I Quit Spotify

I quit Spotify a few years ago as well.

They kept changing stuff, breaking my work flow, with every change it felt like there was more friction to listen to the music and podcasts I wanted, and less friction to listen to algorithmically selected slop I didn't want to listen to. Eventually I just said fuck it. I don't need this source of stress and frustration in my life. I've never looked back.

I'm on youtube music now. In many ways it's a worse product, but it at least stays the same and doesn't keep trying to make me change my listening behavior.

I suspect Spotify's problem is that they have (or had) too many developers, so you get this pressure to look busy "improving" the product, with endless lateral change as a result instead.

>Of course, there aren’t many alternatives for a comprehensive music-streaming service.

These days there are 10s of 1000s of radio stations with a web presence. From all over the world. Some have live DJs, some use automation, some have special syndicated programs. Over the years I've tried out many hundreds of them for an hour or two. Some are great! Many have multiple programs each day at regular times. It's a whole 'nother world. Some are college stations, some are long-time businesses like SOMA-FM.

I use VLC to listen to them (go to the 'Media' heading, select 'Open Media stream' and paste the URL ... instant play) , and to make a playlist to group stuff by genre or source-type.

Audio-quality-wise, if that's a concern, their bit-rates can vary from 50k to 320k. VLC can tell you that. Not a problem; if I don't like what I'm hearing today, I have lots of lossless favorites from my collection on a drive.

SOMA-FM has a great selection of genres you can try for starters. Or take a walk on the wild side by searching here [0], a site where all station info has been entered by users... including many that might be in your own neighborhood. Copy the URL and plug it into VLC.

[0] https://www.radio-browser.info/#!/

I totally recommend Radio FIP (France Inter Paris) for anyone a little frustrated with Spotify. I listen to this for hours each day. I love every one of those hours.

Unlike Spotify, expert DJs select a wide range of music from genres that span the globe. Throughout the day, FIP curates an eclectic mix of genres—from jazz to rock, world music to classical—ensuring that I'm constantly exposed to various musical worlds without needing to curate or chase playlists myself.

FIP's programming is uninterrupted by DJs or ads, allowing for a seamless, immersive listening experience. The station's French commentary, when it occurs, adds a touch of charm without becoming a distraction, making it easy to "set it and forget it."

Do yourself a favour...

PSA for people with kids: Parental controls and QA in Spotify are a bad joke.

I found out the hard way that Spotify features tons of videos and that you cannot disable them. See for instance

https://open.spotify.com/episode/5KS759AlVGVj34OHPbcx1p

There's also ton of dubious stuff in the "ASMR" category you probably wouldn't want your kid have access to and that is not caught by the "Explicit" filter, see for instance (NSFW!)

https://open.spotify.com/artist/3AxgfSNuDgYnz54lT4jkmT

Needless to say, I immediately canceled the Spotify family account.

We (as a family) moved from Spotify to Apple Music, but it was entirely down to cost. As our kids have grown and gained their own devices we've had to find apps/services that we can share with them. The most successful has been Apple One, having Arcade for them, TV and News for us, the storage, and extras like Fitness, it made sense to get Apple One. At that point we had Apple Music for "free" so decided to migrate after over ten years. Genuinely very happy with it!

Many of the complaints in the OP apply to Sonos too though, we brought into it years ago, and are incredible disappointed with the recent changes.

The article has all the pieces but doesn't connect that Spotify's incentive is "Discovery Mode": https://newsroom.spotify.com/2020-11-02/amplifying-artist-in...

> artists and labels can identify music that’s a priority for them... it won’t require any upfront budget. Instead, labels or rights holders agree to be paid a promotional recording royalty rate for streams in personalized listening sessions where we provided this service

"Payola" is the term for radio stations secretly charging labels to feature their songs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payola

"Discovery Mode" is the modern structure. Instead of a station's single broadcast, it's many algorithmic playlists. Instead of the publisher paying up front because the radio and retailer are separate businesses, they just accept a lower royalty rate on plays because Spotify plays are the discovery and the sale together. Perhaps these differences and this press release is enough "disclosure" to avoid prosecution, I'm not a lawyer. I wish Spotify's internal legal analysis was public.

