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Spotify files for its IPO

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Re: Spotify files for its IPO

#141

Post by TheHegemon »

mbrzuzy wrote: post #89
bedhead wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same reason people don't move from Amazon to Wal-Mart, or Apple to Android, or Netflix to...I don't even know what. Spotify is objectively better as a service, people love it, and we are creatures of habit. There are other factors like social and all the playlists you've created. Besides, people derive value from things based on more than price alone. You might not see why they have pricing power but the fact is they…

Good point. If Spotify started charging $15 instead of $9.99 I wouldn't care, I would still pay. They are simply the best music streaming service out there IMO. I payed for Google Music for a bit a while ago and I hated it and switch to Spotify. The experience was awful. I'm also pretty sure that Google Music rips audio from Youtube in certain cases which makes the audio quality terrible.

> I payed for Google Music for a bit a while ago and I hated it and switch to Spotify.

It's always so interesting how people can have similar experiences but come out with completely different perspectives. For me, the Google Play Radio feature is the most important thing they have. It's like a Pandora that doesn't play you the same three songs over and over. When I would try and use the radio feature on Spotify it would play music that was not even close to the original other than it maybe being in the "alternative" category.

Re: Spotify files for its IPO

#142

Post by TheHegemon »

rzanella wrote: post #122
on_and_off wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disclaimer : I worked for one of Spotify and Google competitors. >Most people would agree that Spotify is a better music player while each of Google's music apps are bad in different ways I am not so sure about that. Spotify is on top of its game : adjusting the loudness of tracks, using ogg, .. I am however pretty sure that to almost all the users, it makes no difference. Furthermore, it is very hard to differentiat…

Spotify's radio is a 10-song loop, another service w/ better radio and same price would definitely steal some users.

Google Play, for the kind of music I listen to, seems to have the best radio feature.

Re: Spotify files for its IPO

#143

Post by eropple »

Fnoord wrote: post #119
eropple wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a six month trial of Google Music and YouTube Red, thinking I'd go to that instead of Spotify. I canceled the Google one because changing over was too much effort.

Are there scripts to aid changing services to convert playlists etc? That'd increase competition and decrease lock-in. If I change password manager there are scripts. If I change browser there's addons for the other browser as well. [...]

I assume, but here's the thing: it's ten bucks a month and I don't watch YouTube on devices without ad-blockers very often. It's not worth my time to think about it.

Re: Spotify files for its IPO

#144

Post by e12e »

bhj wrote: post #47
SnowingXIV wrote: post #42

I hope they do get funding so they can support messaging again, one of the reasons I came back to Spotify was for one of my most beloved features. Sending tracks to friends within the application, but then found out it was removed. I still subscribe to Spotify, but the "copy link" send to friend via text is so much worse than being able to just message within.

Yes, I would like to see more social features that aren't tied to Facebook. I know it's not their core competency, but it's odd that the Friends feature requires FB even though they support "standard" non-FB user accounts. And a timeline-esque view of who's been listening to what at-a-glance would be neat.

Actually, I think networking is their core product (though maybe not competency...).

Their App is tricky to use (easy to skip, rather than enque a song, or accidentally skip while looking at meta data, or searching for tracks to queue).

They have offline working, half-decent play lists (but still too easy to accidentally make a new list, rather than augment an existing one).

However - "everyone" knows it, and knows favourite songs on it, and have an active account - so it's nice at parties, or for sharing tracks in person or via messages, tweets/statuses etc.

The only other thing I'd like to see was a steam/sdk integration for soundtracks in games. Everyone listens to their own music with any (mmo) game worth playing - but it'd be nice to have Spotify cross-fade to the "scary/dramatic" playlist in a fight, and "moody" when the game calls for quiet mood etc.

Re: Spotify files for its IPO

#145

Post by e12e »

Shywim wrote: post #37
sova wrote: post #18

Spotify has been doing one feature wrong for as long as I can recall: The Previous Track button will always navigate to the previous track in the list, no matter what you played before, and if there is nothing in the playlist before that track then the button effectively does nothing. Come on! PREV stands for Previous not List Index - 1. Other than that, Spotify works well enough that I do appreciate the service, eve…

Isn't that the standard behavior on every music player?

