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What's your favorite online music streaming platform?
There are loads of music streaming platforms to choose from and I'm curious why you decide to use your current one.
I see most people use Apple Music and Spotify but other platforms seem convincing like Google Play Music, Deezer, or Pandora.
Spotify. Most of the others didn't exist when I joined, and Spotify hasn't given me any reason to leave or not like them, simple as that. I don't tend to change vendors unless something pisses me off, or someone offers better service.
When I was porting all of the Spotify playlists for the l2t best of 2017 to the other services I got a chance to check them out last year. No thank you. I honestly didn't mind Deezer at all, if I had to switch that'd be the first one I looked at, it was far more feature rich than the others. The rest (including Google Music)? Also-rans with far less features and less music, at least last December.
Why Spotify? I can follow thousands of artists and get instantly notified the second one of them releases a new single, or album, or even shares some other artist or playlist. I can dive into thousands upon thousands of community-curated playlists covering an impossible array of genres and find them all with the search engine. I can make collaborative playlists with other Spotify users (hi, l2t mods). In like five years I've found less than twenty albums I was looking for that weren't on the service, mostly jazz albums that weren't on any service - they have far more than anyone else.
Exporting the listentothis bestof playlists from Spotify to the others always leaves out lots of albums because they just aren't anywhere else. I should point out those playlists are full of exclusively obscure music (not more than 3 tracks over 500k plays per artist) and many of them are sub-100k, some even sub-10k. These are unknown bands just released that year, and Spotify has it all. Those artists that sign a deal and disappear from Bandcamp? They are on Spotify, usually at the same time they show up on Bandcamp or soon after.
I can have playlists much larger than those on other services. I can make and share playlists with anyone, and they don't need an account to listen to them, unlike the others. I can save gargantuan amounts of music data from this service for offline use. The mobile client ain't bad at all. I can use programs like virtual audio drivers to play and record ogg-320 quality music right out of their service, so it's also effortless piracy (but don't tell them that).
Their song recommendations are ok (not quite Pandora level but close). You have far better luck with the 'related artists' feature (if you like X, you'll also like A B C D E F G H etc) and the user-created playlists. Going that route will keep you hip-deep in any sound you're interested in hearing with plenty of new artists.
Why not Spotify? Well, they pay crap to the artists which is a problem (so do their competitors), and I don't know if they've ever turned a profit. I've seen their execs say a few things that make me question if they even understand what the hell they've built or what their product is. They think of their users as their product, not the music, not connecting fans with brand new artists. I'm quite sure they are in a position to collect and sell marketing data based on user's music preferences in a rather unique form of privacy invasion. Wouldn't surprise me if they did, and if they haven't, I expect they will someday.
Tracks/albums/artists do disappear from Spotify from time to time. It's pretty rare I run into that - this year I saw it happen to one single album only. By default the client 'removes' them from your playlists, but they are actually still there just hidden, there's a setting to make it leave them in the view but greyed out.
Where it's at right now, it definitely is a great platform. I disagree with the music recommendation though, in the past few years, I have found some of my favorite artists using their recommendations directly. I felt that Pandora would end up showing me the same handful of artists after a few weeks of listening but Spotify gives you a fresh set of recommendations every week with some of your favorites mixed in. I also really appreciated their end of the year "Taste Breaker" playlist that gave you a bunch of artists/genres you wouldn't normally listen to but would definitely enjoy.
Besides pay, Spotify is also great for artists. I've never worked with a major platform that got back to you so quickly and resolves your issues without any questions asked. Their stat tracking tools for artists are also great. You're right that they pay crap though, I think 200k streams a month amounts to about less than $1k USD? I don't put to much stock in making money off of streaming so it's not a big deal for me, but it would be nice to see them change this because it is by far the worst of any streaming service.
I follow a couple thousand artists, and all Spotify does is recommend me the ones I've already found. When it drags up something new I'm usually pleased with what it finds, but the issue is that there's no way to tell that algorithm any of your preferences. I'd like to be able to tell it I want exclusively artists I haven't followed, or even listened to before.
It also does some rather stilly algorithm things. I like new music in old styles. Spotify figured out the 'old styles' part, but there's no way to tell it to stop bothering me with old artists from the 50s-80s. If I could tell it 'Show me nothing older than 1999' it'd be vastly improved.
Those are my only gripes with the recommendations.
Spotify’s social features are far above anything else on any other platform
Does spotify even have social features? Can I recommend musics to other people using spotify?
You can share playlists, yes.
I'm going to second this. Spotify all the way, right now.
Pandora, frankly, is not very good and doesn't help me find d things I like.
Deezer lost me after a few minutes.
YouTube can sometimes turn up the goods when looking at the charts.
Do you have to have an active Facebook account for Spotify/tie it into said account?
I want to say I used Spotify a few years back but wound up souring to it because of its close ties to FB. I don't want to hold it against them though if that isn't the case.
Hell no. My Spotify account is its own independent thing. I never even looked at the other social integration stuff it can do since that stuff doesn't interest me. The only app I've ever shared Spotify data with was Bandsintown - I allowed it to import the list of the artists I was following, so I'd know if any of them ever had a show nearby.
