ad-supported option were banned from any sort of mobile listening. Zero. Zilch. Today, Spotify is opening it up a bit for smartphones and pretty much all the way on tablets.

    “Today we’re giving people the best free music experience in the history of the smartphone and the tablet,” said Daniel Ek, CEO & Founder at Spotify. “Whether you’re going to the gym, or having a party with friends. Just sit back and let Spotify serve you great music for every moment of your life.”

    Ok, so here’s the rundown: Free users now have access to streaming music on their smartphones, but it’s limited. You can listen to playlists (either personally curated or from users you follow) and you can “shuffle” through artists’ entire catalogs.

    “Want to listen to a certain artist? Just hit shuffle play, sit back and listen to their entire catalogue. Don’t settle for something similar. Don’t settle for just one track from the artist you want to hear every 20 minutes,” says Spotify in a clear “shots fired” statement aimed at the likes of Pandora.

    What’s obviously missing from Spotify’s free features for smartphones is the ability to search for and listen to any song you want at any time. I’m working on getting a statement from Spotify on how many “skips” free users will have in the “shuffle” mode and will let you know when I find out.

    When it comes to tablets, Spotify is breaking it wide open. iOS and Android tablet users can now stream any song they want for free.

    Here’s Spotify’s justification for the difference in smartphone and tablet streaming:

    “Unlike mobile devices, it turns out that tablets are becoming the new desktops. Tablets are where people lean in, search and build playlists.”

    Of course, it’s likely that Spotify simply had a hard time negotiating with labels and were unable to bring full, free streaming capabilities to smartphones. That, and maybe they didn’t want to give all the milk away for free – they still want users to buy the cow. Most likely some combination of the two.

    If this is a bit confusing, here’s a handy chart:

    Spotify also added 20 new markets today, which is pretty big news on its own. As of today, Spotify is available in the following 55 locales:

    Andorra, Austria, Belgium, Bolivia, Bulgaria, Denmark, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, UK, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, USA, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan

    Spotify has just over 24 million total users, 6 million of which pay for the service. Today’s announcement will likely excite the 18 million-or-so Spotify users who are still hanging out in free land. Not allowing any sort of mobile streaming put Spotify in the dark ages, when compared to most other music streaming platforms. With today’s announcement, Spotify moves into the mobile age while still giving users a reason to pony up for a monthly subscription – mainly better music quality, unlimited smartphone streaming, offline mode, and the removal of ads.

    Oh yeah, and they also added the entire Led Zeppelin catalog – so make sure you throw all of that on a playlist for mobile streaming.

    Images via Björn Olsson, Flickr and Spotify

  • Spotify to Launch Free Mobile Streaming – with Restrictions, Of Course

    Spotify to Launch Free Mobile Streaming – with Restrictions, Of Course

    Soon, users who opt for the free (ad-supported) version of Spotify will finally be able to stream music via their mobile devices, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal.

    Spotify will reportedly announce the new free tier feature tier at a December 11th press event, an event for which they distributed invites earlier this week.

    According to the WSJ, Spotify has been trying to work this whole thing out for almost a year – negotiating with major record labels to determine exactly how much they’ll have to pay to stream songs, free to users, via mobile.

    Free Spotify users shouldn’t get too excited about the new mobile offerings – it’s not going to be unlimited. The WSJ says that the new feature “will allow nonpaying mobile users to play a limited number of songs on demand, but will mostly serve up music based on the user’s input” – kind of like Pandora or other radio competitors. Tech Crunch says that free mobile listening will be less-restricted if users choose to listen to previously-curated playlists.

    Of course, this marks a significant departure from Spotify’s long-standing model which forced users to opt for the $9.99 per month tier if they wanted to stream music via mobile. Spotify’s other $5 per month option allows user to ditch the ads, but still doesn’t offer mobile streaming.

    Spotify has around 24 million total subscribers, about one-quarter of which pay for the service. The move to open up mobile streaming to the free tier is an obvious answer to the challenges of rival services like Pandora, Rdio, and iTunes radio. But by placing restrictions on free mobile listening, Spotify is ensuring that people will still have a reason to opt for the $10 per month plan – so that they can stream any song, at any time, as many times as the want.

