I have got to admit I canned Spotify subs years ago - but how are they managing to grow their subscriber base whn it is now going to be £11.99 in the UK? That is way, way too high for what it offers…
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Third one in a little over two years. They say it’s to keep up with inflation as if they’re a retail store operating on razor thin margins and people accept that. Meanwhile, they’re donating to fascist political parties and shafting artists by leveraging loopholes to pay out fewer royalties.
Just saying; cancelling Spotify and changing to Qobuz takes five minutes. Sound quality is amazingly better, the curated recommendations are done by human beings that love music, and ‘just works’ with everything that Spotify does. (For us, anyway.) It’s French, rather than Norwegian-American like Tidal is, if you’re trying to stop spending money on everything US at the moment, too.
They don’t have any other recommendations apart from those human made ones though? Couldn’t find what I wanted.
The UI is awful and their artist pages are normally blank for indy artists.
The migration is pretty seamless though, and they apparently pay their artists way better.
They have the human made ones, they have the “artist radio” function that plays songs similar to a band you like, they have a weekly top 30 based on stuff you’ve been listening to. The headline ‘albums of the week’ are based on what they like, which I don’t think is unfair - I’ve really enjoyed some of them.
I listen to a lot of metal and electronic, and I’ve always found the descriptions excellent - usually several paragraphs even for the most obscure of bands. Was well impressed that they had Lambrini Girls as one of their ‘albums of the week’, and their album at studio quality. Not that that’s essential for punk. Admittedly I don’t listen to a lot of indy, but they’ve always had what I’ve wanted to listen to.
My main complaint about the UX is that it’s nearly identical to Spotify, but I suppose there’s not much else you can do. Something particular about it that you dislike?
Thanks for the long reply.
Did not know the radio function existed. On mobile at least I can’t find it on the artists page? I have to go into the … Menu on a track in a playlist?
I listen to a lot of instrumental stuff while working, so I may be going too indy? Someone like soundcriters should should have something on their page?
https://open.qobuz.com/artist/5003476
I dislike that you have to go to a playlists page to play it in shuffle, you can’t do it from the playlists menu.
Double clicking should play a track but doesn’t.
I’m on Tidal right now and currently considering the switch to Qobuz. There’s no official (or unofficial) Linux client which is kind of a bummer. Tidal at least has a half-decent unofficial one…
Yeah, I could just use the web player or strawberry but I just prefer having a dedicated app.
Yeah, the web client works just fine on Linux. A good native client would be better, of course, but I’d rather use the web one than a half-assed native one.
Qobuz catalog is extremely lacking IME.
As much I despise Spotify, I’m trying out Qobuz and it’s just not really it.
No folder organisation for playlists or albums.
No Linux application.
No lyrics.
No support for smart speakers.
No information linking to artist tours and merch.
No dedicated classical music app.
Generally lacking when it comes to non western artists.
Prides itself on providing high quality music, yet still only has lower quality masters for some artists compared to Apple Music, Tidal, and even Spotify.
I want to love it, like the way it loves and respects the music industry, with it’s special magazine etc, but it’s just not it.
Do they have an API? I use a lot of third party recommendation services, to avoid Spotifys and would love to make sure I can create playlists into it
Im 90% sure they have an API, I’ve seen github projects that mention using it
might be possible to just build a TUI for it then. I’ll look into it.
I also just switched to Qobuz. I like to listen to albums and playlists. The UI is more minimal than Spotify which I enjoy. I like the fact it’s not constantly trying to push new things like podcasts, concerts etc. on me. I just want to listen to music and pay the artists for it!
I’m glad to hear this! I’ve just cancelled our Spotify this past week and my partner is looking for a new service (I only listen to the same albums on repeat so I’m going to survive).
For those using spofity connect: tidal has “tidal connect” as well, which is identical and exactly as supported.
Qobuz unfortunately lacks this feature, to my knowledge.Correction: Qobuz has released “Qobuz connect”! I don’t know how widely supported it is vs. Tidal connect, though; iFi and Cambridge audio most notably seem to be missing, according to this list.I personally also prefer the tidal algo to Spotify and qobuz, but that is a matter of preference.
It’s quite easy to download Tidal content on any device w/o the app as well—for educational purposes, of course.
For some, Tidal may be a better alternative. I’ve been quite happy with it. Others may prefer Qobuz.
Qobuz released Qobuz connect back in May
Thank you for the correction! I have updated the comment.
Will they be raising their rates in India? Because that’s where Spotify thinks I live now.
Bandcamp is not banned in the UK yet. But i think the government has strong intelligence that they are a terrorist organisation.
Well, it’s owned by friggin’ Epic, now… so they’re not that far off with their Intel.
Wow, that trade went by very quietly. Glad they’re out from Epic at least i guess… scummy as hell behavior from Songtradr…
Yeah, was like just over a year later, they still are the independent & small label place imo, I don’t have faith that’ll last forever unfortunately. They still are my go to place for discovery and exploration, bandcamp daily still has some interesting finds, I just make sure I download my purchases.
Let’s say it together: Enshittification
It’s been long underway for Spotify; raising prices is just the lastest step.
I’m paying £20/m for a lossless family plan from Deezer… That’s how they get you 😭. Now I’d have to apologize to my family members if I took away their subscription. Used to be around £17 when I started a few years back.
