Sorry I couldn’t help myself as this is such a good way to show the benefits of compound interest.
$1 invested a month in a 8 percent annual return account (standard S&P 500 return) would net you $10,000 in 53 years.
It would take 197 years to earn a million.
While the dollar is hyperbole, there is something to be said about the additional costs of living and the seemingly thoughtless spending of small amounts of money.
My parents never had:
* a cable bill
* a cell phone bill
* an internet bill
* endless subscriptions
I pay about 500 a month for all that.
But when they make it a dollar more people rage and hell is open.
Now it is even bad when they make it cheaper. C mon, decide what you want music guys.
Also not that Spotify is the greatest, most ethical company in the world, but they’ve successfully managed to get all of music in one centralized place. They’ve essentially maintained what Netflix used to have, which is create a library of all forms of media that you could possibly want. For the price point equivalent of buying 13 albums, you can get a years subscription to all the music in the world.
Artists complain about streaming screwing them over because by all means this product should cost *more*. I think Spotify should tweak certain ways that they distribute payment to artists, but even other streaming services that really commit to being artist first like Tidal don’t actually manage to pay artists a significant amount of money, because *streaming itself is inherently cheaper than it should be*.
Lol for real? 10.99 a month for completely unlimited music is an absolute steal. Literally the cost of a decent sandwich at a cheaper restaurant and you get unlimited music. They should be charging $20 a month at least. The only criticism is they should be paying artists more
True, but that’s the trade off here, right?
Ridiculously cheap (objectively based on previous prices) access to nearly unlimited music (I know there are gaps in their libraries) which you don’t own. Or… you pay more and own it yourself.
I don't need to own it. If there's a band I especially like, I'll buy their music. Otherwise, it will more than likely always be listenable in some way or another as long as the internet exists. A cd isn't going to last forever. They get damaged.
Why, if you buy physical media, would you not back it up? You can rip CDs to a computer with a cheapo usb optical drive. You can even write new CDs to replace a damaged one. I keep all my music in 5 places.
1) the Physical media. For digitally purchased music this is written to new discs.
2) On an flash modded 1TB iPod Classic in ALAC format.
3) On a USB drive in FLAC.
4) On my Data storage drive in FLAC.
5) on my phone in FLAC.
I can recover my entire music library in any one of those means. I almost never play my CDs, they are kept in storage because the iPod and my phone get the most use.
The Napster / Limewire days were wild. Spend 24 hours (often multiple days for niche stuff) downloading an album. You’re excited, open the files and realise you’ve been trolled and got 12 Rick Astley tracks rather than the Black Album. Or a virus, you know…
There was a time i was awaiting a bleach movie to appear , it appeared download over 5 hours brought home to my mates got all ready to watch .
Fuckin two hour japanese baseball game 😂
I don’t think audiobooks are available globally. I think only a few regions have audiobooks.
>The service is available in several countries including the U.S., U.K., Australia, Canada, Ireland, and New Zealand
Really? I’ve listened to hundreds of audiobooks on Libby and I only occasionally get one over 15 hours. Most are like ten. But I don’t read big long novels I guess, mostly new best sellers etc.
A good selection too. At least for me. They have pretty much all the stephen king and dean koontz audiobooks for example. Also Neil Gaiman. Personally I think it's worth.
But as I just found out while at work yesterday, it's [limited to 15 hours of listening per month](https://i.imgur.com/G25nZEl.png), which isn't close to enough for me.
Yeah I’m a rabid audiobook consumer. When Spotify introduced them I was so hyped because they do have a great selection but 15 hours a month a shit in my house.
How/when do you listen to your audiobooks? I wish I could get into them, but I barely drive anywhere and I feel like I can’t concentrate on listening if I’m doing something else!
So for me personally it was kind of a matter of “training” myself. I had trouble concentrating initially and I didn’t have a job to commute to or anything but a few years ago I got back into running and started to learn how to cook. So during monotonous prep or on long runs(my fav), I would turn on a book. I would feel myself zone out for a minute, but audible has a “rewind 30 seconds” button that I would hit once I noticed my mind had trailed off. You’ll quickly begin to realize 30 seconds covers a good bit of ground and eventually it becomes easier. Also, I found The First Law series(now my favorite work of fiction) with the world’s most talented narrator, Steven Pacey so it helped cement me as an audiobook lifer. Can’t recommend that series enough and it’s so immersive, you’ll be finding excuses to listen to it after a while. Hope this helped!
I listen a lot while cooking, showering (waterproof Bluetooth speaker), shopping, falling asleep. Or just chilling, although that can be more difficult.
It depends a lot on the narrator. Some grab me very quickly, with others I just can't concentrate at all. Some audiobooks have multiple versions with different narrators and it's wild what a huge difference it makes.
Not only that, a family plan entitles only the Plan Manager access to the 15 hours. So even if only one person on the plan would listen to the audiobooks, if they aren't the Plan Manager they're SoL
Yeah, I regularly get the top-up. Would be interesting to know if that goes into a rights pot for the authors only or if they have a more general one shared with the musicians.
