Spotify announces merchandise sales for bands
When Spotify and Topspin announced today that bands would be able to sell t-shirts and other branded merchandise through the music service, it hit four birds with one stone. Continue Reading
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As Beats Music looms, free music services circle the wagons
It’s as if Beats Music were a meteor headed for earth, and inhabitants on the ground were feeling the heat of its approach. Rdio has followed Spotify, making its web listening free and unlimited. Even Pandora has added a feature to counter Beats Music’s emphasis on curated listening. Continue Reading
If you thought Spotify had free listening before, well, now it’s extra free.
Beats Music is launching next Tuesday, aiming squarely at Spotify’s subscription business. Spotify set the stage in December by freeing previous listening restrictions that applied to non-paying users. (That side of the business is ad-supported.) Today, Spotify makes more news by revealing a restriction most people didn’t know about, then lifting it. Continue Reading
Oasis dives into the stream
British rock band Oasis has yielded to time and trend, adding its 10 albums (representing over 70-million album sales) to Spotify, Rhapsody, Deezer, and Rdio. As usual with announcements like this, but rarely mentioned, YouTube already carries Oasis extensively, with full albums, live performances, official videos, and the band’s own YouTube channel. Continue Reading
Spotify releases (and also disclaims) an analysis foretelling higher ad revenue
It takes 14 pages, but eventually a point is quietly made: Spotify advertising revenue is forecast to rise five percent in 2014. The plain-English premise is this: Spotify has labored successfully to sell advertising in a down economy, so imagine the good times as things recover. Continue Reading
Spotify releases Spotiamp, an homage to Winamp, which is still available
Spotify’s new Spotiamp, in addition to being an homage to Winamp, is a fine, lightweight desktop program for streaming Spotify playlists. Only Spotify Premium members need download it. And by the way, Winamp isn’t dead yet. Behind the scenes, a buyer might be forestalling its announced shutdown. Continue Reading
YouTube, sleeping giant, is winning the streaming-music race (including Led Zeppelin)
An unofficial revenue report reveals YouTube as a financial giant. On the content side, YouTube is winning the streaming-music war before launching its rumored music service. Led Zeppelin signed an “exclusive” streaming deal with Spotify, but already has a much larger presence on YouTube. Continue Reading
Is Spotify now radio? Or maybe Pandora?
At yesterday’s Spotify media event, founder Daniel Ek referenced radio frequently, and not uncritically. Spotify’s new free-mobile feature targets the ease of radio, plus the personalization of the Internet age. In use, it resembles Pandora. Does Spotify have a new identity? Continue Reading
Spotify unlocks mobile, expands internationally, and adds Led Zeppelin
“Let’s get to today’s announcements,” said founder Daniel Ek after a quick intro at the Spotify Event in New York today. There were three main headlines, each one certain to make some people happy. It’s about mobile, international, and getting the Led out. Continue Reading
Why Spotify’s upcoming announcement matters
Spotify will announce free mobile access to its listening platform, according to the Wall Street Journal, citing anonymous sources. If true (we think it is), the announcement will probably be part of a Spotify media event in New York on Wednesday of next week. Continue Reading
SpotifyArtists vs. SpotifyForArtists spoof site
The “Spotify Debate” has been raised to a new level. It features the same debate points, but now presented as dueling websites. Until now, the war of words and philosophies was waged in sniping blog posts and interview quotes among… Continue Reading
Spotify’s whiz-bang summary of 2013
Spotify might not have a big-data operation like Wal-Mart or Target. But 24-million users listened to 4.5-billion hours of music in 2013, and have created one-billion playlists on the platform. So there’s a good flow of metrics. Spotify, which has… Continue Reading