I do not recommend getting a family plan.
Is there any music on spotify that isn’t also on youtube? Youtube has practically everything, it has always seemed to me. I’ve never been tempted by spotify.
The 128 bitrate on YouTube is quite the drag IMO except for like carmusic maybe.
This and the fact that Youtube are just as much robbing gits… like I have said, I don’t want to sound mean but generally I’d like the artists to get paid for their work somehow. Now how to do that is the hard bit
AFAIK to get money in artists’ pockets it’s best to buy merch and buy tickets to shows.
There is a ReVanced version of Spotify, for people who didn’t already know. Block ads and get premium features for free: https://revanced.app/
(There’s also YT Music ReVanced)
On desktop install Spicetify in your Spotify client. It does many things, including block ads.
If you are going to steal music you may as well just steal music
Blocking ads isn’t stealing
I heard the ReVanced patching stopped working recently. Is that not the case anymore?
Not sure cause I use YT Music ReVanced instead for the larger music selection.
Can’t I just go with piracy
This is more convenient than piracy.
Having the files locally is more convenient though
How is having any song you want being one search away less convenient than having to curate and organize a music collection, and then go digging though folders to find the song you want?
Look, I’ve been collecting music since 1998 and even I admit that streaming is a lot more convenient. Only reason why I still collect music is because I am a DJ and don’t always have a reliable wifi or data connection at every gig. But even then I’ve culled the vast majority of 50k+ tunes down to about a 1000 of the best and most popular on the dance floor. Then swap songs in and out as needed. The modern era makes it easy to re-obtain a deleted track, and often in higher quality than I originally ripped it at (I use a spectrum analyzer on my collection to verify).
I used that for the longest time, but lately it stops working several days after I update it. I’m glad though, as now I have Navidrome set up.
Wow, thank you!
spotify lost me as a customer as soon as I learned that they gifted 150k to Trump for his inaugaration party
And yet, despite the subscription price or its raise, Spotify still insists on forcing promoted content on your homepage.
What pisses me off is that I can’t have a family plaln associated with my main Google Workspace account. Because it’s a Workspace account. So if I want to have a family plan for YouTube Music I need to have it associated with a gmail account not my workspace account. That’s such bullshit, if you ask me!
You mean replacing a bunch of people with AI didn’t work?
Never will. All the tech bros can stomp and wine. But it will never replace real people with real skills. It’s fucking stupid that these business majors can dictate stupid decisions.
I will cancel it
Lazy doormat Spotify users: “Okay… but this is the LAST, LAST, LAST TIME FOR REAL. Do it again and there’ll be a hashtag and a series of Tiktok memes!”
I make that subscription cost back in 10 minutes of work.
Doormat Spotify users 🤣
“I’m SO good at making money that I don’t care when people cheat me out of it for no other reason than because they feel like it. This is something I am proud of.”
“I spend hours configuring services so I can have a second sandwich with lunch twice a month.” - Proud little nerd with poor cost benefits analysis.
I’m very happy to skip a fast food trip to not extend my day job for .000005% of my salary.
Ohhhh maybe I’ll save up for a bigger house now that I have opened up budget for that avacado toast!
You are so cool. I am very impressed.
You’re the one out here calling people names, take a moment and think about your comments and behavior. You can only be accountable for your own actions.
Maybe if you don’t want some random person shitting on your stupid comments, you shouldn’t be so derogatory about different use cases. Think about that and how you ended up here being lectured about being a dick on the Internet.
I made a general comment, and my opinion has not changed. You didn’t have to make it personally about you, but you decided to come defend your honor against a nonspecific shitpost. Just like MY opinion is mine, yours is YOURS, and you didn’t need to jump in here.
Heck, I specifically addressed my initial comment to “lazy, doormat Spotify users” and for some reason you decided I was talking about you.
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I mean spotify is one of those things where it’s harder to move away and the cost benefit is harder to argue against. It’s not like the streaming bullshit that has happened where everything is fragmented and you’d need 200 substations to watch the movies you want.
The thing that sucks with Spotify is the money they gave fucking Joe Rogan
Look, I can’t expect your assessment of value proposition to align with mine - we are different people.
But if I were a paying Spotify customer, and they gave $250 million dollars to pay someone I think is actively damaging the world, and then started charging me MORE to pay for it, there is ABSOLUTELY no amount of cost benefit and convenience that would keep me there.
I will sit in a dark, silent room motivating on pure spite before I would accept such an indignity.
Like I said, fuck Joe Rogan, but every big Corp has been responsible for awful shit. At some point you have to live and you have to give in somewhere.
This is coming from someone that self hosts and even I can’t be bothered to self host every fucking random ass song in existence.
My value proposition is that my entire family doesn’t have to listen to ads and I don’t have to spend half my day tracking down songs.
Again, my larger point is that spotify for all its bullshit still isn’t streaming video levels of utter bullshit.
Well, you’re right. Everyone has to draw their own line. I’ll agree with you this is probably less egregious than some, and I personally do make make purchases I shouldn’t from institutions I shouldn’t to get by.
But I do every single one of those holding my nose and acknowledging I’m contributing to a problem.
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I dumped it months ago and went back to Deezer.
I got a subscription two months ago because I had an event where it was simply easier to just use Spotify. I’m going back to plexamp I guess.