    Image via Björn Olsson, Flickr

  • Some Guy Has More Than 90,000 Spotify Playlists

    Some Guy Has More Than 90,000 Spotify Playlists

    The best part about music streaming service Spotify releasing a bunch of stats is picking through to find the most interesting one. Back in October, on their 5th birthday, Spotify casually noted that 20% of the songs in their library have never been streamed. Ever. Sad, right?

    As 2013 comes to a close, Spotify has just released a year-in-review and my favorite little tidbit is this: Some dude in the US has over 90,000 playlists.

    And you thought you were obsessed.

    Other interesting figures include 4.5 billion total hours streamed in 2013, 1 billion playlists created so far, and 20,000 new songs added every single day.

    Globally, the most-streamed song of the year was Macklemore & Ryan Lewis’ “Can’t Hold Us.” In the US it was “Radioactive” by Imagine Dragons. Rihanna was the year’s most-streamed female artist.

    Here are the most-streamed songs of the year, in convenient playlist form:

    “Congratulations to Macklemore & Ryan Lewis who achieved incredible success in 2013, and to Rihanna who is again crowned the Queen of Pop. It’s also amazing to see young artists like Lorde, becoming sensations almost overnight, She’s a truly thrilling discovery for Spotify users and will help to re-shape the pop music landscape,” said Spotify head of content Steve Savoca.

    Spotify now boasts 24 million total users. You can check out their entire interactive year-in-review here.

    Image via Spotify

  • Spotify for iOS Now Keeps Track of Concert Dates

    Spotify for iOS Now Keeps Track of Concert Dates

    Spotify just released an update to its iOS app that makes a few fixes and additions – most notably the inclusion of concert dates on artist pages. Take a look:

    Spotify iOS Concert dates

    Spotify has also introduced a better search function which sports instant results as well as the new ability to search playlists and user profiles – the latter being a much-needed feature for Spotify search.

    Also, if you speak Japanese, Russian, or Indonesian – Spotify is going to make more sense to you (they added language support). It now looks more in-tune with all of your other iOS 7-optimized apps as well.

    You can grab the update now over at the App Store.

    Images via Thinkstock, Spotify for iOS

  • Researchers Argue That Unavailability, Not Search Engines, Lead To Piracy

    Every few months, the MPAA comes out of the woodwork to claim Google’s search results encourage piracy. According to their logic, the prevalence of illegal sources on Google’s front page indicates that something is wrong. Now a group of researchers are pushing back against the logic.

    The Hill reports that George Mason University’s Mercatus Center has recently launched a Web site called piracydata.org. The Web site takes the top 10 most pirated movies of the week and mashes it up with data from CanIStreamIt.It. The result is a graph detailing when a movie is available online for legal purchase, rental or stream.

    As you might expect, the top 10 most pirated movies of the week are not available on any legal streaming services. In fact, not even all of them are available for digital rental or purchase. The researchers behind the project say that’s the real problem – not search engines.

    “When movies are unavailable, illegal sources may be the most relevant search results,” Jerry Brito, director of the Mercatus Center’s Technology Policy Program, said. “Despite what the content industry might like to see, search engines are just telling it like it is.”

    The findings come over a year after the entertainment industry successfully convinced Google to alter its search algorithm to take piracy into account. As you may recall, Google introduced a ranking algorithm change in April 2012 that would demote sites based upon the number of takedown requests Google receives for that site. The change was controversial, but it remains in effect.

    Since then, the entertainment industry and governments have doubled down their efforts to partially pin the blame of piracy rates on search engines. Back in November of last year, seven months after the algorithm change went into effect, the UK government said that Google still wasn’t doing enough to stop piracy. It pointed out that searches like “Maroon 5 free MP3” returned links to sites that offered pirated music.

    While the evidence may seem damning, it completely ignores that piracy rates have been plummeting thanks to the likes of Spotify and Pandora. As it turns out, giving people what they want in a convenient method at a good price leads to people paying for that service.

    So, let’s apply the same logic to movies. In an interview with Tweakers, Netflix CEO Reed Hasting said that the arrival of Netflix in Canada reduced local piracy rates by 50 percent. There’s no comparable number for U.S. piracy rates, but it’s probably has reached a similar rate thanks to Netflix.