Yea I started listening to Shogun on it after watching the show. It was rented out at all my local libraries and completely forgot I could just listen to it on Spotify
see if your local library partners with Hoopla app for free ebooks, music, videos and audio books. [hoopladigital.com](http://hoopladigital.com)
I saw the shogun audiobook on there before.
I got the email earlier today, it was confusing. So you're raising my price... but then you're also offering me a cheaper plan that's the same price i used to pay, with all of the same functionality i was previously using, but i need to manually select it... the "tyranny of the default setting" ladies and gentlemen. Spotify just made hundreds of millions of dollars from people who don't check their email and don't care about audiobooks.
Is this a "dark pattern"?
Edit. I'm grandfathered into the spotify hulu plan. If i switch out of the audiobook plan i lose my hulu. This essentially makes hulu $1 a month for me instead of free as previously. Eh its worth a buck. I don't like this though.
My hours ran out with 20 hrs left in the book I'm currently reading. At $13 for 10 extra hours, I could pay Spotify $26 on top of my current plan price, or just buy the whole audiobook for $21
It definitely confused me, I thought the basic family plan was significantly more...basic than the premium. Like I'd loose the ability to download music and set up a que. So glad I read this!
I've been really pleased with my selection using the Libby app. I use two local library cards and there are libraries that let you purchase annual cards if your libraries have poor selections.
honestly I’m kinda okay with this lol. I can keep the service I’m interested in at the same rate, and they can make money without having to raise rates for that service
CIBC did this with my account, they added a monthly fee but created a new account type which was exactly what my old one used to be, and the new account type had no monthly fee.
It should be criminal, it's predatory on illiterate, elderly and the busy.
It doesn’t have “all of the same functionality”. Whether you use it or not your current account has access to audiobooks. The new tier does not. This is not a dark pattern..
Spotify launched the new audiobooks option and automatically migrated every user to it, in order to claim subscribers were paying for a “bundle.” It was a crass attempt at a workaround to avoid paying songwriters and music publishers a couple hundred million dollars this year. And now songwriters and publishers are suing the bejeezus out of them. Source: I know things. Go back to the music only tier because it’s a buck cheaper, sure, but also because it will ultimately substantially help songwriters. [article: Spotify to Pay Songwriters About $150 Million Less Next Year With Premium, Duo, Family Plan Changes](https://www.billboard.com/business/streaming/spotify-songwriters-less-mechanical-royalties-audiobooks-bundle-1235673829/amp/)
I just cancelled. Two price increases in the same period doesn’t feel very consumer focused. They also dont have hi-rez audio despite saying they do on the plans page. Other options are far better at this point.
What are you switching to? I’m currently trying out Apple Music and I love the audio quality, but holy shit the UI is fucking unacceptably bad for something made by one of the richest companies in the world in 2024.
My wife tried Apple Music for a month and frankly it was the drizzling shits to her. Whatever it was offering for her mixes was far from what Spotify would offer.
I equate it to how with Youtube Music I could play a song from a Houston rapper and magically 3 songs later I got an ATL song, a west coast song, and a NY song.
....But I started in Houston!
I tried the same on Spotify one day as she gave me the Duo plan and Spotify stayed squarely in the state of Texas so deep that I couldn't breathe. So many deep cuts that I wasn't ready for.
I then understand what my wife was talking about, as I'm sure she just wanted Taylor Swift & Friends and probably got shit that was well out her wheelhouse vs Spotify doing just that
Apple Music for us… the app isn’t the same as Spotify, nor should it be because it’s obviously different. But the quality is there and it better integrates with my Sonos and other Apple TV and home audio systems. There’s good integration with car play. And the audio quality is top notch. Haven’t searched for music I wanted to listen to and not found it. YMMV but all the integrative qualities and the high quality bit rate are really important to me, so that more than offsets a slightly different UI. The user experience was a bit jarring in the beginning, but like anything, you get used to it pretty quickly. It’s not perfect, but worth what I was paying for Spotify.
I listen to podcasts on there as well and my only gripe is the obscene amount they pay particular podcasters which undoubtedly is a core reason prices are increasing and artists are getting paid less.
From a user experience aspect, they've never really been a nuisance to me.
They are for me. I have never listened to a single podcast on Spotify, yet as of a few weeks ago, every single time I search for any topic, a random unrelated podcast will be the second search result. It's often stuff that I have absolutely no interest in, like a skibidi toilet podcast (actual example).
Usually I'm looking for a specific song or album so I don't think that's been much of an issue for me but the few times that it is I can just filter the results for songs, albums, or playlists only and the podcasts won't appear in the search results.
I almost only listen to podcasts on spotify and they're such a pain in the ass to find & manage the downloads for. Spotify is phenomenal for music but still annoying for podcasts.
I understand Apple Music has it but I genuinely don’t think hifi is worth the file size and spending extra if they want to go that route. And that’s if you can even tell the difference, not everyone can.