Excellent! Thanks for the follow-up. I'll have to give them a try. I'm enjoying Google Play Music but want to see about branching out to other services.
I use Google Play Music because of the simplicity of it. The UI is very minimalistic and quick to use. You are also able to upload personal files to your library if a song is not on there. It has competitive prices and not gonna lie, I like how YouTube Premium comes with the deal too.
The main problem I have with it is that the discoverability of new music is terrible. Also, I have a suspicion that the shuffle feature chooses songs not at random and based on what you are likely to enjoy.
This is the key feature keeping me on Google Play Music. I don't think there's another streaming service that offers it. If others did, I would definitely consider switching, as I've been making a conscious effort to move away from Google services. Until then, however, I'll stay with GPM.
iCloud Music Library (previously named iTunes Match) provides functionality like this for Apple Music.
Interesting! I didn't know about this.
Do you know if there is a way to upload music without using iTunes?
The support document for setting it up only mentions iTunes for macOS/Windows, so it's doubtful. iTunes isn't required to run past the initial upload, so one could just install, upload, and either just not open it or even uninstall if they don't plan to add more music.
And a small correction to my above post, iTunes Match is still offered separately from Apple Music. It just offers the ability to do iCloud Music Library for those who don't subscribe to Apple Music.
Spotify definitely does not offer this. You can combine your local files with your Spotify library, and even use their client to sync the music collections over wireless to your phone and any other devices, but you cannot upload music to their service and then download it again somewhere else. Their reason for this is 'it would require additional music licensing and we'd have to raise the service price to cover it.'
Google's resources let them offer it for free, which is pretty remarkable. I've "had" google music for five years now and don't have the subscription. Although they do bother you about it in the interface sometimes.
My biggest issue with Google was their interface. After Spotify's client Google felt like a simple plastic toy. That could just be because I've been using Spotify forever and that's what I'm used to. I really hated Tidal's interface. Deezer's was actually prettier than Spotify which surprised me.
Gonna stay on GPM until they get rid of it. And I don't plan on using YouTube Music, ever.
Why not?
I keep trying and it's just so bad as a music player.
It's also worth noting that bandcamp has far and away the best business model. They've been well in the black for a long time, one of the few (the only?) streaming services to achieve profitability.
It's also because they keep it small. Last time I read about the company they had 30 people total, but that was years back so they've likely grown by now. They've helped artists earn something like a half billion already. I bet they've made more money for artists than any other platform ever has.
I'm using Tidal for two reasons:
It does mean that my bandwidth usage is ridiculous but l'm okay with that.
I believe Tidal's primary selling point is that they are the only FLAC quality streaming service. iTunes is AAC-320, Spotify uses Ogg Vorbis at 320. Honestly I can't hear the difference. Google transcodes everything into MP3 which is a very poor choice. MP3 is actually the worst of the bunch.
I "hear" the difference as in, high quality audio isn't actually audible but it does still vibrate the environment around you(namely the lower freqs like <50hz), like the couch vibrating while you listen on speakers. To me that adds an extra dimension to listening music, and considering l listen pretty much 24/7 apart from sleeping it pays off :p
The dynamics are often a lot better too since there's more room for audio levels.
Tidal supports 96 kHz/24bit audio which boils down to 4.6 Mbit/s bitrate. Rip data plan lol
Deezer also does.
Can you listen to those FLAC also outside Tidal’s official app and have them backed up? Because on Deezer you can’t due to DRM.
Tidal doesn't have a family plan for HiFi.
Interesting, l wonder how l'm getting HiFi out of a family plan then.
In any case, maybe it's called different but l don't think being pedantic about this is of any relevance.In any case, maybe you meant something different.
Edit: Proof1 and Proof2.
(edit log: added images + rewrote sentence)
I just looked it up, apparently they do have a Family HiFi plan. Must have missed it last time I checked.
I like Spotify a lot.
Currently I'm using Google Play Music and YT Music and both are horrid in comparison for me.
I like Deezer, I got it cheap through my cellphone plan, and it's a service I use quite a lot.
It's Flow-feature (generated playlist based on your likes and dislikes) works great for me (not amazing, but good enough for my taste).
I also have youtube music, but mostly for youtube premium, because the music offerings is too pale compared to Deezer or even GPM (oddly enough)
I use Deezer as well, mostly because it’s available in my country (and Spotify isn’t).
I find it fairly good, the HQ quality audio is nice as well. I didn’t compare it to many others though.
Flow is quite nice, but AudioScrobbler/Last.FM did a much much better job at recommendations.
I've heard great things about last.fm but oddly it gives me pretty bad recommendations. Most of the stuff it suggests I've already listened to.
I don’t know how good it is nowadays, I stopped using it several years ago when it got acquired. Back then it did a really good job.
Not exactly the answer to your question, I suppose, but I don't use any at all. I listen to music on my phone on occasion, and with the MicroSDHC cards these days, buying one that holds a TON of music is fairly cheap. So I just stuff it with my MP3s and be done with it. I use youtube-dl to rip anything I like to expand my collection.
