Spotify?

[yougotthesilver]

Hey guys,

I was just wondering If any of you uses Spotify? I've been told it's the best invention of the century - well, kinda - and I'd love to check it out.
However, I take it they changed their free account set-ups a bit, because now you need an invitation to get in, much like TfS. I've asked all my friends who use Spotify, but strangely, they can't send any invites.
So, If there is anyone who uses Spotify and who can send invitations, would you mind sending me one?

That would be so cool. Thank you so much!

 

[nothingless]

I LOVE Spotify. I listen to it 99% of the time now, instead of iTunes lol! PM me your email address, and I'll send you an invite.

http://www.spotify.com/

Spotify is a new way to listen to music

Music is everywhere. Any track you like, any time you like. Just search for it in Spotify, then play it. Any artist, any album, any genre - all available instantly. With Spotify, there are no limits to the amount of music you can listen to. Just help yourself to whatever you want, whenever you want it.

All the music, all the time

Think of Spotify as your new music collection. Your library. Only this time your collection is vast: 8 million tracks and counting. You can create as many playlists as you like from this collection - just drag and drop the tracks you want.

And because the music plays live, there’s no need to wait for downloads and no big dent in your hard drive. You can listen at any time, no matter where you are. Through your computer or your mobile phone.

Music to share

Thanks to Spotify, it’s now easier than ever to share music. You’re free to share everything you listen to on Spotify with your friends - tracks, playlists, the lot.

Just send them a link to a track or playlist and they can listen instantly. If you like, you can also collaborate on shared playlists. Social music made simple.

Thank you for the music

Having instant access to all this music is a wonderful thing, but what about the artists and musicians who make it?

We’re big believers in rewarding their creativity. That’s why we came up with a way to fairly compensate them for the music featured on Spotify. If they stop, the music stops. To us, it’s a no-brainer.

Just can't wait for it to launch in the US and for some more record companies to come aboard!

 

[Cecilia15]

Yeah, you need to get an invite from someone with a premium account and the best thing, you can use it on iPhones, Android phones and some Sony Ericssons.

 

[Salvatore]

I was just having a discussion with some followers of mine about Spotify . It's not available in Italie so I cannot offer my own opinion, but I've heard mixed reviews . Some say it's really great and that they don't use iTunes anymore . Others say it's really not that great and the ads on free accounts get annoying .

Having instant access to all this music is a wonderful thing, but what about the artists and musicians who make it?

We’re big believers in rewarding their creativity. That’s why we came up with a way to fairly compensate them for the music featured on Spotify. If they stop, the music stops. To us, it’s a no-brainer.

A friend of mine said that Lady Gaga made only around $168 USD last year even with millions of streams . I believe the pay rate to the artists is around $0.002 USD per stream making it not best for if you're concerned with profits, but great for exposure . I don't know .

 

[nothingless]

^ The pay rate can't be that bad, otherwise why would record companies sign up with Spotify? And plenty have - if it was that bad a deal, I'm sure they'd ignore Spotify.

I wouldn't call 'exposure' a convincing factor, not yet. Spotify is only available in a few countries, and even where it is available, it isn't exactly mainstream or anything yet! Someone like Lady GaGa doesn't need Spotify for exposure LOL!

The ads aren't that bad...it's exactly like radio without DJs. I have a premium account though (got it solely so I could use the iPhone app and cache songs offline so I can listen to all my Spotify playlists without being connected to the internet), and it's totally worth it for only £9 a month.

 

[Salvatore]

^ The pay rate can't be that bad, otherwise why would record companies sign up with Spotify? And plenty have - if it was that bad a deal, I'm sure they'd ignore Spotify.

I wouldn't call 'exposure' a convincing factor, not yet. Spotify is only available in a few countries, and even where it is available, it isn't exactly mainstream or anything yet! Someone like Lady GaGa doesn't need Spotify for exposure LOL!

The ads aren't that bad...it's exactly like radio without DJs. I have a premium account though (got it solely so I could use the iPhone app and cache songs offline so I can listen to all my Spotify playlists without being connected to the internet), and it's totally worth it for only £9 a month.

Well of course Lady Gaga does not need exposure . She's in fact over-exposed .