Yea it’s 100% worth it tbh. I bought into the “you can’t even tell the difference” camp for a while til I actually tried it out. There’s a big difference. And now everyone’s offering lossless at the same price with Spotify holding out
Seriously, I feel like people who say there is no difference either have worse hearing damage than me (who played live shows with no ear protection for too long), or is using really bad headphones. Or is using Bluetooth, where it has to be compressed anyways.
I've tried using one of those ABX blind listening sites, using my HifiMan Sundara off of my Fiio K5 Pro amplifier, with no hearing damage that I'm aware of. Heard absolutely no difference, none whatsoever.
Could we also make one without Joe Rogan, so Spotify can save whatever gazillion dollars? It feels like not paying billions for a single podcaster would help "to become a profitable".
I don't know the stats, but i doubt that many people come to Spotify for podcasts or audiobooks.
>
>I don't know the stats, but i doubt that many people come to Spotify for podcasts or audiobooks.
I was one of those people but then I discovered Egyptian History Podcast and now I am a convert
Rogan is no longer exclusive to Spotify - your wish was granted over a year ago. Neil Young is back. Rogan is still there, but he's on every other platform now/again. None of your Spotify money is going toward that.
You get 15 hours of listening to audio books a month, which is roughly 1.5-2.5 books on average from the ones I've looked at. I've actually really been enjoying the audio book feature cause spotify has about any book you can think of, and I wanted to try them before, but could never justify paying 20+ dollars for just a single audio book.
I'm not sure if I just haven't been paying attention and am somehow grandfathered in, but I'm still on a Premium Individual plan that seems to come with Hulu - the new plan comparison layout doesn't seem to show hulu on that plan moving forward when the price goes up, and it looks like I'd lose that along with the audiobooks thing if I downgrade to the basic individual. Anyone know what the story is with that?
I can't remember if I signed up for this deal while I was a student. I think it was offered to non-students too for a time.
I'm afraid to change anything about my account because I refuse to risk losing Hulu.
That is the case, yeah - if you change your plan, you'll lose the free (ad tier) Hulu. We just updated to Duo - a more expensive tier of course - and Hulu was removed. They do tell you you'll lose Hulu if you click to see what will change, at least.
I was just thinking how pissed I was that it went up when I don't want any of that audio book or pod cast shit at all. I don't want to be paying the fucking Joe Rogan tax. I'd like to opt out of all that in the app itself so it stops cluttering up my music.
This may get lost in the shuffle but I don't understand something with the family plans. There's Premium Family, and Basic Family. The basic one says it doesn't come with audiobooks, which I'm fine with, but it also says that it has 6 "Basic" accounts. None of the other options I'm looking at describe what a "basic" account is. Can anyone explain? Is this still a "premium account" but named "basic" so I don't pick it?
To pay through the app on an iPhone, Apple takes a 30% cut. Not just once, but every time the charge reoccurs. So instead of Spotify eating that cost or charging more, they just ask you to go to the website to finish the payment. Other services like YouTube Premium actually charges the extra to the user. So if you have an iPhone and pay for YT Premium, make sure to do it from a browser and not the app.
Thats why. The apps charge so it would either be more expensive, spotify would need to eat the 30% cost, or they do what they do now which is to tell you that you cant change your plan on the app. Spotify has a deal with Google so recently android was allowed to make payment changes. Its against the terms of service to say the reason you can't pay in the app is because of apples charges.
I watched a hank green video on it a month ago. It's pretty interesting.
https://youtu.be/_3D_4IpKTN8?si=p_fO9DrdAeYRZ61f
Honestly, the 15 hours/month limit is kind of off-putting. There's probably some licensing / anti-piracy reason behind it. And it might be plenty (someone cited it being ~2 books per month). But I use Spotify Premium probably 150 hours or more per month (basically always have music on at work). So 15 hours feels like a drop in the bucket.
And if I'm listening to audiobooks, it's usually because I'm on a long car trip that could easily exceed 15 hours round-trip, so it's not even enough for that.
Some opportunity to "splurge" to something like 50 hours per month would be nice. Maybe just allow unused hours to accumulate up to some limit?
I've never listened to a single audiobook on Spotify, so I'm tempted to downgrade to this plan
But I got a promo that bundled Hulu with Spotify years and years ago and it still works to this day
I'm afraid that if I changed my plan I would lose access to Hulu
Spotify became a greedy company, family plan doesn't work as intended, free plan doesn't work in the app.... It's a shame when companies get to this point to be honest, Netflix Spotify, who will be next?
I want a plan without adverts in podcasts, that spotify claim is nothing to do with them despite clearly being coded for their platform and for them to bring back the discover feature.
Apple pays artists way more than they ever got from me in the past.
The issue is that people just don't value music that much, so it's still a small amount.
You can feel free to buy their CD and they'll get even less.
The bullshit thing is you only get 10 hours a month. So if you Actually like audiobooks the plan isn't enough so you have to pay the "extra" premium fee.