    Of course, you can only take piracy rates for TV shows and movies that are available on Netflix into account. For the past three weeks, the top 10 most pirated movies haven’t been on Netflix or any other legal streaming service. The big movie studios would tell you that it’s all about making the most money on a product, and how it doesn’t make sense for a movie to hit Netflix at the same time as it hits digital marketplaces. The music industry has already blown holes in that theory as its embrace of Spotify has led to the industry making its first profit in over 10 years.

    What does all of this tell the movie industry? It tells the industry that it should stop looking for the splinter in Google’s eye while ignoring the plank in its own. The industry must embrace digital revenue models that aren’t tied to crappy services like Utraviolet that limit what a person can do with their movies. It needs to be instant, seamless and easy – just like what Spotify is to music. Netflix is undoubtedly waiting with open arms to become the Spotify of movies, and it’s just waiting for the film industry to finally pull its head out of its ass.

    [Image: Nintendo/YouTube]

  • 20% of the Songs on Spotify Have Never Been Streamed

    20% of the Songs on Spotify Have Never Been Streamed

    Today’s Spotify’s 5th birthday (Happy Birthday, guys!), having been launched back on October 7th, 2008, in Sweden (and a handful of other European countries).

    As many companies do on milestone days, Spotify has released a celebratory blog post with some stats about the streaming service. A couple of them we already know, like the fact that Spotify has streamed over a million years’ worth of music in its 5-year history. Or, the fact that users have created over 1 billion individual playlists. Impressive stuff.

    But this one caught my eye. Spotify says that 80% of its more than 20 million available songs have been streamed at least once.

    That means that 20% of Spotify’s catalog, or about 4 million tracks, have never been streamed by a single person. Not by a single one of Spotify’s 24 million users in 32 markets around the world.

    On the flip side of this interesting statistic, here’s Spotify’s playlist for the top 10 most-streamed songs over the last half a decade. Inside, you’ll find Imagine Dragons, Gotye, Rihanna, and Daft Punk. You’ll also find Macklemore & Ryan Lewis’ “Thrift Shop,” which is the most-streamed song in Spotify history with over 150 million streams.

    C’mon, Macklemore. Share the love. There are a few million songs out there that have never been streamed – not even once. So sad.

  • Nirvana’s In Utero Kicks Off Spotify’s New Original Documentary Series, Spotify Landmark

    Music fans looking to get the inside scoop on classic musical moments have a new resource. Spotify has just unveiled a new music documentary series – it’s called Spotify Landmark and its premiere episode takes an in-depth look into Nirvana’s seminal album In Utero.

    “Spotify Landmark is the story behind some of the greatest moments in music, told by the people who made them. Each show blends intimate interviews with artists, producers, industry figures and celebrities to create a listening history of legendary albums, concerts and events,” says Spotify.

    In Utero is being rereleased this month in a 70-song, 3-disc special edition to mark the album’s 20th anniversary, so it’s fitting that Spotify would choose this historic music moment to profile in their debut Landmark series. Plus, it’s just a terrific album – so there’s that.

    What this amounts to is a sort of audio-documentary featuring a bunch of key players in the “musical moment”‘s creation. For instance, the In Utero episode features segments from Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic, album producer Steve Albini, and comedian Bobcat Goldthwait, who created the famous album release promotional video.

    Check out the full Landmark episode below:

    Image via Spotify Landmark

  • Xbox Music Comes To iOS And Android, Goes Free On The Web

    Spotify changed the music industry forever by bringing free ad-supported music to users on the Web. Microsoft tried to imitate that success with Xbox Music, but still required a subscription to even stream on the Web. That might not have been the best idea, and now Microsoft is making some changes.

    Microsoft announced today that users of Xbox Music will get free ad-supported streaming on the Web and Windows 8 devices. The company notes that users will have access to unlimited free streaming for the first six months. After that, users will have access to “limited hours of free streaming,” but Microsoft doesn’t say how limited it will be.

    If you want unlimited streaming on the Web, you’ll have to subscribe to the Xbox Music Pass. The $9.99 monthly subscription gets not only unlimited streaming on the Web, but mobile streaming vita the new Xbox Music apps for iOS and Android. The subscription will also net you unlimited music streaming on Xbox 360 alongside access to thousands of music videos.

    “Xbox Music now, more than ever, powers music experiences between Windows 8, Xbox, Windows Phone, and now iOS, Android and the Web,” said Jerry Johnson, general manager of Xbox Music. “We’re also excited to connect artists with their fans on the most anticipated consumer product of the year when Xbox One launches Nov. 22.”

