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Interesting service but all I do is download music to listen too, the idea of streaming across the net while also paying a monthly fee is a turn off.

You can stream when you're on WiFi. You shouldn't stream, unless you're willing to pay for it, when you're not on WiFi, then you can instead listen to the 3333 songs that you can store for offline listening.
 
I still can't figure out why this particular service gets so much launch related buzz when Rdio is already out there kicking ass.

No mention of Rdio at all? Come on.

This..mostly. I've actually used both. I like RDIO's UI better. But Spotify seems

a.)to stream faster
b.)in higher quality and
c.)has a far more expansive catalog. especially when it comes to independent artists.

Just my observation. I find that MOG has a wider selection as well. But I hated the lack of a desktop app.
 
Exactly, especially when the service dies in a few years, all the money people paid will be gone.

Didn't this already happened about a decade ago with subscription services vs. iTunes?

SERIOUSLY! And if your electric company goes under, all that money you paid for electricity is GONE! Or your water company! Or your cable! Or INTERNET!

Holy crap, it's a conspiracy!

:rolleyes:

It's a service. You're paying (significantly reduced prices compared to buying the media) for the service. You use and enjoy the service. If the company goes under, your money doesn't "go away" any more than it does in the example services I gave above.
 
I've used this service for the last few years (Europe) it was a brilliant service until they changed the way adverts work a few months back.. Before it was unlimited listening with adverts every 6/7 songs. Now theres more adverts, you can only listen for 10 hours a month and a maximum of 5 times per song.
 
Since you are going to the shows, buy the CDs there. The band gets more of the money. They just pay the wholesale cost for the disks and get to keep the rest. And those sales still figure into any royalty checks they might be lucky enough to get.

While the sentiment with this is great (yay!), the unfortunate reality is that now labels are getting cuts of tour merchandise (cds, and even non-audio merch: shirts, mugs, etc.) (as well as gate receipts). Touring is the only way to make a living (for most bands), and labels have realized that, too.
 
I'm glad you guys are getting Spotify but don't get too excited.

I'd say the success rate of finding actual popular music is about 85%.

E.g Red Hot Chili Peppers are not on there, nor are the Foo Fighters to name but a few. Most of it is random obscure music or Karaoke versions.

Don't get me wrong it is good and who knows, they may have stepped up their game now they are to be open in the US.
 
I'm glad you guys are getting Spotify but don't get too excited.

I'd say the success rate of finding actual popular music is about 85%.

E.g Red Hot Chili Peppers are not on there, nor are the Foo Fighters to name but a few. Most of it is random obscure music or Karaoke versions.

Don't get me wrong it is good and who knows, they may have stepped up their game now they are to be open in the US.

Both RHCP and Foo Fighters are on the UK version.

RHCP has What Hits? and stuff up to Mother's Milk. Foos have the entire catalog.
 
Go ahead and pay your monthly fee like lemmings for music you will never own and when Spotify have a certain amount of users in the US, they will like in Europe, change their price points etc and you will have thrown 120 euros down the drain.

I don't think you understand how a service works.

But anyways moving on, it is a little bit boring reading so many posts from people who have no idea what they are talking about!
Boy howdy, I know the feeling.
 
It is so refreshing to see soooo many people on MR who have never seen Spotify let alone used it!!! defending a service that is not all it is made out to be! (maybe Spotify have created users on MR?) :eek:

I'm a Spotify user. You know, it's available in Europe...

Go ahead and pay your monthly fee like lemmings for music you will never own and when Spotify have a certain amount of users in the US, they will like in Europe, change their price points etc and you will have thrown 120 euros down the drain.

But anyways moving on, it is a little bit boring reading so many posts from people who have no idea what they are talking about!

Will be interesting to see in one year where Spotify are!


I'm paying €10 each month. So I guess I "throw away" €10 each month, and not €120 each year. ;)

And I'm rather happy with it, I don't have to store music anymore, I'm not tied to one service and if I decide I don't like Spotify, there will be other services that I then can switch to. Spotify isn't and won't be the only streaming service.

And since Spotify allows paying on a per month basis, it means that if they would hike the price, lots of people would leave within a month. Which makes it less likely that they would do so.
 
I'm glad you guys are getting Spotify but don't get too excited.

I'd say the success rate of finding actual popular music is about 85%.

E.g Red Hot Chili Peppers are not on there, nor are the Foo Fighters to name but a few. Most of it is random obscure music or Karaoke versions.

Don't get me wrong it is good and who knows, they may have stepped up their game now they are to be open in the US.

I've got all Foo Fighter's realeases on Spotify. I can find Red Hot Chili Peppers' EMI releases, but not their releases on Warner, this more likely has to do with Warner and their dislike of Spotify's free, ad supported service. Considering that this service is being cut down severely, I would guess that their Warner releases will be added in the future.
 
Enjoy the novelty while it lasts!

We've had it in the UK for a few years and it used to be great. Then they strangled the free service in an attempt to make everybody pay £100 a year.

A lot of people have ditched it now. It's a pale shadow of its former self.
 
Enjoy the novelty while it lasts!

We've had it in the UK for a few years and it used to be great. Then they strangled the free service in an attempt to make everybody pay £100 a year.

A lot of people have ditched it now. It's a pale shadow of its former self.

No, it's still going strong. They just stopped cheap people leeching. They did not make enough money on the free service.

And honestly, £100 is less than a days wage. So it is really cheap for having music for a year.
 
No, it's still going strong. They just stopped cheap people leeching. They did not make enough money on the free service.