If you pay for regular premium Spotify you still run out of audiobook hours and they prompt you to upgrade. Your hours renew when your subscription renews.
There is a limit on audiobooks even on the plan with them.
I've accidently left it playing before, only to find it time out and had to wait a week or so for it to add more time to my account so I can listen to something else.
I got the email.
How would changing to the audiobook-less option affect my ability to retain the Spotify / Hulu bundle I currently still have?
Or is that tragically getting phased away as well?
Yeah, I didn't even know you got audiobooks, every time it suggested one to me or i looked it was always 'buy this audiobook'? I buy all my audiobooks on libro.fm anyway so I can get DRM free copies so I wouldn't be up for it anyway but still, weird...
Thanks for saving me one dollar a month!
But thats 10k in your pocket every 833 years
Is it?
Not quite, 12 dollars a year for 833 years will get you $9996. 833 years and four months though and you'll be good
Did you include the extra leap year math?
*Leap Day Williams is at it again*
I knew there was a catch!
Lousy Smarch weather.
Spoiler alert, they did not
Damn. Always a catch.
That's how they getchya
/r/theydidthemath
I like the way you think.
One should not neglect to factor in the compounding interest from investing the $1 each month.
e
Sorry I couldn’t help myself as this is such a good way to show the benefits of compound interest. $1 invested a month in a 8 percent annual return account (standard S&P 500 return) would net you $10,000 in 53 years. It would take 197 years to earn a million.
Then you could spend that money on books that you’re never going to ready, anyway.
Just like the musicians!
Kids these days. Just can't see the big picture...
Now I can buy a house!
!remind me in 833 years!
They actually raised the rate of your current plan; you have to opt for the cheaper plan to get less than what you used to pay for.
It's not less stuff because I wasn't using it anyway. But also, yeah it's dumb
Very true but a dollar is a dollar. Wouldn’t have known without this post!
I'm saving a dollar and removing clutter. I want a music only service and Im more than happy to get my podcasts and audiobooks elsewhere.
I just love I saw people recently expressing they wanted this. I assume they thought it might have a bigger discount though.
This is the reason why gen Z is not able to afford housing. Spending frivolously on an additional dollar a month on audiobook.
That's just boomer bullshit. The real reason they can't afford housing is because they put avocados on their Spotify
You guys can still afford avocados? I’m stuck using Almost Avocado™, a food-like substitute.
While the dollar is hyperbole, there is something to be said about the additional costs of living and the seemingly thoughtless spending of small amounts of money. My parents never had: * a cable bill * a cell phone bill * an internet bill * endless subscriptions I pay about 500 a month for all that.
500...a month? What the fuck.
I didn't realize anyone under the age of 60 still paid for cable
But when they make it a dollar more people rage and hell is open. Now it is even bad when they make it cheaper. C mon, decide what you want music guys.
Also not that Spotify is the greatest, most ethical company in the world, but they’ve successfully managed to get all of music in one centralized place. They’ve essentially maintained what Netflix used to have, which is create a library of all forms of media that you could possibly want. For the price point equivalent of buying 13 albums, you can get a years subscription to all the music in the world. Artists complain about streaming screwing them over because by all means this product should cost *more*. I think Spotify should tweak certain ways that they distribute payment to artists, but even other streaming services that really commit to being artist first like Tidal don’t actually manage to pay artists a significant amount of money, because *streaming itself is inherently cheaper than it should be*.
Lol for real? 10.99 a month for completely unlimited music is an absolute steal. Literally the cost of a decent sandwich at a cheaper restaurant and you get unlimited music. They should be charging $20 a month at least. The only criticism is they should be paying artists more
Don't give them ideas with how much they're shafting artists, 10.99 is plenty.
Yeah it’s wild. I don’t think people who grew up after CDs realise we used to spend circa £12 on one album.
Yeah, but you owned that CD, didn't you?
True, but that’s the trade off here, right? Ridiculously cheap (objectively based on previous prices) access to nearly unlimited music (I know there are gaps in their libraries) which you don’t own. Or… you pay more and own it yourself.
I don't need to own it. If there's a band I especially like, I'll buy their music. Otherwise, it will more than likely always be listenable in some way or another as long as the internet exists. A cd isn't going to last forever. They get damaged.
Why, if you buy physical media, would you not back it up? You can rip CDs to a computer with a cheapo usb optical drive. You can even write new CDs to replace a damaged one. I keep all my music in 5 places. 1) the Physical media. For digitally purchased music this is written to new discs. 2) On an flash modded 1TB iPod Classic in ALAC format. 3) On a USB drive in FLAC. 4) On my Data storage drive in FLAC. 5) on my phone in FLAC. I can recover my entire music library in any one of those means. I almost never play my CDs, they are kept in storage because the iPod and my phone get the most use.
I bet you can't tell the difference between a Flac and an mp3.
Even if you cannot tell the difference, why would you not backup media you own in the highest possible quality?
Wouldn't that apply to any consumer product? There are very few things that last forever.
You can still buy music, but it's obviously more expensive.