    If that’s not enough for you, Microsoft also announced two upcoming additions to its Xbox Music service that might just help convince you to join its side. The first is what Microsoft calls the Web Playlist. It scans a music-related Web page (i.e. music festival Web site) and creates a playlist based around the listed artists. This functionality will launch on October 17.

    The second is the addition of a radio service to the Web-based Xbox Music player. With its radio service, Microsoft will offer unlimited skips and “a view of the full recommended music stream.” Beyond that, expect something similar to Pandora when it launches later this year.

    [Image: Google Play]

  • Spotify Sued Over User-Curated Playlists That Mimic Compilation Albums

    Does creating a playlist that mirrors an established company’s own playlists amount to infringement? Or more specifically, does allowing your users to create similar playlists and hosting them on your service make you liable?

    Streaming music service Spotify is being sued over a bunch of user-generated playlists. The plaintiffs, London-based EDM brand Ministry of Sound, claim that Spotify has a duty to remove playlists from their service that mimic the playlists put out by their compilations division.

    While Ministry of Sound has its own record label, the bulk of its business (and popularity) comes from its special compilations of dance music.

    “Unlike others [record labels], the largest part of our business comes from sales of compilation albums. We painstakingly create, compile and market our albums all over the world. We help music fans discover new genres, records and classic catalogues. Millions trust our brands, our taste and our selection. We give them great listening experiences at a good price,” says Ministry of Sound’s Lohan Presencer.

    “…But you won’t find our compilation albums on Spotify. Why not? Because its business model does not recognise that our products have any material value. It doesn’t consider them worth licensing. Which would be entirely its prerogative had our paths not crossed. But last year we noticed something on Spotify. Users of the service were copying our compilations. They were posting them as their own playlists and calling them “Ministry of Sound”. We assumed it was an oversight on Spotify’s part and contacted the company to request it remove the offending playlists. It declined, claiming there was no infringement and it wasn’t its responsibility to police its users.’

    Presencer says that this is a true “David vs Goliath battle.”

    Of course, Spotify has all the rights to stream all of the songs on these compilations – but it’s the actual compilations that Ministry of Sound feels are protected.

    “What we do is a lot more than putting playlists together: a lot of research goes into creating our compilation albums, and the intellectual property involved in that. It’s not appropriate for someone to just cut and paste them,” says Presencer.

    And that’s exactly what you’ll find if you do a search on Spotify for “Ministry of Sound” – dozens of user-curated playlists that are “cut and pasted” in the same way as some of the company’s famous compilations.

    Can you really claim that playlists are protected as IP, even if the songs on the playlists don’t come from your record label? Ministry of Sound thinks so, and it will be a question for the courts. Spotify has acknowledged the lawsuit, but has yet to comment.

    Image via Spotify

  • Spotify Connect Will Make Your Music-Listening Life Easier

    Spotify announced a new feature called Spotify Connect that lets you control your music listening across devices without interruption. For example, if you’re listening on your phone, you can easily switch over to your living room speakers or your tablet with the tap of a button. The company has partnered with some manufacturers to ensure this kind of experience is a possibility.

    You’ll soon be able to use speakers and home audio systems from Argon, Bang & Olufsen, Denon, Hama, Marantz, Philips, Pioneer, Revo, Teufel and Yamaha, and other as of yet unannounced brands, who are working to offer this functionality. You’ll see a Spotify Connect logo on compatible systems.

    “Thanks to Spotify Connect, you won’t need to rely on unstable connections to stream music between your devices,” says Spotify. “No longer will incoming phone calls, loss of signal range, or watching a video spoil the party. Unlike other wireless music solutions, using Spotify Connect won’t drain your battery. Plus you can continue to use your phone or tablet to call friends or start playing your favourite game without missing a beat.”

    “Today, listening to music at home can be a frustrating experience – dropouts, below-par audio quality, signal range and phone restrictions, battery drainage, it’s basically a hassle,” says Spotify VP Product Management Sten Garmark. “Spotify Connect solves this by giving you effortless control of your music across your phone, tablet and now speakers with millions of songs built right in.”

    The feature will roll out to Spotify Premium members on iPhone, iPad and home audio systems over the coming months, with Android devices and desktop support later.

