Dear Spotify, can we just get a table of songs? • Hacker News Board

Re: Dear Spotify, can we just get a table of songs?

#451

Post by ddingus » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 9:25 PM UTC

javajosh wrote: post #444

ddingus wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The speakers... A while back, my wife and I went for a week way out in the sticks. We live in Oregon, and our favorite place is out in the Ochoco high desert National Forest. And nothing works there. I mean nothing except for AM radio late at night.[1] After a few days, our hearing settles back to what is supposed to be normal. City life is loud and our hearing system compensates in various ways that reduce our abili…

Great story. Sounds like nights at Joshua Tree, where I am more familiar. Apple's laptop speakers are the best in the world. But even the best laptop speakers aren't "good hifi system good", especially in bass and stereo separation, but these qualities are not needed by lots of music. Even cheap modern portables with li-ion batteries and rare-earth magnets are startlingly good, a real feat of engineering, and perfect…

I agree with you, though I also love a room with properly placed and tuned loudspeakers.

Re: Dear Spotify, can we just get a table of songs?

#452

Post by Tabular-Iceberg » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 9:27 PM UTC

I think the inconsistent mess of Spotify is what most people actually want, because back in the day I remember constantly hearing from people how much they hated iTunes. This Neil fellow and myself are the ones with the weird taste in software, not the UX experts behind Spotify.

Re: Dear Spotify, can we just get a table of songs?

#453

Post by AuthConnectFail » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 9:31 PM UTC

frosted-flakes wrote: post #325

wonderbore wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AB is the worst. I don't know how long it's been going on, but on YouTube’s homepage it keeps alternating between "Hover to expand video and see Watch Later button" and the regular always-visible Watch Later button. https://imgur.com/a/70p07Ku Pick one already.

I think you can turn off that expand-on-hover popup in the YouTube settings. I found it super annoying and I was surprised it was even an option.

Weird, I actually love that feature. Especially on my browser if there are multiple videos on my feed that I wanted to watch then hated open multiple tabs for them and in most cases I never ended up going there or bloating the number of tabs open.

Re: Dear Spotify, can we just get a table of songs?

#454

Post by fleddr » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 9:33 PM UTC

This kind of "discovery" UI sucks. You see it everywhere now. A/B testing, out of touch design teams and algorithms have overtaken basic common sense.

Spotify has many teams working on the UI of their app, could be 100+ people, perhaps even hundreds. Isn't that absurd when the UI of any classic music/media player is superior?

Re: Dear Spotify, can we just get a table of songs?

#455

Post by frosted-flakes » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 9:35 PM UTC

AuthConnectFail wrote: post #453

frosted-flakes wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you can turn off that expand-on-hover popup in the YouTube settings. I found it super annoying and I was surprised it was even an option.

Weird, I actually love that feature. Especially on my browser if there are multiple videos on my feed that I wanted to watch then hated open multiple tabs for them and in most cases I never ended up going there or bloating the number of tabs open.

Oh, I use the Watch Later feature all the time, just not the autoplay-muted-on-hover popup.

Re: Dear Spotify, can we just get a table of songs?

#456

Post by casey2 » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 9:37 PM UTC

Dear Spotify users, don't.

There are good reasons Spotify does what Spotify does, some of which have already been mentioned in this thread. Instead of begging and groveling for them to change, why not change your habits to ones more beneficial to you? Spotify has never promised users freedom; they are simply a front-end to their collection of licensed music. Spotify has all the power in the relationship with their users and will perpetrate abuse on their users without hesitation or warning.

If you're on a freedom-respecting OS, I recommend either soulseekqt or any plain old BitTorrent client for music acquisition. I recommend mpd with ncmpcpp as a client for playing, and sending cash by mail to whoever you want. Remember, sharing is a virtue, not a vice.

Re: Dear Spotify, can we just get a table of songs?

#457

Post by ddingus » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 9:42 PM UTC

dreamcompiler wrote: post #429

ddingus wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The speakers... A while back, my wife and I went for a week way out in the sticks. We live in Oregon, and our favorite place is out in the Ochoco high desert National Forest. And nothing works there. I mean nothing except for AM radio late at night.[1] After a few days, our hearing settles back to what is supposed to be normal. City life is loud and our hearing system compensates in various ways that reduce our abili…

100% agree. I got a new MBP in 2020 and its sound is shockingly good. I had never experienced decent sound from laptop speakers before.

Nothing like those speakers, agreed.

In a more normal office setting, I am far more inclined to use the built in speaker and mic combo myself when using my Apple device.

Otherwise, my goto is actually the Samsung AKG pack in earbuds that came with my Note phones. Mic is great, audio quality also great. Those have a wire.

I do not mind a wire. Always works.

Re: Dear Spotify, can we just get a table of songs?

#458

Post by aaaaaaaaaaab » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 9:54 PM UTC

Godel_unicode wrote: post #318

ulrikrasmussen wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same, I love Bandcamp, and I am truly worried that Epic will find a way to ruin it. It is one of the last places on the internet I know of where you can easily buy music for download (i.e. you actually own it).

You can buy and download DRM-free music from Apple and Amazon.

As lossless files?

Re: Dear Spotify, can we just get a table of songs?

#459

Post by mahogany » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 9:57 PM UTC

dendriti wrote: post #279

mahogany wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can access basically every song ever recorded Not really, there is a lot missing from Spotify, and not just obscure music. And you have to accept the fact that music may (and does) go missing at any time. Plus, even for songs that are on the platform, you are forced to listen to what version they have, which is almost always a "remastered" version. Example: early Beatles songs have vocals hard-panned to one side,…

How does this work for you then: Spotify allows the vast majority of music listeners far more access to far more music than ever in history.

Yeah, you're right in that sense. Honestly my post is a little over-dramatic because I'm venting based on these experiences I've had with Spotify. Overall, it does offer a lot and I've gotten a lot of enjoyment out of it.

Re: Dear Spotify, can we just get a table of songs?

#460

Post by vinceguidry » Sat, Jun 04, 2022, 10:01 PM UTC

javajosh wrote: post #203

frogstomp19 wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like we've lost essentially nothing. In the streaming era, it's easier than ever before to discover new artists and listen to an unprecedented variety of music with minimal investment. If it's slightly cumbersome to listen to albums on Spotify, it's still much less cumbersome that going to a store to buy a CD or purchasing online and waiting for it to arrive + keeping your collection physically organized and i…

>I feel like we've lost essentially nothing. We've lost: cover art, liner notes, the ability to share or sell your music without 3rd party permission, music stores, and in many cases local music scenes that formed around music stores. Bret Victor has been harping on this for years, but we've also lost a great deal of tactility - putting a CD in a player and pressing buttons to play it uses your hands in pleasant ways…

Man I used to put CDs in players all day long, I don't miss it a single bit. I was one of the first MP3 player adopters and never looked back. I also used tapes. Was happy to ditch those for CDs too. Never used vinyl though. Maybe I would have liked that more than tapes and CDs. Seems plausible enough, but then again maybe not.