I don't use anything either. Though I don't rip from youtube because the quality is horrible.
I'm currently using Spotify and I like it a lot. I was using Apple Music at the time when the selection on Spotify wasn't so great. It's definitely gotten better in terms of obscure offerings.
I do have some complaints though. For one, the desktop app is horrible and I wish there was a better and more lightweight client. I also wish there was a more social element to the platform. I would like to show and see what my friends are listening to like last.fm and I want to be able to share tracks or playlists directly. You can add people on the platform, but there's no distinction between an artist and a casual listener/user. I can just see their playlists and what they're currently listening to, but only if I'm using the desktop app and not the web app (which I'm using the majority of the time).
I'll second the social element. I think adding some features in that direction would do wonders for their service.
I use GPM since I listen to mostly foreign language music and at the time when I was trying spotify they lacked a lot of non american music and GPM has the ability for me to upload my own music. I was considering moving to spotify but might have a grudge against them after interviewing with their engineering team and got ghosted by them. Also not a fan of the changes they made to their desktop app
I use Google Play Music because it gives me a way to play music in the browser and share music/playlist snippets with people even if they aren't logged into Google. But a large part of why I use it is that I really hope that they'll utilize their AI prowess and sheer amount of data to come up with new and exciting ways to recommend new music that I might be interested in more effectively than any other service.
Not positive, but I'm pretty sure Google Play Music is not getting any new features or development aside from serious issues or bug fixes. Their new baby is Youtube Music, and judging from how much Google likes to leave projects behind, Google Play Music is going away in the next few years.
I think that's totally fine, if they get YouTube music features on par with Google Play Music the central idea will remain the same - that Google will take advantage of their AI capabilities/prowess to make some really cool recommendation systems!
Their claim is that they won't do that until all the features are transferred over. I understand being skeptical of that, though...but it seems as if there will be a moment where they force them together instead of just leaving GPM out doing nothing for a long time.
I'm currently on GPM, because Spotify and YTM aren't available in my region (yes I know about the Spotify VPN trick and I used that for a while, but it wasn't worth the effort in the end), but I don't really like it. Once Spotify launches here I'm switching over.
I tend to swap and move around. I'm going to move to Apple Music because my mobile phone provider gives me 6 months free Apple music. I had a Spotify deal for a few months which only cost me £1 a month so moved to Spotify. I'm not brand loyal whatsoever!
That said, I do prefer Spotify as their music selection is probably the the most comprehensive out there.
You should check out your local library. Some partner with services like freegalmusic.com that let you steam 2 hours and download up to 5 songs per week for free. Combine this with a Plex server and you've got your own streaming service :)
I use Spotify (paid). It works fine, but they collect too much data for a music streaming service... they keep data about the headset you use and even your window size.
I'm sure they can use this to improve their product, but it's essentially a music player. Not sure yet what I'll do.
I still don’t use an online streaming platform for music. I like my collection of lossless audio and I have 20,000 + songs and some records
Pandora. I enjoy music but don't put much effort or thought into it. I don't maintain my own playlists nor do I keep up with bands/singers. I thumbed up/down a lot of songs on Pandora and created a lot of stations, so its recommendations are fine-tuned to my tastes. Depending on my mood, I just shuffle all of my stations, play a single station, or play Thumbprint Radio. Of all the options I have tried, Pandora seems to provide me with access to the greatest variety of music that suits my taste, in the least amount of time possible, while requiring me to know very little about music in general.
I’m surprised there aren’t any other SoundCloud listeners. I tried Spotify for a week and was too frustrated with the UI. SoundCloud has all the main artists I would listen to on other platforms, plus tons of indie artists, which makes it so much more valuable to me.
Mine is Spotify as it's so comprehensive in size and selection that no other platform comes close.
Is this post a stealthy advertisement for Deezer? What is Deezer? Anyway, Spotify is the best streaming service I’ve tried by a large margin.
Deezer is a ten year old French streaming service, mostly big in Europe.
Interesting. Never heard of it.
youtube video converter + AIMP = free, high quality music for brokes
If you're "illegally" downloading it (not that I'm advocating it), at least use Deezloader. It's the actual audio file, rather than a music video; and you can get that HiFi source.
(is it against the rules to discuss piracy?)
I left more or less the same comment in another topic. I don't think there's any real rule against speaking about piracy broadly, but it is probably wise to exercise some caution and avoid active promotion of it or step by step guides.
Be sure to read the terms of service.
piracy laws don't apply in Argentina lol
I think the major issue is when groups pop up dedicated to piracy - then you're in 'aiding and abetting' territory. I don't think we want that here, and Canadian law may have something to say about it as well.
I'd hate to see discussions about piracy or that touch on it penalized just because they link to known piracy sites, though. Trying to prevent that is a lot of police work and I think it sabotages those discussions too. Anyone can go to any search engine and instantly find those sites, so it seems kinda pointless to try and censor them.