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Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

newsroom.spotify.com

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Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#721

Post by nkohari »

kojeovo wrote: post #651
buro9 wrote: post #621

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Interesting way to look at it, a bet. A bet involving people's livelivehoods.

This is literally how all commerce works, though. If someone opens a restaurant, for example, it's a bet that there's a market for the food they're preparing, and that their staff will be capable of being able to meet the demand. Sometimes you're right, and sometimes you're wrong.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#723

Post by redleggedfrog »

heyjamesknight wrote: post #676
buro9 wrote: post #621

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

This is what happens during periods of economic uncertainty. It's like counting cards with a freshly shuffled deck: nobody can tell what the state of the game is, so you place a minimum bet until you can get a feel for things again. The movie is meh, but the boardroom scene in Margin Call has a great line: "I'm here for one reason and one reason alone. I'm here to guess what the music might do a week, a month, a year…

They should feel good, because their capitalist machine has done just what it has aspired to do - get people to spend money they don't have:

https://apnews.com/article/spending-consumers-inflation-econ...

That's peak capitalism right there - you've got people spending to buy products with money borrowed from credit card companies and banks, which they will have difficulty paying off and will pay a good amount of interest on.

If you can't make a company work in that environment, you might want to do a bit of a self examination and notice that your advertising is annoying and off-putting and your web-browser based client is utter shit.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#724

Post by alienreborn »

r00fus wrote: post #702
rez9x wrote: post #649

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently left Spotify for Apple Music, in large part because of this new development path. I don't want podcasts, audiobooks, etc mixed in with my music. I prefer separate apps. I think what bothered me more was the focus on branching into these new paths without any innovation in the music department--I'm sure there was innovation that wasn't visible to me. I'm tired of the same black and green color scheme. I don…

Looking to do this - how did you migrate your playlists? Also my family was using my main Apple Music account - so I have to "clear out the new place" as I setup a family account for them.

I have migrated services couple of times and used Soundiz and Songshift. They miss few matches but overall gets the job done.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#725

Post by bobdvb »

syrgian wrote: post #175
dustedcodes wrote: post #158

I have never had Spotify and would like to understand what people like about it? Admittedly I pay for YouTube Premium which comes with YouTube Music, so I use that for music. YouTube is kind of an integral part of life I find, everybody uses it. It has so much useful content, it has educational content, product reviews, how to guides, and then of course all the entertainment content. So assuming that probably most pe…

Not Spotify, but I pay for Amazon Music. I listen music all the time, and it also works for 5 of my family members (out of which 1 listens a lot and the rest listen a little). It's cheaper than Youtube Premium and has better quality as far as I can tell. I don't listen to podcasts, but I know people listen to them in during their commute. In fact, I am surprised someone with kids and little free time considers Youtub…

I probably watch more YouTube than SVOD (e.g. Netflix).

Plus the family sub for YT Premium is well worth it. But I do sub to Amazon Music not Spotify because of Alexa.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#726

Post by nova22033 »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #4
thiago_fm wrote: post #3

They need a bigger cut. 17% will not have a big enough impact to its bottom line. They need to have enough money to invest in other initiatives, as the business they are in is proven to be margin-thin. Apple and Amazon will eventually eat Spotify given enough time, if they don't find a moat to be built

>They need a bigger cut. 17% will not have a big enough impact to its bottom line. What's stopping them from bigger cuts? We've seen that big SW products can run on lean teams(whatsapp, post-Musk Twitter) and we know many large tech companies are overloaded with way more workers than they need to run(Google), just because they could overhire when money was free. >Apple and Amazon will eventually eat Spotify given eno…

post-Musk Twitter

Spotify is actually trying to make money. If the goal of running Spotify was to get everyone to listen to the CEO's crappy garage band, maybe then it would be a valid comparison.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#727

Post by wayfinder »

rez9x wrote: post #649
crazygringo wrote: post #596

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

I recently left Spotify for Apple Music, in large part because of this new development path. I don't want podcasts, audiobooks, etc mixed in with my music. I prefer separate apps. I think what bothered me more was the focus on branching into these new paths without any innovation in the music department--I'm sure there was innovation that wasn't visible to me. I'm tired of the same black and green color scheme. I don…

Umm, what? There’s been plenty of innovation…

The new cover videos bands can post on songs are ill. The changing of the like button to not be just for liked songs is great (usually, tho sometimes I wish it was two separate buttons). There’s constantly a bunch of new tools to find new music, some hitting better than others. The “listen with friends,” while still buggy asf, is a great feature.

5 years ago, Spotify updates were more like “we changed the colors and layout of the UI and that’s about it.”

It’s true though. They haven’t reinvented music completely.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#728

Post by nostrademons »

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…

Is it though?

There's always a business justification for hiring, simply because there has to be to get the headcount approved. That doesn't mean that it's the actual reason, as in the deciding factor that gets the decider to say "yes, we're going to hire more people". Principle agent problems are a thing. You can always come up with reasons that are true but wouldn't by themselves change your decision. And conversely, you can figure out what someone's actual reasons are by looking at counterfactuals where those conditions didn't occur and the person (or a peer) made a different decision.

Between 2020 and 2023, Google went from 118k employees to 190k. Meta went from 58,604 to 86,482. Stripe went from ~2000 to ~7000. Coinbase went from 1200 to 4500. These companies are not competing significantly in podcasting and audiobook efforts. But what they do have in common is that they are growth tech companies whose business models are pretty sensitive to interest rates and availabilty of capital. Who didn't hire in 2021-2022? Mostly industries like restaurants and hospitality that are not particularly interest rate sensitive, and were still recovering from COVID. They're catching up now that people are spending more.

That makes me strongly suspect that directors hire simply because there are funds available, and there are funds available because rates are low. Indeed, this is the Fed's lever on the unemployment rate. If they didn't, then changing the money supply wouldn't have any effect on unemployment or wage inflation, which would be purely determined by shifts in consumer demand.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#729

Post by verall »

apwell23 wrote: post #544
rorroe53 wrote: post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Middle class 15-20 years ago was able to buy, or even finance building of their own houses. How many poor you know who do that? Only thing that has really improved is access to cheap Made in China goods, and perhaps plane tickets. But actual necessities like housing are becoming more and more unaffordable.

> But actual necessities like housing are becoming more and more unaffordable. That has to do with supply restrictions with NIMBY and environmet regulatory capture by nimbies. Blame your local boomer neighbor not a billionaire.

por que no los dos?

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#730

Post by matwood »

dangus wrote: post #714
crazygringo wrote: post #596

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

I think that people get really upset about layoffs like they're an example of poor planning, but in reality it's all a calculated risk. Laying off employees isn't a very negative thing from the perspective of the corporation. Very few costs are associated with laying off employees. A few months of salary, but that's it. It's an at-will arrangement. I learned in a business class that, mathematically, most companies ac…

> If we want this to change then we need to have our governments have better layoff protections in place, like mandatory severance or notice periods.

But then you push companies in the exact opposite direction than you say you want them to go. If it's harder to do layoffs, companies will take less risks that require hiring.

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