331–340 of 479 posts
This has investment bankers quaking in their boots.
2. If a client wants to buy/sell snapchat, the investment bank is still going to make broker fees on the transactions.
For pre-selected music that I listen to frequently, I use playlists with Spotify.
For truly discovering music with algorithms that work, I use Pandora.
I do notice there is NOT a lot of overlap at times, due to bizarre licensing restrictions and deals.
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And exactly the same can be stated for Blue Apron and Stich Fix, thus the point of my rhetorical question. Just because the two in question aren't as sexy as Spotify or Dropbox shouldn't exclude them from being considered a tech company. I'd argue that the logistics of shipping perishable food is significantly more difficult than streaming an audio file, and recommending clothing to meet an individual's specific styl…
Blue Apron and Stitch Fix aren't selling software/hardware as a customer-facing value proposition, so they're definitively not tech. You definitely have to draw the line, or else every big company in existence is a tech company. Banks hire thousands of software devs.
We are getting closer to the day where every company is a tech company. Marketing requires tech to do what is very complicated bidding and A/B testing. Most companies involved in sales are using CRM to understand how to better reach customers. This list goes on and on, as tech is embedded into everything people do these days.
I do love Spotify as a product, however I don't think it will scale the same way Netflix does. Spotify is at the mercy of major record labels, and as their books become more transparent the record labels will squeeze every dollar they can for licensing. That is, unless they find a way to upend the record industry entirely. Spotify has a unique position with their amazing discovery/recommendations engine- they could p…
I agree they should sign exclusive deals with artists which would give them leverage in their negotiations with the record labels with an eye on the long-term hope of breaking that reliance on them. They won't be able to get into concert tickets at the present time in any significant way due to the exclusive agreements between Ticketmaster and venues. Though maybe the could start with some smaller acts and venues and…
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I think you underestimate the annoyance and frustration users feel when content disappears from their library. This is especially noticeable in playlists: when half of your favorite workout playlist suddenly disappears, it's not something you'll ignore easily. People pay Spotify a monthly subscription for the convenience of being able to listen to the music of their choosing, at the time and place of their choosing.…
It’s already happening, and it’s less of a problem than I thought it would be. Some of my playlists are 200+ tracks. A few songs go missing from time to time. I can never remember which tracks have gone, I just know something’s missing as the flow from song to song is off. It’s extremely irritating, but not enough to make me go elsewhere as I can’t see any other service not having the same problem.
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Yeah, it's already happening, that's why I brought it up. Right now it's not a huge problem, because it doesn't happen too often or on a large scale. Like you said, it's usually a couple of songs in a larger playlist. Now, imagine the scenario comparable to what @bogomipz said above: "no Beatles, Pink Floyd, No Motown, No AC/DC". I'm betting all of us would be a lot more frustrated and irritated than we are right now…
I’m curious. Do a lot of people actually use a single music streaming platform? As an avid music lover, I get my new doses from various services. Spotify is the only one that I pay for. I mainly use it to discover the latest mainstream stuff from genres I don’t typically listen to. But the Beatles? Come on, why isn’t that saved in your hard drive somewhere?
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>"Starting their own label is exactly what they need to do to remain competitive. It's exactly what Netflix ended up doing and I think it's turning out pretty well for them." This seems to be a common refrain that Spotify can just "pull a Netflix." And this is very unlikely. Firstly no matter how much opriginal content they could create, if they don't have back catalog it's going to be a total non-starter for the mai…
> A streaming service that has no Beatles, Pink Floyd, No Motown, No AC/DC etc is going to shed users pretty quickly. I disagree. I think for most people music is fungible; they just want something to listen to. I think Spotify can afford to have gaps in it's library. Sure, if a large enough portion of the music industry cut them off it would be an issue, but I don't think they're in imminent danger of that.
For those interested in this one, small-scale phenomenon: https://qz.com/767812/millennial-whoop/
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> At the end of the day who really cares what is and isn't a "tech company"? Every company has a tech aspect to it these days. Because the way a tech company grows and a non-tech company grows are very different. Nike extensively uses software but you wouldn't call them a tech company, because their growth is limited by sales of their apparel, which is a physical good. 'Real' tech companies aren't typically limited b…
That's right, 'real' tech companies such as Apple, Intel, Samsung, and many others can sell as many products as there are bits streaming across the network.
I'll add the caveat that the product they sell or use for revenue needs to be the tech they are developing. So, once again, Nike sells athletic apparel, and while they use tech to do so, I wouldn't consider them a tech company. But Facebook and Snapchat don't sell a product (other than user info) but depend on the tech they develop to make money.
It's a fine line, but I think we can see what might divide tech and non-tech companies.
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>"Starting their own label is exactly what they need to do to remain competitive. It's exactly what Netflix ended up doing and I think it's turning out pretty well for them." This seems to be a common refrain that Spotify can just "pull a Netflix." And this is very unlikely. Firstly no matter how much opriginal content they could create, if they don't have back catalog it's going to be a total non-starter for the mai…
Spotify should not "pull a Netflix". Spotify should "pull a Bandcamp". Rather, Bandcamp should start a streaming service. I've had a payment model in my pocket for years that I think would work really well for them.
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And how is anyone supposed to sift through all that garbage to find something worthwhile?
Personalized playlists, artist radios etc. The point is you don't have to sift because they do it for you.
Spotify playlists and Browse are very bias. My Spotify 'home page' shows me mostly popular/mainstream stuff that I never listen to. :)