But all these gripes come back to: Spotify makes more money from this than when playing albums, curation, personal playlists, etc etc. There isn't a general issue of control or caring, there's a specific, nameable moneymaking "feature".

I just started using and paying for Spotify, having been a diehard radio listener all my life (and, in a previous period of my career, worked in the sector). It was more of a reaction against radio rather than being in favour of Spotify, though. I was tired of my listening being characterised by inane commercials, constant depressing negative news, DJs telling us that it's some stranger's birthday, long interviews with some jerk I've never heard of, endless dreadful tracks that I wouldn't choose to listen to.

It got to the point where I couldn't figure out why on earth anyone would listen to radio when you can get all the music you like, with no ads, no news, and no Dave Doubledecks, for a few pounds a month. After a couple of weeks of using it, it started recommending music I'd never heard before, and really cool Scottish and Welsh folk music that the radio stations here would never touch, so I've discovered really cool stuff through it. I love that I can tell it never to show me certain artists - for instance, if I never heard Eminem again in my life it'd be too soon, so I've told it to never recommend any tracks by him, whereas local radio plays him incessantly.

Here’s an experiment you can do across any music service, count how many clicks/taps/interactions to go from a cold start to dark side of the moon. Now play their next album that you can’t remember the name of.

For bonus fun count how many times it tries to interrupt you and have you listen to something cheaper, their in house podcasts or whatever the latest rap album they’re pushing is, despite that after tens of thousands of hours of listening they know you’ve never once chosen it or any adjacent genre.

Shameless promotion: rad is an auto D.J. that actually does follow your preferences https://rad.fm/

I'm looking for a music app (streaming or otherwise) that supports what seems to me like a basic feature, but which seems to be unsupported in anything I've tried.

I want the ability to shuffle my library/play the latest releases/whatever while leaving albums intact.

I want to play the entirety of one album in order, then play another album in order, and so on.

Anyone know of an app that does this? I'll drop spotify today if some other streaming service can do this.

In 10 (5? 25?) years I'd be very interested to read an "insider story" book about Spotify, similar in scope as https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Plex or something.

Spotify used to be cool and within the industry, the big example of engineering culture, agile with "the Spotify model" with squads and tribes etc. being able to adapt and ship stuff quickly.

But now somehow it seems they regressed into an organization that cannot ship basic features (stuff like lossless audio) for years, and that is more interested in pursuing legal action than in pursuing customers. Reading a book about why would be a good lesson for many people in IT.

Perhaps I’m old but I never got into this at all. I have a very carefully curated collection of music which is combination of CD rips, stuff from bandcamp and bootlegs and piracy. I can’t possibly replicate this with any online music service.

I had been a Spotify subscriber since near when it started. I was annoyed with every change over the years, but I had nearly a decade of playlists that I didn't want to lose. It never felt worth switching because it seemed like a huge effort.

Recently, I finally switched to Apple Music after discovering there is absolutely no way to disable video podcasts on child accounts and that because of that, Spotify search is full of TikTok compilations, Minecraft streamers, and straight up adult content that you absolutely can't disable for children. It's really terrible and unforgivable.

The good news is (1) I actually like Apple Music a lot more, even on Android and (2) switching took like 5 minutes using Soundiiz. It is a web app where you log into both services and it syncs your playlists and collections instantly. I have no connection to it and there are probably other similar services that might be just as good, but it worked really well for me and was worth the $5 or whatever I payed. I moved everyone in my family over to Apple Music and no one complained or lost any playlists.

Since being on Apple Music, it's really refreshing that they prioritize music features over dumb engagement features. They promote lossless audio and spatial audio remixes instead of trying to push paid podcasts and other junk you don't want. It also supports streaming your own local music that is not in their library. It is a really nice product.

Obviously both are giant companies who don't care about you, but Apple Music really seems like a better product to me made by people who actually listen to music.

