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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%

#811

Post by CydeWeys »

digger495 wrote: post #749
acjohnson55 wrote: post #462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At every company I've worked at, there are things we want to do that nearly everybody think are a good idea. But we can't do them all, because we have limited capital. So we have to be very strategic. Spotify has developed a huge surface area, because they are attempting to be the one-stop shop for all things audio. The thesis is that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, and that's what they're selling to…

> there are things we want to do that nearly everybody think are a good idea. They aren't a good idea. Almost always. For example, "lets put podcasts in spotify". Not a single person I know wanted podcasts in spotify.

Huh? Lots of people wanted podcasts in Spotify. Why wouldn't they? Podcasts are hugely popular.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#812

Post by dang »

surgical_fire wrote: post #188
maxglute wrote: post #102

Should have fired 80% of their employees years ago when service was reasonably feature complete. Not that I don't sympathize with people getting laid off, but feels like past a certain point, more heads changes products faster than can be fixed, and sometimes moving fast degrades what shouldn't have been changed in the first place. NPR acquisition drama aside, pocketcast has like 25 employees that makes the service s…

[flagged]

Please omit swipes and name-calling from your posts here. You can make your substantive points without any of that.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#813

Post by dang »

maxglute wrote: post #193
surgical_fire wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Relax, I was being hyperbolic. Does spotify need 20x more employees than Valve/STEAM? How's twitter working with 80% less employees? Sure it's worth less, but it works mostly fine. Yes spotify needs more than 10 employees, but did it need 10000? After these rounds of cuts, will it still need 7500 next year? I surmise it can settle much lower than what people expect, and maybe their service/product would have been bet…

I realize the GP was being provocative, but please omit swipes (like "Relax") from your comments as well.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#814

Post by rez9x »

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 used Soundshift. You can pay ~$7 to have unlimited exporting or do playlists 200 at a time for free.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#815

Post by rez9x »

wayfinder wrote: post #727
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…

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 upda…

I'm not sure what you're referring to with the Like/Love button. It seems to be the same as it ever was for me, except the UI is different based on whether you're in CarPlay, mobile app, or desktop app, so sometimes it's a heart and sometimes it's a plus sign.

One of my biggest complaints for Spotify is the removal of star ratings, but that's been probably a decade ago at this point. Apple Music has it for the desktop app, but it's missing from mobile.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#816

Post by ssnistfajen »

deng wrote: post #773

Spotify is a completely mistery to me. I'm asking: What does Spotify really have ? They don't own the music. They don't own podcasts (OK, they may have some exclusives like Rogan). All they have is a license, a bit of software, and lots of users. How will they ever turn a profit? What's the end game here? I just switched my whole family from Spotify to Deezer and it was literally a matter of minutes. There are even s…

I like their music discovery functions e.g. generated playlists and song/playlist/artist "radio". My playlist variety expanded greatly over the past 3 years because of these features from Spotify. A centralized platform that is relatively to use (nonsensical UI changes aside) is a strong incentive for users to stay, though by no means a moat.

The end game was always about rapidly burning VC money to acquire more users, while kicking the can of profit-making down the road. Now ZIRP has ended for the time being, the chicken has finally come home to roost.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#817

Post by jmarchello »

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…

I'm not saying businesses shouldn't make bets or innovate, but in my experience hiring more people to do those things has a point of diminishing returns, and that point is much lower than most people think. From what I've experienced, more people tend to slow innovation, not accelerate it.

And while Spotify may not have hired for the sake of hiring, my comment was more targeted to the general behavior of tech startups during the ZIRP years, where I've personally experienced companies just hiring to show they they're growing, even when they have very little work for those extra personnel to do. It's not often intentional, but is rather the result of poor discipline or lack of forethought.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#818

Post by guyzero »

MuffinFlavored wrote: post #806
guyzero wrote: post #799

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spotify is a sales channel. Walmart doesn't actually make anything, US car dealerships don't make anything. But they have customers and that's all it takes to sell something. And, strangely enough, once a sales channel is big enough it can begin taking a bigger slice of profits and telling suppliers what they should be doing (a la Walmart).

Walmart doesn’t technically make anything (not sure if it’s true to be honest) but they probably “enable” a lot of manufacturers to “make things” under their Great Value brand

I suppose one could argue whether Walmart's primary value-add is sales or whether it's logistics, but certainly either of those is a higher priority than making things for consumers to sell. House brand items are still produced and packaged by some other company.

The "logistics" of Spotify's business are mostly commoditized (storage, computer, app development), but certainly they have label relationships that would be hard for a new competitor to replicate. But the key part is that for whatever reason 226 million people have given Spotify their credit card number (or local analog) which makes them pretty important to record labels.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#819

Post by ssnistfajen »

mrkeen wrote: post #705
sitkack wrote: post #700

So effectively contractors. Companies shouldn't be allowed to "shed" this much of their workforce in a system like the US's here we have a very poor safety net. They bulked up, built their products and now want to slim down and enjoy their profits at the expense of these sacrificial workers.

Sidestepping the issue of the US's labour laws, I almost feel like this is what a healthy software industry should look like . You go in, you build, and when the job is done, you leave. We just haven't figured out how to get the job done yet.

If only employers are capable of communicating that expection to prospective employes in an honest manner instead of doing the whole "we are a family" gaslighting act.

Re: Spotify will reduce total headcount by approximately 17%

#820

Post by sb8244 »

MuffinFlavored wrote: post #806
guyzero wrote: post #799

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spotify is a sales channel. Walmart doesn't actually make anything, US car dealerships don't make anything. But they have customers and that's all it takes to sell something. And, strangely enough, once a sales channel is big enough it can begin taking a bigger slice of profits and telling suppliers what they should be doing (a la Walmart).

Walmart doesn’t technically make anything (not sure if it’s true to be honest) but they probably “enable” a lot of manufacturers to “make things” under their Great Value brand

That's pretty new in the grand scheme of things? They started making things under their brand once they became established.

I could see Spotify doing the same thing. Particularly around live ticketing, merch, etc.

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