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Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

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Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#621

Post by buro9 »

crazygringo wrote: post #596
jmarchello wrote: post #495

Anytime I see layoffs like this, All I hear is "We hired for the sake of hiring when money was cheap and we wanted to signal 'growth', But now reality has set in and we need our employees to serve a purpose beyond simply headcount". In my opinion they did these employees a disservice by hiring them in the first place. We need our companies to act more responsibly regardless of the price of capital. Innovate sure, but…

This is completely backwards. They didn't hire "for the sake of hiring" -- they hired specifically to build up their podcasting and audiobook efforts, which were totally new products within the app. Which they thought were essential to staying competitive -- e.g. what if people start moving over to Amazon instead with its Music+Wondery+Audible, or other competitors? Now it's turned out those bets haven't been as succ…

They placed a bet, and that bet didn't pay off.

But what I'd expect is for them to cut only a little (not 17%), because they would place another bet on something else to remain competitive.

To cut so heavily looks like they've no great idea on the next bet that they could make, that they don't believe those people they hired could contribute towards another thing in the near future (or they have no runway to explore doing so).

Companies should place bets to stay relevant and grow, this looks like there isn't a big bet now.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#622

Post by mrWiz »

RamblingCTO wrote: post #385
mtlmtlmtlmtl wrote: post #40

I often wonder what kind of work actually happens at Spotify. Pretty much every major change to the software or api since I started using it has made the product worse. Breaking libspotify, pointless UI redesigns, obvious, user-facing bugs that go unfixed for years. Removing features like play queue for long periods. There's metadata errors and even audio corruption in some albums that I actually reported to them yea…

I still hate the change about the "add to playlist/like" button with all my heart. I don't want to like all the songs I add to playlists. I have a few hundred playlists with a looooot of songs (I listened to 86000 minutes last year of over 4000 artists ...). That change was utterly idiotic

I've always used that button to "like" songs and used the "Add To Playlist" item under the ellipses menu to add things to a particular playlist. What was your process like before the change, and what is it now?

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#623

Post by erellsworth »

sometdog wrote: post #606
erellsworth wrote: post #447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure how specific you want your criteria to be, but you can create a Spotify "radio" station based off of any song, band/artist, or playlist. Spotify's discovery capabilities are miles beyond Pandora, in my opinion.

They removed the ability to create "radio" stations off of playlists, which does make discovery somewhat more difficult.

Oh man, I didn't know they did that. Lame.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#624

Post by alexanderchr »

BurningFrog wrote: post #575
sydbarrett74 wrote: post #525

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are better off in absolute terms, yes. That is incontrovertible. What matters to the human psyche is relative well-being compared to one's peers. And by those measures, the 'middle class' is demonstrably worse off than 50 years ago.

> What matters to the human psyche is relative well-being compared to one's peers Like it or not, that's how we primates work, yes. Of course, in aggregate that distribution never changes. If you or your group gets lower status, someone else gets higher. It's a true zero sum game. And half of us will always be below average.

No this is not correct. Half of us will always be below the mean, this much is true, but we can obviously do something about the spread of the distribution.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#625

Post by local_crmdgeon »

svarcoe wrote: post #516
jmarchello wrote: post #495

Anytime I see layoffs like this, All I hear is "We hired for the sake of hiring when money was cheap and we wanted to signal 'growth', But now reality has set in and we need our employees to serve a purpose beyond simply headcount". In my opinion they did these employees a disservice by hiring them in the first place. We need our companies to act more responsibly regardless of the price of capital. Innovate sure, but…

And they were still hiring too! My first day was last Monday haha, last day today

Hope they gave you a fat severance package

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#626

Post by CoastalCoder »

alephnan wrote: post #427
mtlmtlmtlmtl wrote: post #40

I often wonder what kind of work actually happens at Spotify. Pretty much every major change to the software or api since I started using it has made the product worse. Breaking libspotify, pointless UI redesigns, obvious, user-facing bugs that go unfixed for years. Removing features like play queue for long periods. There's metadata errors and even audio corruption in some albums that I actually reported to them yea…

There was a meme about Spotify replacing the heart symbol to like a song with a ‘+’ sign. No one asked for, it benefits no one, and people proactively want the old version. I’m sure they had countless meetings for this “feature” and how much human hours. There would have been a designer, and a researcher. There would have also been a data scientist lying with statistics about how this change moved the core business m…

This change reminds me of Netflix replacing their 5(?)-star rating system, with a simple thumbs up / down system.

Netflix claimed there was statistical justification for the change, but my most charitable interpretation is that their goals don't align with mine.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#627

Post by teg4n_ »

jaywalk wrote: post #605
ActionHank wrote: post #505

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just remember they signed Joe Rogan for over 200 million and he's not brought in nearly that amount for them. Did they retrench the people who made that decision? Did they retrench the management who approved that contract? Spotify employees should be pushing for some degree of corporate and fiscal responsibility given they are retrenching, but they still gave Joe the bag.

Unless you are pretty high up at Spotify, you have literally no idea how much Joe Rogan has brought in for them. His podcast has been number one on the platform since it launched.

Personally, I cancelled my Spotify premium family plan over it. I doubt I’m the only one.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#628

Post by hammock »

notpachet wrote: post #620
hammock wrote: post #618

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Anytime I see layoffs like this, All I hear is "We hired for the sake of hiring when money was cheap and we wanted to signal 'growth', But now reality has set in and we need our employees to serve a purpose beyond simply headcount".... In my opinion they did these employees a disservice by hiring them in the first place. We need our companies to act more responsibly regardless of the price of capital. Innovate sure,…

> They were being responsible at the time. Another strong contender for humanity's future epitaph.

Remember hindsight is 20/20. If capitalists were as risk-averse as some would like, we'd be stuck in the past forever

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#629

Post by geodel »

gtirloni wrote: post #580
querez wrote: post #543

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel like I've woken up to the nature of the employer/employee relationship with all these layoffs. I was blind but now I see, we ARE human resources I think that's just a normal process of growing older. Also: yes, of course you are a resource to your employer. An annoying one (stell or laptops don't usually talk back and has demands). I also don't think there's anything wrong with companies behaving this way. B…

> By all intents, purposes and employment contracts, it was always meant to be a "work for payment" type deals, nothing more That's exactly the opposite of what 99% of the companies sell to candidates. You must have seen stuff like this is a great place work, join the family, etc. So maybe you mean the hidden intent was that but that's not the message being broadcasted.

Well this is same for 99% products advertised on media. No one really take it at their face value. So why is employment advertising/selling is expected to be factual.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#630

Post by 0xEFF »

gtirloni wrote: post #580
querez wrote: post #543

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel like I've woken up to the nature of the employer/employee relationship with all these layoffs. I was blind but now I see, we ARE human resources I think that's just a normal process of growing older. Also: yes, of course you are a resource to your employer. An annoying one (stell or laptops don't usually talk back and has demands). I also don't think there's anything wrong with companies behaving this way. B…

> By all intents, purposes and employment contracts, it was always meant to be a "work for payment" type deals, nothing more That's exactly the opposite of what 99% of the companies sell to candidates. You must have seen stuff like this is a great place work, join the family, etc. So maybe you mean the hidden intent was that but that's not the message being broadcasted.

No company reflects “we’re family” in contracts or compensation packages. That fact alone tells us the message is and always has been bullshit.
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