Has anyone heard anything concrete about the introduction of Spotify Hi Fi? They did say it would be “later this year” but they seem to be cutting it pretty fine!
No idea but I wish they would hurry up. I’ve asked them on Twitter 3 times in the last few months and they never reply, not even a useless corporate response such as “our exciting hi fi will launch soon”
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It’s weird. I’m starting to wonder if it’s happening at all. I can’t imagine there are any technical obstacles. Perhaps there are corporate or legal problems.
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Probably practical getting all those files in a more controlled format. Plus legal of course.
I think apple releasing a hifi tier without any up charge probably threw a spanner in the works.
It wouldn’t surprise me if their commercial model for it is screwed without a premium price tag…. All that work and xtra cost and they can’t add any premium to the price now Apple have set the bar… it wouldn’t surprise me if it doesn’t happen now not in The short term anyway
A cynic might think they merely bought themselves some time, knowing full well it would be longer until the actual release.
It worked on me, for example, as earlier this year I binned my tidal subscription in anticipation of this release.
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I hope they get taken to the cleaners by the competition authorities here in the UK and in the USA. Spotify are bad for artists and writers. Same goes for Apple Music, YouTube Music, Amazon Music and the big three record companies, who now have more power than at any point in history, with about 90% of the industry.
Universal alone now controls about 40% of the market. And the company’s CEO, Lucien “Lucifer” Grainge, will be paid £123m in salary and bonuses this year. That’s more than all UK songwriters did from streaming and physical sales [CDs and vinyl mostly] in 2019. Let that sink in.
Fcuk Spotify.
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Spotify revolutionised the way music is delivered. Without them I would not have fallen back in love with music.
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Good for you. But there’s a price to be paid, and it’s not being paid by you or other consumers, is it?
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Yes it is - I spend more on music now than I have for the last 20 years. And now I don’t have to buy expensive CDs that I discover are crap and never play again. I also listen to more diverse music rather than playing it safe.
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But all those money you pay does not go to the arts, nor to the musicians. They go to networking engineers, venture capital folks, to hardware companies like Linn/Naim and on and on and …
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Given the recent activity by Tidal (viz. hifi tier now £9.99/month), I wonder if this industry insider knowledge pre-empting Spotify hi-fi, or whether Spotify hi-fi will now be stillborn?
My streamer has Tidal Connect, and as I can download music to my phone I can play files in my car.
I may well be tempted to change as a result…
@jan Some of the money goes to musicians, but not much. Most of the streaming companies are running at a loss or very thin margins, so no money flowing back to owners and venture capitalists. Not sure why any of the monies flow to hardware companies like Naim, more likely the other way around where the hardware companies are paying licensing fees to streaming companies. In fact the only real winners so far in streaming are the users/subscribers. Over time, as the number of subscribers increases and the business models evolve, this will change. Hopefully there will be more money for everyone in the industry, including musicians.
Let’s not forget that the music industry was in turmoil around 5 years ago with physical sales and downloads in long term decline. Pirating of music was rapidly growing and proving almost impossible to control. Streaming is part of the solution to those problems. I would go as far as to say that streaming is the saviour of music! Is the business model perfect - no, will it improve - yes.
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We do need people to move to paid subscription services for this to happen. Most of the younger people I know seem to consume their music from free services like YouTube. They don’t seem to be concerned about sound quality at all! I wonder if there is some way to make sound quality cool again?
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It is perfect for UMG, Sony and Warners, plus a few big current artists and heritage acts (who made their money a long time ago). For most artists, there is virtually nothing.
It is a broken model that puts the power and rewards into the hands of a few, leaving the grass roots with nothing. It needs intervention from governments in the US, EU and UK. The big record companies (Universal is the world’s biggest publisher as well as its biggest record company) need to be broken up, artists given fair reward for their work – and the public (especially the young) educated in the fact that music and artistic creation have a value, and that it is worth paying for.
Not sure I share your optimism.
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Spot on, Kev.
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The big record companies would love that. The steaming services need to pay artists more fairly.
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Most of the younger people I know seem to consume their music from free services like YouTube. They don’t seem to be concerned about sound quality at all! I wonder if there is some way to make sound quality cool again?
The public mostly don’t care about sound quality, mostly they never have – they value convenience and easy access. What needs to be done is making paying a fair whack for music cool again.
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The sense of entitlement in consumers, including music fans. “I wan’ it…it’s my right”. Sad.
Got to pay the piper.
(A few Tanqueray 10’s over the line, but even so…)
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I wonder if the introduction of Tidal Hi Fi Plus (and, more pertinently, Tidal Hi Fi) will force Spotify at the same price. Indeed I wonder if it is deliberations about the introductory price which is causing the delay.