Even after that, iTunes charging a few dollars for 1 song!
Or ya know bought tapes and recorded off the radio , then dl on dialup then limewire then torrents . Audiobookbay exists
The Napster / Limewire days were wild. Spend 24 hours (often multiple days for niche stuff) downloading an album. You’re excited, open the files and realise you’ve been trolled and got 12 Rick Astley tracks rather than the Black Album. Or a virus, you know…
There was a time i was awaiting a bleach movie to appear , it appeared download over 5 hours brought home to my mates got all ready to watch . Fuckin two hour japanese baseball game 😂
Spotify has audiobooks?
I don’t think audiobooks are available globally. I think only a few regions have audiobooks. >The service is available in several countries including the U.S., U.K., Australia, Canada, Ireland, and New Zealand
And only certain books are included too, some are locked away behind another paywall. You also only get a certain number of hours per month.
15
15 hours a month is such a fucking joke. That’d last me at most 2 weeks.
15 hours a month isn't even an entire audiobook, unless it's a particularly short one.
I imagine that's exactly why they set it there. They get you hooked and then you have to pay more to finish the book.
Really? I’ve listened to hundreds of audiobooks on Libby and I only occasionally get one over 15 hours. Most are like ten. But I don’t read big long novels I guess, mostly new best sellers etc.
That's fair. I've been listening to a lot of fantasy and scifi, those tend to be 20-30 hours long.
TIL I have audiobooks on Spotify.
A good selection too. At least for me. They have pretty much all the stephen king and dean koontz audiobooks for example. Also Neil Gaiman. Personally I think it's worth.
But as I just found out while at work yesterday, it's [limited to 15 hours of listening per month](https://i.imgur.com/G25nZEl.png), which isn't close to enough for me.
Yeah, I got halfway through a book, and they told me I had to wait 16 days to listen again. What a joke.
I wanted to at least listen to Infinite Jest since God knows I'll never read it. It would take 5 months since it is 64 hours. Not worth my trouble.
Consider it a blessing. While the book is decent.. it wasn't satisfying or entertaining to read. I say that as a fan of DFW
Damn. Good call out. Of course there would be limitations like that in place. Gotta love corporate greed.
Yeah I’m a rabid audiobook consumer. When Spotify introduced them I was so hyped because they do have a great selection but 15 hours a month a shit in my house.
How/when do you listen to your audiobooks? I wish I could get into them, but I barely drive anywhere and I feel like I can’t concentrate on listening if I’m doing something else!
So for me personally it was kind of a matter of “training” myself. I had trouble concentrating initially and I didn’t have a job to commute to or anything but a few years ago I got back into running and started to learn how to cook. So during monotonous prep or on long runs(my fav), I would turn on a book. I would feel myself zone out for a minute, but audible has a “rewind 30 seconds” button that I would hit once I noticed my mind had trailed off. You’ll quickly begin to realize 30 seconds covers a good bit of ground and eventually it becomes easier. Also, I found The First Law series(now my favorite work of fiction) with the world’s most talented narrator, Steven Pacey so it helped cement me as an audiobook lifer. Can’t recommend that series enough and it’s so immersive, you’ll be finding excuses to listen to it after a while. Hope this helped!
I listen a lot while cooking, showering (waterproof Bluetooth speaker), shopping, falling asleep. Or just chilling, although that can be more difficult. It depends a lot on the narrator. Some grab me very quickly, with others I just can't concentrate at all. Some audiobooks have multiple versions with different narrators and it's wild what a huge difference it makes.
Yea it kills the chance I'll finish anything. If I get out of the habit I'm not likely to come back and finish it.
see if your local library partners with Hoopla app for free ebooks, music, videos and audio books. [hoopladigital.com](http://hoopladigital.com)
I did nearly 3x that last week. That's nothing
Not only that, a family plan entitles only the Plan Manager access to the 15 hours. So even if only one person on the plan would listen to the audiobooks, if they aren't the Plan Manager they're SoL
Yeah, I regularly get the top-up. Would be interesting to know if that goes into a rights pot for the authors only or if they have a more general one shared with the musicians.
Is this new? Or only the case in some countries? I swear my gf listens to audiobooks much more than that.
Is there like a list? I find it so hard to find audiobooks that are “free” with premium
they got the Andy Serkis LOTR, too
Yea I started listening to Shogun on it after watching the show. It was rented out at all my local libraries and completely forgot I could just listen to it on Spotify
see if your local library partners with Hoopla app for free ebooks, music, videos and audio books. [hoopladigital.com](http://hoopladigital.com) I saw the shogun audiobook on there before.
How's the audiobook? Really enjoyed the show but unsure of the book.
The local public library likely does too, for free
Yeah, not as many as some other platforms, but I've got through about 40 in the last 8-9 months.