Don't know, but not having a useful history of tracks is really annoying. Why I've landed on cloudplayer for Android - it allows you to go back to "that nice track three songs back when I was biking down a hill" (when shuffling a large, partially unknown selection).

Re: Spotify files for its IPO

#146

Post by remir »

nunez wrote: post #59
pembrook wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the same problem Netflix & Amazon have been successful in combating. The answer is to become a content owner by competing with the big labels directly. All Spotify needs to push the big labels back on their heels is to sign a few top 40 artists of their own. I might be wrong but I remember reading something like 90%+ of streams on music services are of songs currently on the charts. Capture the popular cultur…

It’s really not though because music is a loss leader for amazon, apple and google, but it is spotify’s entire business. The only other major competitors out there are either in major cahoots with the big 3 (tidal, pandora) or gone (soundcloud, grooveshark, rdio). Netflix has this problem too but they “solved” it by making their own content. Amazon are Google are doing the same thing. That’s the direction I see Spoti…

Apparently Apple is gearing up to create their own video content.

Re: Spotify files for its IPO

#147

Post by remir »

TheHegemon wrote: post #141
mbrzuzy wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good point. If Spotify started charging $15 instead of $9.99 I wouldn't care, I would still pay. They are simply the best music streaming service out there IMO. I payed for Google Music for a bit a while ago and I hated it and switch to Spotify. The experience was awful. I'm also pretty sure that Google Music rips audio from Youtube in certain cases which makes the audio quality terrible.

> I payed for Google Music for a bit a while ago and I hated it and switch to Spotify. It's always so interesting how people can have similar experiences but come out with completely different perspectives. For me, the Google Play Radio feature is the most important thing they have. It's like a Pandora that doesn't play you the same three songs over and over. When I would try and use the radio feature on Spotify it w…

Spotify's strength is their recommendation engine, IMO. It's really good.

Re: Spotify files for its IPO

#149

Post by awad »

_whm1 wrote: post #46

I don't think this is a good long term investment. Disclaimer: I worked for a Spotify competitor in the past, so i have a pretty solid understanding of how the business works. I think it is a bad investment for one simple reason: Spotify purchases its main product (music) from a oligopoly. I'd estimate that 95%+ of the tracks streamed (by total playtime) are from one of the 3 major music labels: Universal, Sony or Wa…

In a way, these dynamics remind me of the movie theater business. Here's a good read:

https://25iq.com/2017/12/30/moviepass-premature-scaling/

Given that music is generally not a substitutable good, margins can only be so strong on the core streaming product to your very point. I'm not really aware of any other revenue stream they may have (do they do ads?) and am curious what they might propose. Presumably they do have enough scale to be possible successful with something tied to monetizing their user data whether through ads or some other value-added service?

Re: Spotify files for its IPO

#150

Post by remir »

BinaryIdiot wrote: post #110
bedhead wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same reason people don't move from Amazon to Wal-Mart, or Apple to Android, or Netflix to...I don't even know what. Spotify is objectively better as a service, people love it, and we are creatures of habit. There are other factors like social and all the playlists you've created. Besides, people derive value from things based on more than price alone. You might not see why they have pricing power but the fact is they…

> Same reason people don't move from Amazon to Wal-Mart, or Apple to Android, or Netflix The big difference is Apple has its own ecosystem, Amazon and Wal-Mart sell a lot of different stuff, Netflix has a TON of original shows to differentiate itself from Hulu and others. Spotify? They literally offer the identical catalog of music as everyone else. Literally. Sure their apps may be slightly better but who cares? If…

Groove Music is literally dead. Play Music is buried on the Play Store somewhere as if Google doesn't want people to access it. Seriously, I had to do a Google search to find it. Its UI is not as good as Spotify (in my opinion) and the service doesn't seem like a priority for Google.

I haven't tried Apple Music and Amazon.

Spotify on the other hand has a decent desktop app available on Windows, macOS and even Linux. Their mobile app is great, too. They have brand power, a UI that a lot of people like and their AI-based playlist engine is amazing.

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