Spotify support forums (community) are a honeypot for complaints. Take a look at how long the 'top ideas' have been ignored to see for yourself.

Using the non-shuffling feature titled 'smart shuffle' is the most frustrated I have been using any software in my 30 years of life. If your connection speed is not on big US city level, accidentally toggling shuffle practically halts the application for minutes. Reference: https://community.spotify.com/t5/Live-Ideas/Mobile-Other-Sma...

For credibility: there are 142,664 scrobbles saved on my last fm since 2013. I use the service a lot and wish I did not have to resort to modding tools like Spicetify for basic feature toggles. Way to ruin a wonderful product. If there was a 'Spotify but only the music you choose', I'd switch in an instant.

I also quit Spotify about 6 months ago and went back to Pandora. I’ve been super happy with that decision. Spotify kept me in a weird bubble of sorts always playing the same songs and artists. When I went back to Pandora I rediscovered that their music recommendation engine is amazing! I’m now listening to more new artists than ever and have found way more new music.

Interesting how the reasoning is on the UI/algo side when it should be about how artists are treated. I "quit" Spotify or any other streaming service without even subscribing to them.

I must admit I’m a bit baffled here. I find the listening experience on Spotify to largely conform to what I want to do. If I want to discover new music, I’ll pick a song I like, create a station out of it and dig into songs/artists that populate it. If I want to go into an artist’s catalog, I’ll look up the artist (or visit them in my library after having added them to it) and find and album that I want to listen to.

I think the only thing that really bothers me is that you might add a song or an album to your library but for some reason that doesn’t automatically add the artist to your library. I feel like they should all be interlinked.

I don’t use the desktop app at all though. Maybe the mobile app just has a better design?

I moved my family plan from Spotify because they still don’t have an easy to use music locker solution. As an amateur producer I love to have my unreleased music always available. I was already a premium Youtube subscriber to get rid of ads and Youtube music was included. While the UI is not great I can appreciate that it can play and download music from Youtube as well that is not otherwise available on any of the other streaming services. The way Spotify treats third party developers (including myself) with all the unfixed issues being broken for years was just the last nail in the coffin.

My reasoning for leaving Spotify was this:

  - Spotify pays fractions of pennies per play to the artist ($0.00318)
  - Apple Music pays about three times more ($0.008)
  - Tidal pays more than Apple Music ($0.01284)

I picked Apple because I've got it anyway through Apple One, if I wasn't in The Ecosystem, I'd switch to Tidal since it integrates with PlexAmp directly.

https://virpp.com/hello/music-streaming-payouts-comparison-a...

Anecdotally, and without having read this, I unsubscribed and stopped using the app just last week. I think YouTube has better recommendations and selection.

I too am sick of Spotify. They make it harder and harder for me to access my own library and keep shoving 'recommendations' down my throat. If I want recommendations, I'll ask various meat-suit friends and family members whose musical tastes I respect.

Does anyone here have experience with Tidal? I have heard good things about them.

Sort of related: "Why Spotify's "grand strategy" will fail"

https://youtu.be/yDWgOwb8kj4

The whole article is just someone's opinion about how much they don't like spotify that they had to share it with the world. Obviously use what works for you. Use spotify if you like it, use youtube music if you like it, use radio channels if you like them, use any podcast app if you like it, like no one cares about how much you hate a specific app, stop using it and move on :D

Spotify, where's the Foo Fighter's cover of "Down in the Park" from the X-Files soundtrack?!

With Spotify subcription hikes, one could buy a lot of music. Does a decent MP3 or FLAC store exists nowadays? For some specific albums it's nice to have the physical object of a CD, but in general I'd rather not buy the plastic discs just to rip and store indefinitely.

The problem is that Spotify has to pay huge royalties to the studios instead of being able to make a large margin as other tech companies do. So they get squeezed from both ends, on one side the customer who doesn't want to pay more and on the other side the music industry.

