Thanks Chris. Personally I still feel what is missing is all the context around the artist and their music. Granted there's a short biog for an artist, but I just think music is all about context, and digital music consumption has really stripped that out.
(It is also why I started writing Missed Listens. I just wanted to focus on one album and explain why I felt it was worth investing time into.).
As a music fan I'll never use Spotify. SoundCloud is superior in every way. Algos are poor at recommending music, humans are so good at it. But I've learned most people don't really care anyway. It's fine. They want am/fm radio online, and that's what Spotify is.
I don't trust Spotify that much, if at all; but I'd trust TikTok even less to be a curatorial "middleman" between my bands and potential listeners. The playlist curators want their audience attached to them, not the artists they mine for content; taking that state of affairs and then adding "hopefully the impenetrable black-box TikTok algorithm that operates in the interests of keeping users scrolling and very little else will favor that creator this week" makes for a pretty bleak addition to an already hostile game.
Great article. And I agree Spotify has wandered into murky waters deciding what it wants to be. Still... as a platform to connect with me music it’s stellar. As are other streaming music services. I just clicked over and now I’m listening to Steely Dan. I have all the albums and CDs and digital files, but I clicked and now I’m listening. To me that’s awesome. The business and direction and discovery around the company is fair game for insight and opinion, but for a music consumer like me Spotify, and the others, are a gift. Perhaps not a perfect gift but a gift nonetheless. 😃
Fascinating insight. Maybe we should be use algos to connect listeners to artists rather than songs.
Thanks Chris. Personally I still feel what is missing is all the context around the artist and their music. Granted there's a short biog for an artist, but I just think music is all about context, and digital music consumption has really stripped that out.
(It is also why I started writing Missed Listens. I just wanted to focus on one album and explain why I felt it was worth investing time into.).
As a music fan I'll never use Spotify. SoundCloud is superior in every way. Algos are poor at recommending music, humans are so good at it. But I've learned most people don't really care anyway. It's fine. They want am/fm radio online, and that's what Spotify is.
I don't trust Spotify that much, if at all; but I'd trust TikTok even less to be a curatorial "middleman" between my bands and potential listeners. The playlist curators want their audience attached to them, not the artists they mine for content; taking that state of affairs and then adding "hopefully the impenetrable black-box TikTok algorithm that operates in the interests of keeping users scrolling and very little else will favor that creator this week" makes for a pretty bleak addition to an already hostile game.
I cannot argue with that sentiment.
Great article. And I agree Spotify has wandered into murky waters deciding what it wants to be. Still... as a platform to connect with me music it’s stellar. As are other streaming music services. I just clicked over and now I’m listening to Steely Dan. I have all the albums and CDs and digital files, but I clicked and now I’m listening. To me that’s awesome. The business and direction and discovery around the company is fair game for insight and opinion, but for a music consumer like me Spotify, and the others, are a gift. Perhaps not a perfect gift but a gift nonetheless. 😃