It's more towards the artists that are just starting . If users can stream entire new albums, for a low price or free, it could attract listeners that may eventually buy a song and hopefully the entire album . That's my logic for this .

Major labels were reluctant to do it at first I believe, but when the demand became hire, they had to sign on . The pay rate is in fact somewhere around this as I've seen in different contracts it's no more than $0.02 USD per stream to the label which then must be split between so many parties it's unreal . I'm a musician and I've the option to distribute to Spotify, but I'm not sure yet . Like I said, it's not even available in Italie so I cannot even enjoy my own music in it !

 

[Salvatore]

This is an interesting read :

The Guardian UK

[FONT=arial,sans-serif][FONT=arial,sans-serif]The launch of Spotify in the UK must surely be one of the biggest PR successes for an online music service. Despite only having spent around £5,000 on marketing since 2006 (according to Daniel Ek, one of Spotify's founders), they've managed to gain huge media coverage – not least in The Guardian.[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,sans-serif]It's been described as sexy, incredibly user-friendly and the future – maybe even the saviour – of legal music consumption. I've met Ek, a fellow Swede. He seemed like a really nice guy who loves music, and when he said it's important that artists are compensated, I really wanted Spotify to be all the things the hype had promised.[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,sans-serif]I signed up and quickly realised that, yes, Spotify is indeed user-friendly – if not for discovering new music, for rediscovering music from my teenage years as well as records I've lost along the way. But I wondered how artists could be compensated with so few adverts (sometimes, despite being logged on for hours, I haven't seen any ads at all). As more details about their operation have emerged, my initial choice to put them in my proposed Fair Trade category appears to have been a bit premature.[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,sans-serif]The major record labels – and the bigger indies – that I spoke to seemed unusually positive about Spotify, which made me think that they must have received a pretty hefty payment and/or equity in the company. Sure enough, the other week some of my suspicions were confirmed when it was reported that the majors received 18% of Spotify shares. Merlin, who represent a large portion of the independent labels, received 1% (as their labels represent 11-12% of Spotify plays, it appears this is a bit disproportionate to the value of their content). What they paid for their shares is still under debate, with ComputerSweden reporting that it was as little as $10,000. Regarding payments, the labels I spoke to said that they're not allowed to divulge these details. But, as it's common for majors to demand such payments, I'd say it's likely they did.[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,sans-serif]I can see why this puts Spotify in their good books. One of the main reasons why majors have been hesitant to offer their music to start-ups is that they've seen companies like YouTube and Last.fm build businesses, only to sell them off for big bucks without sharing the money with the copyright owners whose music they used.[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,sans-serif]A source close to Spotify told me he has serious doubts that their business model will add up and that it's a case of "spot the idiot", ie "find somebody stupid enough to buy it before realising that it's too costly to run and that the numbers don't add up to making a profit".[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,sans-serif]Spotify is currently valued at $250m, despite, according to The Register, only having an advertising income of £82,000 and just 17,000 UK users signing up to pay £120 a year for Spotify Premium. Having equity in the company ensures that the labels get paid if Ek and his colleagues find said "idiot" and decide to sell up (Ek says they have no intention of selling up, by the way). But what does this all mean for the artists?[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,sans-serif]On Spotify, it seems, artists are not equal. There are indie labels that, as opposed to the majors and Merlin members, receive no advance, receive no minimum per stream and only get a 50% share of ad revenue on a pro-rata basis (which so far has amounted to next to nothing). Incidentally, when I asked a Spotify rep if they would feature music by unsigned artists the way We7 does, he said no, but that all they would need to do was to sign up to a label and they'd get on the site.[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,sans-serif]For artists who "signed up to a label" there's a tangible risk that revenue which comes from a possible sale of shares by the label would end up in the proverbial "blackbox" (non-attributable revenue that remains with the label). There's growing concern about this in the artist management community and, a few weeks ago, Bob Dylan decided to pull his back catalogue from UK streaming services. The only Dylan albums currently on Spotify are Bob Dylan's 60s Live, A 30th Anniversary Concert Celebration, a tribute compilation and a few tracks that are featured on movie soundtracks.[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,sans-serif]In Sweden, where Spotify has been running the longest, Magnus Uggla – well-established since the late 70s – has withdrawn his music from the service. On his blog he said that, after six months on the site he'd earned "what a mediocre busker could earn in a day". Regarding his record label, Sony Music, he says "after suing the **** out of Pirate Bay, they're acting just like them by not paying the artists". When he found out that Sony had 5.8% equity in Spotify he wrote: "I would rather be raped by Pirate Bay than ****ed up the *** by (Sony boss) Hasse Breitholtz and Sony Music and will remove all of my songs from Spotify pending an honest service."[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,sans-serif]As labels taking equity in new services becomes commonplace (the majors are currently in the process of doing it with BskyB and VirginMedia for their soon-to-be-launched music services), the issue of how to compensate the artist is a problem that won't go away and needs to be resolved.[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,sans-serif]So, in the light of recent revelations, I'm afraid I'm going to have to withdraw the virtual Fair Trade stamp I gave Spotify a few months back, until they prove that they are, indeed, concerned about treating artists right.[/FONT]
[/FONT]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2009/aug/17/major-labels-spotify