Those of us who aren't deterred by self-hosting, I highly recommend using Roon. It allows you to use your own MP3s/FLACs/Wav, use Tidal/Qobyz for HQ streaming of things you don't have, and the best recommendation engine I've seen in music.

I also left Spotify. However, my reason wasn't the user interface but the sound quality. Since I bought high-quality studio monitors and an excellent sound card, sound quality has become important. I switched to Tidal and I'm not going back.

I use Deezer - thanks to it I discovered new music that I like. With Spotify if you listened to one Beatles song you got only Beatles recommendations. At least the app is stable and serves the basic purpose of playing music.

Don't get me wrong, I've started moving away from Spotify, but not entirely for these reasons. Music to me is mostly one big playlist and a few smaller playlists from the same library of my music. And where my music doesn't get randomly yanked because the artist had a fit with Spotify or license issues came up

I never understood people's fetishization of albums and "enjoying" an album and all the music app interfaces created around that. I just want a cloud or self hosted version of winamp, where jumping to the next song or queueing it up from my playlist is a hotkey away rather than 12 clicks on a crowded interface.

Been moving to navidrome but i expect to eventually need some workarounds to get what i want.

Edit: also the poor implementation that is smart shuffle and shoving it down my throat

sensible move.

shitification thats spotify.

I would like to see a HN inspired web site that lists all of the bands and musicians where we can click on a link and go directly to the band or musicians web site and buy or download the music directly from them.

No middle man earning a small fortune off the backs of those talented musicians.

I knew it was going to go down hill when they killed off 3rd party clients.

For months now Spotify has locked me into algorithmic slop in its discovery features. In the past I had no problem listening to some chill lo-fi while I work and rock or indie or whatever for pleasure. The Discover Weekly playlist would give me a reasonable mix of these.

Nowadays my Discover Weekly is nothing but "lo-fi" elevator music, despite my best efforts to dissuade it with the dislike button. Worse, if you click in to any of the artists of these songs they're all mysteriously vacant profiles with no social media connections or descriptions.

I absolutely despise Spotify as a company and have felt trapped by them for years so maybe I have an unreasonable bias against them in thinking this, but the thought crossed my mind that they're creating this slop themselves to suck up as many streaming minutes as possible to avoid paying real artists/producers.

Of course, it's also possible they're just turning a blind eye to abusers who generate this stuff and flood the platform looking for a quick buck. Mutually beneficial for them I guess.

This is the 5th time this story has been posted in 12 days.

tl;dr: Author doesn't like algorithmic recommendations. Also, UI updates are confusing.

Summary (thanks, Kagi!):

> a recent app update altered its interface, making it harder to navigate

Spotify constantly change their interface ever so slightly.

I personally often like the changes. I sometimes can't find things.

This is a really valid point of criticism, but not something everyone agrees is a bad thing.

> app shifts towards promoting playlists and algorithmically generated content over traditional albums

OK, this is the real reason.

I like the algorithmic recommendations.

It helps me discover electronic music which has a high similarity.

When algorithmic recommendations are not sufficient, and I have actual time on my hand to explore music, I browse the "Artists like this one..." directory, old-school style.

I mostly play "Liked songs" and explore recommendations on adventurous days.

> corporate profit over user experience

Isn't really an argument.

> feel increasingly alienated from their music, with algorithms dictating listening habits

If argument does not sound convincing, repeat the argument.

> diminishes the significance of entire albums

To be more precise, Spotify is changing the reward mechanism to favor singles over albums:

https://www.grizzlybeatz.com/lofi-hip-hop-blog/why-releasing...

I'm not convinced it's just a bad thing.

The landscape is changing.

People still make albums if they feel like it.

My main reason for quitting spotify: "Your password has been reset"

I’m quitting Spotify because of some idiotic family plan policies.

We missed an email about address verification, despite we living in the same place for many years and being a paid user for 15 years, and now my wife can’t rejoin the plan for a year.

Moving to Tidal, and perhaps starting buying CDs again.

I quit them because they raised prices again. I find the app to be excellent, but paying $240/yr for music most of which I already have on CDs is idiotic.