And honestly, £100 is less than a days wage. So it is really cheap for having music for a year.

Make it 2 days wage and you will cover the majority of the uk ;)
 
Enjoy the novelty while it lasts!

We've had it in the UK for a few years and it used to be great. Then they strangled the free service in an attempt to make everybody pay £100 a year.

A lot of people have ditched it now. It's a pale shadow of its former self.

Actually, you would be paying £60/year, not £100, the free service never included Spotify on the mobile.

The free service doesn't collect enough revenue, so it had to be cut down. If you're not ok with paying, feel free to go back to purchasing songs and cds.
 
I'm glad you guys are getting Spotify but don't get too excited.

I'd say the success rate of finding actual popular music is about 85%.

E.g Red Hot Chili Peppers are not on there, nor are the Foo Fighters to name but a few. Most of it is random obscure music or Karaoke versions.

Don't get me wrong it is good and who knows, they may have stepped up their game now they are to be open in the US.

Actually these groups are both on Spotify. So let's raise this rate back to 99%.
 
Support music, don't Spotify it !

What makes you think that you need to own music to listen to it offline?

Someone better say: yes you need to own your music to listen to it offline! If you don't like that you can go and enjoy live music. Imagine that! A music fan actually and directly supporting music they enjoy.

Don't let Spotify or Rdio or any streaming service be "THE" way you access music. They are simply versions of a very large commercial Muzak like catalog which (for a significant investment) only lets you save a temporary playlist without ever getting into a relationship with any music. You are accessing a money stream set up by lawyers and extracted from the artists. Really, is that the way to support music?

Support the artists. Buy their music. Own it, proudly, and stream it to whatever device as many times as you wish, without any cost, because you own it.
 
Someone better say: yes you need to own your music to listen to it offline! If you don't like that you can go and enjoy live music. Imagine that! A music fan actually and directly supporting music they enjoy.

Don't let Spotify or Rdio or any streaming service be "THE" way you access music. They are simply versions of a very large commercial Muzak like catalog which (for a significant investment) only lets you save a temporary playlist without ever getting into a relationship with any music. You are accessing a money stream set up by lawyers and extracted from the artists. Really, is that the way to support music?

Support the artists. Buy their music. Own it, proudly, and stream it to whatever device as many times as you wish, without any cost, because you own it.

You're a dinosaur. And this is coming from an artist.
 
Someone better say: yes you need to own your music to listen to it offline! If you don't like that you can go and enjoy live music. Imagine that! A music fan actually and directly supporting music they enjoy.

Maybe if the artists I like actually visited the UK (probably might help if they weren't dead too) then I would actually do that.

Don't let Spotify or Rdio or any streaming service be "THE" way you access music. They are simply versions of a very large commercial Muzak like catalog which (for a significant investment) only lets you save a temporary playlist without ever getting into a relationship with any music. You are accessing a money stream set up by lawyers and extracted from the artists. Really, is that the way to support music?

It's the way that lets me enjoy the music the best. It's totally legal and exceptionally convenient. It also offers the highest quality audio (other than a CD) and it's just £9.99 a month

Support the artists. Buy their music. Own it, proudly, and stream it to whatever device as many times as you wish, without any cost, because you own it.

It's simply not possible for music that I buy to be anywhere near as convenient as Spotify is.

I can't store all my iTunes music on my iPhone - but I can access millions of songs with Spotify. I cache ~50 songs that I'm currently listening to a lot, anything else I can stream when I need it.

Amazon is not offering its cloud music service in the UK.
iTunes Match is also not available and will be limited to 256kbps AAC. It's also not a streaming service.

Technically, it's also illegal to rip a CD in the UK - we don't have a fair use law and the music industry has opposed it until recently.

I have no problem supporting musicians, but they - and the rest of the industry have got to realise that they could easily make things a LOT better for their customers without having to sacrifice their revenues (which are going down the toilet with the status quo).
 
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Neither of them [MOG or Napster] offers the exact same features as Spotify.
Um, OK, but you're splitting hairs. They are all services with millions of songs you can stream from your computer or mobile phone.

If you only listen to 12 new albums every year, then it's obviously better to buy albums.
But then you actually don't say anything about how many new albums you're listening to every year, only how many you're willing to buy.
Right. While I may continue to buy the same number of albums, it is great to have a service where I can listen to new stuff, and not buy the 100 or so albums I'm "sorta interested" in each year, but really can't spend the money, or even the time, to purchase. Or even illegally download...it's a pain!

Really can't wait for this to launch!
I do wonder if all the people who echo this sentiment (and I'm not picking on you, Marximus; a lot of people have said this), even realize that Napster and MOG are HERE TODAY, already doing what they want Spotify to do.
(Unless... does anyone actually think the free service will actually be any good? Like it was when it first came out in Europe? Oh, boy, get ready to be majorly disappointed, then.)

Support the artists. Buy their music. Own it, proudly, and stream it to whatever device as many times as you wish, without any cost, because you own it.
Actually, no one really *owns* music, but that's a topic for another time.
 
Please provide us with a source for this.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11821021

"According to the company's 2009 annual report it had advertising revenues of £4.5m and made £6.8m from subscriptions."

This is Spotify's most recent annual report. Simple deduction, even if you don't subtract the cost of development and running the company that doesn't leave much revenue to distribute among the artists and labels for 12 million songs. Less than 1 pound per song in the catalog. They have additional funds from investment, some of which may be going into payouts to the labels, but that is not sustainable.
 
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