 

[nothingless]

Hmm, the above is interesting - did not know that! Thanks for sharing.

I believe, however, that things will probably even out. Spotify is so new still! If musicians keep pulling their music, it will simply force them to pay people more fairly. Once Spotify launches in the US later this year, they're sure to get many new premium users, which will help with their revenue stream.

I also notice this article is from August 2009, and I must say that here in the UK, I have actually noticed a big increase in advertising for Spotify as well as general awareness of the fact that it exists among my friends and work colleagues. I'm sure their user base has grown since then, and hopefully they are well underway to fixing these issues...after all, without the artists' support, there'd be no Spotify!

 

[Salvatore]

For sure !
You're right it's new so it could take some time to work out the bugs of it . I've decided to place my music there so we'll see how it goes !

 

[harrietcamilla]

I love Spotify! it is such an easy way to listen to music and as a student it works out far cheaper for my housemates than itunes. Unfortunately I missed the sign up date so do not have a membership myself, the waiting list seems to be endless! (so if anyone has an invite I would love them )

That article is really interesting Salvatore, it is a shame artists get such a small cut from having their music played. I hope they sort this out, particularly with it going to the US this year.

 

[Rebe]

well i know people use it alot here in sweden, but i just never caught on....doesn't really appeal to me lol

 

[Salvatore]

So I just got the Spotify and it is indeed really good . Somehow I still want to buy the music because I want to 'own' it . And it lacks in some albums which is interesting . I'm not sure if it will replace iTunes yet though . Hopefully the artist royalty will work out to be fair . I will report how it goes for me on that .

 

[yougotthesilver]

Hope it goes well for you, Salvatore.
That's an interesting article you posted, gives some insight in how it works.

 

[Chaky]

I've been using Spotify for about a year now. I think it's absolutely amazing! There are slight drawbacks in some labels not supporting it, so if you search for particular artists you'll find some major albums missing.

Best thing for me is it easily allows a 'try before you buy' experience. And I've heard loads of albums, especially older stuff, that I would probably never have listened to without it.

They made it more difficult to get the free version of Spotify in recent months in an attempt to get people to pay up. It is a little worrying to think the whole venture could fold if they find their business model will never turn a profit.

 

[Andromaque]

Hi, I have a question about it, I hope someone could help me. Okay, so I understand that Spotify is suported only in a few countries but I don't understand one thing. Does people from other (not suported) countries can or can not register if they have an invite code? Oh and I would be grateful if someone knows where I can get a code since I don't know anyone who uses it. Thank you

 

[Chaky]

Hi, I have a question about it, I hope someone could help me. Okay, so I understand that Spotify is suported only in a few countries but I don't understand one thing. Does people from other (not suported) countries can or can not register if they have an invite code? Oh and I would be grateful if someone knows where I can get a code since I don't know anyone who uses it. Thank you

I'm pretty sure it only works in the supported countries (unless you are particularly techy and know a way around it).

And you can try asking for an invite on twitter using a #spotify hashtag. Some kind stranger might reply.

 

[Andromaque]

Thank you Chaky, I might try that with twitter Although first I must find out for sure can I use it or not.
but thanks for your responce

 

[Birgit]

Does anybody have a Spotify invite? I need it so badly.

 

[e-v-elina]

people say spotify is the greatest invention ever since the wheel. i tend to agree.

 

[nothingless]

Amen.