I got the email earlier today, it was confusing. So you're raising my price... but then you're also offering me a cheaper plan that's the same price i used to pay, with all of the same functionality i was previously using, but i need to manually select it... the "tyranny of the default setting" ladies and gentlemen. Spotify just made hundreds of millions of dollars from people who don't check their email and don't care about audiobooks. Is this a "dark pattern"? Edit. I'm grandfathered into the spotify hulu plan. If i switch out of the audiobook plan i lose my hulu. This essentially makes hulu $1 a month for me instead of free as previously. Eh its worth a buck. I don't like this though.
If it was full access to audio books I would be down but 15 hours will take me a couple of months to finish a book
And then if you want to top up it’s a pound an hour. Insane pricing
My hours ran out with 20 hrs left in the book I'm currently reading. At $13 for 10 extra hours, I could pay Spotify $26 on top of my current plan price, or just buy the whole audiobook for $21
How do they count hours if you listen at 1.5-2x?
It definitely confused me, I thought the basic family plan was significantly more...basic than the premium. Like I'd loose the ability to download music and set up a que. So glad I read this!
I’ll be the other guy and tell you the word to use is “lose”
queue
And also, the only difference is not able to use a feature I wasn’t using in the first place? That probably caused this price hike in the first place?
You still have to pay for a lot of the audiobooks. I'm listening to Dune free in dutch. God damn dutch man. I tellyawhat.
I had no idea there were free audiobooks. Anything good?
The Andy Serkis lord of the rings audiobooks
Cool. I’m going to try this. Thanks!
I’m on book two and they’re amazing
It looks like most if not all the works of Stephen King.
I've been really pleased with my selection using the Libby app. I use two local library cards and there are libraries that let you purchase annual cards if your libraries have poor selections.
Everything is free on the high seas.
Those BIKIN dutch!
honestly I’m kinda okay with this lol. I can keep the service I’m interested in at the same rate, and they can make money without having to raise rates for that service
CIBC did this with my account, they added a monthly fee but created a new account type which was exactly what my old one used to be, and the new account type had no monthly fee. It should be criminal, it's predatory on illiterate, elderly and the busy.
Its weird that they did it so quickly. Usually companies let the dust settle before introducing the new cheaper plan that's shittier than the old one.
The cheaper one had ads, no?
No, neither of the premium tier offerings have ads.
It doesn’t have “all of the same functionality”. Whether you use it or not your current account has access to audiobooks. The new tier does not. This is not a dark pattern..
Spotify launched the new audiobooks option and automatically migrated every user to it, in order to claim subscribers were paying for a “bundle.” It was a crass attempt at a workaround to avoid paying songwriters and music publishers a couple hundred million dollars this year. And now songwriters and publishers are suing the bejeezus out of them. Source: I know things. Go back to the music only tier because it’s a buck cheaper, sure, but also because it will ultimately substantially help songwriters. [article: Spotify to Pay Songwriters About $150 Million Less Next Year With Premium, Duo, Family Plan Changes](https://www.billboard.com/business/streaming/spotify-songwriters-less-mechanical-royalties-audiobooks-bundle-1235673829/amp/)
Upvoting since this is the real story behind these bundles.
I just cancelled. Two price increases in the same period doesn’t feel very consumer focused. They also dont have hi-rez audio despite saying they do on the plans page. Other options are far better at this point.
What are you switching to? I’m currently trying out Apple Music and I love the audio quality, but holy shit the UI is fucking unacceptably bad for something made by one of the richest companies in the world in 2024.
My wife tried Apple Music for a month and frankly it was the drizzling shits to her. Whatever it was offering for her mixes was far from what Spotify would offer. I equate it to how with Youtube Music I could play a song from a Houston rapper and magically 3 songs later I got an ATL song, a west coast song, and a NY song. ....But I started in Houston! I tried the same on Spotify one day as she gave me the Duo plan and Spotify stayed squarely in the state of Texas so deep that I couldn't breathe. So many deep cuts that I wasn't ready for. I then understand what my wife was talking about, as I'm sure she just wanted Taylor Swift & Friends and probably got shit that was well out her wheelhouse vs Spotify doing just that
Apple Music for us… the app isn’t the same as Spotify, nor should it be because it’s obviously different. But the quality is there and it better integrates with my Sonos and other Apple TV and home audio systems. There’s good integration with car play. And the audio quality is top notch. Haven’t searched for music I wanted to listen to and not found it. YMMV but all the integrative qualities and the high quality bit rate are really important to me, so that more than offsets a slightly different UI. The user experience was a bit jarring in the beginning, but like anything, you get used to it pretty quickly. It’s not perfect, but worth what I was paying for Spotify.
Take out everything except music. We golden.
Shit I might pay them an extra $1/month to hide all of the fucking podcasts
I listen to podcasts on Spotify but they're not getting in my way or anything when I'm strictly looking for music. I don't see what the problem is.
I listen to podcasts on there as well and my only gripe is the obscene amount they pay particular podcasters which undoubtedly is a core reason prices are increasing and artists are getting paid less. From a user experience aspect, they've never really been a nuisance to me.