    Image: Spotify (YouTube)

  • Spotify Launches New Browse Tool for Curated Playlists

    Spotify Launches New Browse Tool for Curated Playlists

    Spotify is continuing to focus heavily on music discovery with today’s rollout of a new “Browse” feature, coming inside an app update later today.

    Browse lets Spotify users find curated playlists based on certain categories or “moods.”

    Music for every moment: We’ve got just the right tunes for your morning commute, the party tonight, and the hangover tomorrow. Music for every mood: More than just genres, listen to a playlist for romance or a collection of face melting guitarists.

    Spotify’s new Browse feature comes on the heels of their Discovery feature, which uses Spotify’s algorithms to recommend songs and artists based on what you’ve been listening to. The difference between the two is that the new Browse feature adds a human element, with playlists hand-curated by the folks at Spotify.

    “We don’t rely on one source for recommendations in real life – and music discovery can’t be one-dimensional,” said Gustav Söderström, Chief Product Officer, at Spotify. “Our three-dimensional approach now combines the human touch with strong social features and unique technology from over five years of experience. We know music and we’re the first to marry all three aspects in one service, making it easier than ever for users to navigate the treasure trove of content within Spotify.”

    Recent analysis suggested that streaming music subscriptions will rise to 29 million this year, and could hit 191 million by the year 2018. Spotify currently leads the pack, but if it’s going to hold on to its crown it’ll need to compete with other services that put an emphasis on discovery. With this new feature, the company is doing just that.

    You can expect the new Browse tool to hit iOS and Android first, and eventually roll out to all platforms.

  • Streaming Music Subscribers to Reach 29 Million This Year

    Though they had a rough beginning and much opposition from big music labels, streaming music platforms are now finally taking off in a big way.

    Analyst firm ABI Research today estimated that worldwide subscriptions for on-demand music streaming will reach 29 million during 2013. The firm also predicted that streaming subscriptions could rise as high as 191 million by the end of 2018. This mirrors expectations from another analyst firm, Parks Associates, which predicts streaming music subscribers to triple by 2017.

    The reports also show that Spotify is currently dominating the streaming music market. The service currently accounts for just shy of one-third of on-demand music subscribers around the world, according to ABI. French service Deezer, South Korean service MelOn, and Rhapsody account for large portions of the market as well.

    The rise of streaming subscription services has recently run into opposition from some music artists, who claim the services do not compensate them properly. Last month, Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke criticized Spotify and removed his 2006 solo album from the service.

    “The past two years have seen a remarkable international expansion of streaming as a distribution model, but in terms of its long-term potential we’re still only scratching the surface,” said Aapo Markkanen, senior analyst at ABI. “That’s also something to stress when discussing streaming’s role as a source of artist income. At end-2013 the cumulative revenue from premium subscriptions will amount to less than $5 billion, yet we expect this all-time pot to exceed $46 billion in the next five years. Some two-thirds of it will be going to the rightholders; although how they will split it is then a whole another matter.”

  • Spotify Launches New Comedy App with Curated Playlists

    Spotify Launches New Comedy App with Curated Playlists

    Spotify may not be best known for its comedy content, but the service actually has a pretty good selection. It appears that they want you to know that – and they also want to make it easier to surface. With that in mind, Spotify has just unveiled its first-ever comedy app, Official Comedy. Launched in partnership with Bedrocket media’s Official Comedy channel, the new app compiles all of the comedy content available on Spotify and wraps it up in a nice little package for users looking to laugh instead of sing along.

    Here’s what Spotify’s Candice Katz had to say:

    This first of its kind app aggregates our extensive comedy database and offers listeners a curated assortment of entertaining programming. Now it’s never been easier to get giggling to top comedy performances such as Jerry Seinfeld’s “I’m Telling You For The Last Time” and Aziz Ansari’s “Dangerously Delicious,” along with material from Louis CK, Mike Birbiglia, Kevin Hart, Jeffrey Ross and many others.

    The app lets you browse currently trending funnymen and funnywomen, as well as browse by comedian and “one-liners.” There are also individually generated playlists organized by topic – for instance you can start a 185-track playlist about “the world of medicine, according to some unhealthy people” or a playlist about war in comedy “that would make Patton proud.”

    You can grab the app today.