Odd thing today, well beyond posting this at midnight on a Friday night obviously, in that I actually missed being able to skip to the next track, and then the next one, and then the next one, until I found something I "wanted" to hear. I don't know if this is good or bad. But then today I've not really been in the mood to listen to anything much.
I've un-installed Spotify. I don't think I'll be bothering with it again. The whole concept of the thing doesn't sit right with me. Is it the adverts? Is it the low res streaming? Is it all the shitty cover version and karaoke albums that are strangling the life out of the service? Is it the patronising presumption that people will quite happily pay for their music indirectly by listening to advertisements? Or pay a tenner a month for something that offers little additional benefit beyond the absence of these same advertisements? Or is it that I can't stomach the fact that Spotify is a half-arsed, knee jerk response to the idea that the music industry will only survive if it gives music away for free?
I reckon that the music industry might be better advised trying to work out why they think people won't or don't buy their products. Why do they think consumers will be inspired to buy music that is punctuated the advertisements? Doesn't this reinforce the perception music is a secondary consideration and that it doesn't have any intrinsic value beyond filling the spaces between the advertisements? It's been suggested that where Spotify has value is in introducing people to music that they wouldn't normally have access to. I'm not sure about this. I think it's catalogue is too limited to appeal to those who "really" want to hear something new before they decide to buy. So what listeners is it designed to appeal to?
The other thing I can't get my head around is the actual buying bit. Surely if you are a listener who can cope with the music being free, but interrupted with commercials, then are you really going to buy the same track so that you can hear it without the commercials? Or will you just download it from a P2P site? And, at the other extreme I reckon if you are interested in music to the point that you'd pay for it then the commercials are sufficiently intrusive to annoy these users to the point that they simply won't use the service. So the thing that supports the site is the very same thing that will deter the people they hope to attract - those who'll pay for music. And if this is the case where does this leave Spotify? Isn't it just a place where people can hear things that they might like, but that they'd never actually buy? If that's the case then what's the point exactly?
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