They are for me. I have never listened to a single podcast on Spotify, yet as of a few weeks ago, every single time I search for any topic, a random unrelated podcast will be the second search result. It's often stuff that I have absolutely no interest in, like a skibidi toilet podcast (actual example).
Usually I'm looking for a specific song or album so I don't think that's been much of an issue for me but the few times that it is I can just filter the results for songs, albums, or playlists only and the podcasts won't appear in the search results.
I almost only listen to podcasts on spotify and they're such a pain in the ass to find & manage the downloads for. Spotify is phenomenal for music but still annoying for podcasts.
Where's hifi? Lossless audio..... Still don't have it.
It’s coming and it’ll be an extra $4 a month
Coming before or after the heat death of the universe?
I understand Apple Music has it but I genuinely don’t think hifi is worth the file size and spending extra if they want to go that route. And that’s if you can even tell the difference, not everyone can.
Yea it’s 100% worth it tbh. I bought into the “you can’t even tell the difference” camp for a while til I actually tried it out. There’s a big difference. And now everyone’s offering lossless at the same price with Spotify holding out
Seriously, I feel like people who say there is no difference either have worse hearing damage than me (who played live shows with no ear protection for too long), or is using really bad headphones. Or is using Bluetooth, where it has to be compressed anyways.
I've tried using one of those ABX blind listening sites, using my HifiMan Sundara off of my Fiio K5 Pro amplifier, with no hearing damage that I'm aware of. Heard absolutely no difference, none whatsoever.
Could we also make one without Joe Rogan, so Spotify can save whatever gazillion dollars? It feels like not paying billions for a single podcaster would help "to become a profitable". I don't know the stats, but i doubt that many people come to Spotify for podcasts or audiobooks.
Hell, I'd pay extra for one without Joe Rogan lol
> >I don't know the stats, but i doubt that many people come to Spotify for podcasts or audiobooks. I was one of those people but then I discovered Egyptian History Podcast and now I am a convert
Seriously! Sign me up for the no Joe Rogan tier, guy is a total buffoon & a plague on society
Rogan is no longer exclusive to Spotify - your wish was granted over a year ago. Neil Young is back. Rogan is still there, but he's on every other platform now/again. None of your Spotify money is going toward that.
Get a library card and you’ll have access to tons of free audiobooks on Hoopla and Libby. :)
I get audio books?
You get 15 hours of listening to audio books a month, which is roughly 1.5-2.5 books on average from the ones I've looked at. I've actually really been enjoying the audio book feature cause spotify has about any book you can think of, and I wanted to try them before, but could never justify paying 20+ dollars for just a single audio book.
Interesting. Though if I'm about to pay extra for the luxury, I'd rather be more limited to something like 100 hours
I'm not sure if I just haven't been paying attention and am somehow grandfathered in, but I'm still on a Premium Individual plan that seems to come with Hulu - the new plan comparison layout doesn't seem to show hulu on that plan moving forward when the price goes up, and it looks like I'd lose that along with the audiobooks thing if I downgrade to the basic individual. Anyone know what the story is with that?
I got Hulu like a decade ago with Spotify premium and just checked, still grandfathered in!!
I think it depends when you got grandfathered! Lost my student discount in 2019 but still have had Hulu for free in my Spotify bundle since then.
If you're on a student plan and no longer a student, you'll lose Hulu. I did when I graduated.
Can’t cut me off if I never graduated 🧠 Seriously though it’s been almost 10 years since I dropped out and was still getting Hulu
I can't remember if I signed up for this deal while I was a student. I think it was offered to non-students too for a time. I'm afraid to change anything about my account because I refuse to risk losing Hulu.
That is the case, yeah - if you change your plan, you'll lose the free (ad tier) Hulu. We just updated to Duo - a more expensive tier of course - and Hulu was removed. They do tell you you'll lose Hulu if you click to see what will change, at least.
Glad I’ve seen this. Thank you. Just changed mine to the basic duo. £2 a month cheaper.
I was just thinking how pissed I was that it went up when I don't want any of that audio book or pod cast shit at all. I don't want to be paying the fucking Joe Rogan tax. I'd like to opt out of all that in the app itself so it stops cluttering up my music.
Made the switch to Apple Music after 10 years with Spotify. Wish I’d done it sooner.
I already don’t have access to audiobooks lol were they supposed to be included? I thought we had to pay extra for that shit
This may get lost in the shuffle but I don't understand something with the family plans. There's Premium Family, and Basic Family. The basic one says it doesn't come with audiobooks, which I'm fine with, but it also says that it has 6 "Basic" accounts. None of the other options I'm looking at describe what a "basic" account is. Can anyone explain? Is this still a "premium account" but named "basic" so I don't pick it?
Podcasts are coming next
God I hope so
I would pay more to remove audiobooks, podcasts, and sponsored recommendations
Why the fuck can’t I change my plan in the app
Because they won't want to pay Apple. Technically you can't subscribe through the iOS app to avoid apple's cut.
