Interesting. All this negative attention to Spotify has made me rethink my relationship to it. About 8 years ago i was proudly showcasing to my friends that I had outlistened them, my 110,000 minutes somehow demonstrating a more elite taste (all the while wracking my brain trying to understand was "float house" was, which is clearly now a low-energy way to make sense of floating points). With my hard pivot to live radio I am increasingly certain that spotify is ruining music. Note recent new yorker piece in which Daniel Ek describes the music world as like "elite sport" - millions of people play soccer but only a few get the big bucks. Former Spotify employee described spotify's only competitor to be silent, with sleek algorithmic systems arriving at lo-fi ambient as silence's greatest foe - basically has the same effect but can be monitized. Kind of like when nestle started selling bottled tap water. BUT what this reveals is that, more so, spotify has become a HEDGE FUND with a lucrative fundraising strategy - giving its investees access to all this cheap music that artists have been conned out of. The rich do what they want! Spotify has brilliantly combined IDENTITY CAPITALISM with the INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX and keeps us bought in through shiny features which are meaningless but, like you point out, our valuable only because they enhance the habit.
"With my hard pivot to live radio I am increasingly certain that spotify is ruining music." - note this is from the perspective of a CONSUMER rather than a producer, for whom I'm sure the ruinous effect has been clearer for much longer than the last year or so
Interesting. All this negative attention to Spotify has made me rethink my relationship to it. About 8 years ago i was proudly showcasing to my friends that I had outlistened them, my 110,000 minutes somehow demonstrating a more elite taste (all the while wracking my brain trying to understand was "float house" was, which is clearly now a low-energy way to make sense of floating points). With my hard pivot to live radio I am increasingly certain that spotify is ruining music. Note recent new yorker piece in which Daniel Ek describes the music world as like "elite sport" - millions of people play soccer but only a few get the big bucks. Former Spotify employee described spotify's only competitor to be silent, with sleek algorithmic systems arriving at lo-fi ambient as silence's greatest foe - basically has the same effect but can be monitized. Kind of like when nestle started selling bottled tap water. BUT what this reveals is that, more so, spotify has become a HEDGE FUND with a lucrative fundraising strategy - giving its investees access to all this cheap music that artists have been conned out of. The rich do what they want! Spotify has brilliantly combined IDENTITY CAPITALISM with the INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX and keeps us bought in through shiny features which are meaningless but, like you point out, our valuable only because they enhance the habit.
Blah blah blah look at me rambling on.
"With my hard pivot to live radio I am increasingly certain that spotify is ruining music." - note this is from the perspective of a CONSUMER rather than a producer, for whom I'm sure the ruinous effect has been clearer for much longer than the last year or so
ELITE SPORTS - THAT'S CRAZY!
typo - only competitor to be SILENCE**
An idea I loved
elite sports thing can be found here: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/12/30/mood-machine-liz-pelly-book-review
It’s “The Clocktower at the Beach,” not “The Clocktower by the Beach”
OH SHIT YOU’RE RIGHT THANK YOU