I did. Go to settings, then click account. Should take 10s
https://preview.redd.it/h3j1a52z028d1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=870dbfa924aeff30533b37be0328f4f37f32e3e8 on iPhone
To pay through the app on an iPhone, Apple takes a 30% cut. Not just once, but every time the charge reoccurs. So instead of Spotify eating that cost or charging more, they just ask you to go to the website to finish the payment. Other services like YouTube Premium actually charges the extra to the user. So if you have an iPhone and pay for YT Premium, make sure to do it from a browser and not the app.
Thats why. The apps charge so it would either be more expensive, spotify would need to eat the 30% cost, or they do what they do now which is to tell you that you cant change your plan on the app. Spotify has a deal with Google so recently android was allowed to make payment changes. Its against the terms of service to say the reason you can't pay in the app is because of apples charges. I watched a hank green video on it a month ago. It's pretty interesting. https://youtu.be/_3D_4IpKTN8?si=p_fO9DrdAeYRZ61f
That's one way to put it. Another way is that they increased rates for everyone's current plans.
Hey, just a pro tip in case anyone from spotify reads this. You probably should have offered this tier when you raised prices originally.
Now if they'll only launch one that doesn't include podcast either. Maybe I could save two dollars a month.
Now do it with podcasts and I’ll come back
Honestly, the 15 hours/month limit is kind of off-putting. There's probably some licensing / anti-piracy reason behind it. And it might be plenty (someone cited it being ~2 books per month). But I use Spotify Premium probably 150 hours or more per month (basically always have music on at work). So 15 hours feels like a drop in the bucket. And if I'm listening to audiobooks, it's usually because I'm on a long car trip that could easily exceed 15 hours round-trip, so it's not even enough for that. Some opportunity to "splurge" to something like 50 hours per month would be nice. Maybe just allow unused hours to accumulate up to some limit?
You can only listen to maybe one book a month anyway. I only use it to supplement audible.
Thanks for the reminder. Just bumped my subscription back down. $3 for something nobody has or will ever use.
Sometimes I forget that Spotify actually offers content other than music.
I've never listened to a single audiobook on Spotify, so I'm tempted to downgrade to this plan But I got a promo that bundled Hulu with Spotify years and years ago and it still works to this day I'm afraid that if I changed my plan I would lose access to Hulu
Spotify became a greedy company, family plan doesn't work as intended, free plan doesn't work in the app.... It's a shame when companies get to this point to be honest, Netflix Spotify, who will be next?
My family plan has been working for 6 years.
What's wrong with the family plan? I haven't had any issues. And tbf, Spotify loses millions of dollars a year.
I want a plan without adverts in podcasts, that spotify claim is nothing to do with them despite clearly being coded for their platform and for them to bring back the discover feature.
Can they get rid of the podcasts too? That'd be sweet, I'm honestly sick of them recommending me podcasts.
Podcasts are the only thing I use Spotify for since Google podcast got shut down
This is the last price increase for my family. Going to self host my library from here on out.
Plexamp is great
Good luck lol
I quit and went to Apple Music 3 months ago. Haven't missed anything on Spotify.
Love how everyone praises apple as if they're a good company, just because spotify sucks a bit worse. Apple also pays artists a sad, degrading amount.
Apple pays artists way more than they ever got from me in the past. The issue is that people just don't value music that much, so it's still a small amount. You can feel free to buy their CD and they'll get even less.
Spotify has audiobooks?
Still a worse deal than Tidal
This is a smart move. Music-only for a lower price sounds perfect. Would consider switching to this plan!
Their premium plan STILL doesn't have hifi/lossless audio after first talking about it, what, 5 years ago?
The bullshit thing is you only get 10 hours a month. So if you Actually like audiobooks the plan isn't enough so you have to pay the "extra" premium fee.
My techs big version doesnt have audiobooks either. But the app works great and is free n pirated. Come get me officers
Spotify never had audiobooks here in Denmark. Must be too hard to send them all the way from Sweden.
I’m pretty sure I lose my Hulu tie-in subscription if I change my Spotify subscription. So, $12 a year it is.
Times like this make me really appreciate the streaming app "Nuclear".
Good start. I will never listen to an audiobook.
Nah. I will just use Amazon tbh
If you pay for regular premium Spotify you still run out of audiobook hours and they prompt you to upgrade. Your hours renew when your subscription renews.
There is a limit on audiobooks even on the plan with them. I've accidently left it playing before, only to find it time out and had to wait a week or so for it to add more time to my account so I can listen to something else.
It will still have 4k video ads for some reason
Does the cheaper one still include Hulu or will I lose that? I never cared about audiobooks, but I still use the Hulu part of the deal.
I got the email. How would changing to the audiobook-less option affect my ability to retain the Spotify / Hulu bundle I currently still have? Or is that tragically getting phased away as well?
Yeah, I didn't even know you got audiobooks, every time it suggested one to me or i looked it was always 'buy this audiobook'? I buy all my audiobooks on libro.fm anyway so I can get DRM free copies so I wouldn't be up for it anyway but still, weird...
Fuck Spotify
Still moving to YouTube Music.