Spotify at 1.4 million users in the US, 175,000 paying

[Shawn Knight]

Streaming music service Spotify is said to have reached 1.4 million users in the US after less than a month of going live. The service, which is already popular overseas, is believed to have 175,000 paying members.

All Things D scored this tidbit of information from a source familiar with the company’s operations. There’s still a lot of room for growth, as evident by Spotify’s European market breaking the 1 million paid subscriber mark months before the US launch.

Spotify is a DRM-based music streaming service that allows users to instantly listen to millions of songs from several major and independent record labels. The service launched in select European countries in October 2008 but only opened their doors to US users on July 14, 2011.

There are three service plans to choose from. The first is a free, ad-supported version that gives you unlimited streaming access to over 15 million songs. This version is invite-only and it is unclear how long it takes to receive an invite once requested.

For $5 a month, you can skip the invite queue and start streaming right away, ad-free. Finally, for a monthly fee of $10, you get access to the same bank of music but are granted the ability to use the Spotify client on your mobile device. Furthermore you can store tracks for offline listening should you not have Internet access at a given time.

Have any of you tried Spotify? My yearly subscription to Pandora recently expired and I'm thinking about giving Spotify a try as it seems much more flexible. We'd love to hear your thoughts on your favorite music streaming service.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/45013-spotify-at-14-million-users-in-the-us-175000-paying.html

 

[TorturedChaos]

I got an invite a few days after requesting one and have been using it to stream music at work. I like the free unlimited as apposed to Pandora's limit of 40hrs a month. Also I can pause it with the "pause" key on my keyboard - regardless of if Spotify has the focus right then. Can't really do that with Pandora when its running in FF and I got tired of iTunes for the same reason. (Have to pause a lot at work when answering the phone or helping a customer).
I do like Pandora suggestion system tho for finding new songs but haven't really seen anything like that in Spotify. Overall I'm enjoying the Spotify's free membership tho .

 

[lawfer]

Dude, just get Grooveshark. Grooveshark has both Pandora's random music discovery feature, and more music than Spotify. The desktop version is free, but the mobile version requires (I think) the same as Spotify a month.

I also have Spotify, I got an invite from Ars Technica a few weeks ago. Spotify is good, don't get me wrong, but being practical myself, I see Grooveshark as the overall better choice. (Also, there's a little software out there used to download music from Grooveshark... )

 

[Guest]

Problem with Grooveshark is song quality and speed. Spotify blows it out of the water on both fronts. I t pay for Spotify...It is well worth it. I had Rhapsody before and Spotify is far superior...They just need to fill a few holes in the audio catalog.

 

[Technochicken]

I got an invite for spotify about a minute after applying for it. I haven' used it much yet, but I like it a lot, especially since it lets me integrate my itunes library with streaming songs I've starred.

 

[lawfer]

Guest said:
Problem with Grooveshark is song quality and speed. Spotify blows it out of the water on both fronts. I t pay for Spotify...It is well worth it. I had Rhapsody before and Spotify is far superior...They just need to fill a few holes in the audio catalog.

Song quality? Groovehark allows you to upload your own songs. If you happen to find a song uploaded by someone else (usually such songs are not even part of the album listing), then of course you're going to hear whatever song they put on. If you search of an album, search for the whole album, and not simply pick and choose (the often random) songs.

As for speed, I ain't going to lie, Spotify plays music instantly. Groovehark takes 2-3 seconds, althogh not when it plays the next song; I believe it's because it starts streaming the next song while playing the last seconds of the current song.

If Grooveshark had a desktop application, it would be the no-brainer choice. The discovery/radio feature, the excellent playlist management, the browsing speed (thanks to HTML5), the enormous song library, and its cheap mobile counter part, make it, in my opinion, the overall superior choice. Especially if you listen to music at work, or anywhere but home where you have your actual music library.

I do like Spotify, I just think the application needs a LOT of work. The clear resemblance to iTunes (ugh), the annoying music (and non-music) ads, the poor library management, make it just good. Not great. For me, that is...

 

[tonylukac]

I requested an invite to Spotify and got one within a week. I like it a lot. How can you go wrong? Unlimited, free, legal streaming. Am not using it much, tho. It may be questionable whether Grooveshark is legal.

 

[lawfer]

tonylukac said:
I requested an invite to Spotify and got one within a week. I like it a lot. How can you go wrong? Unlimited, free, legal streaming. Am not using it much, tho. It may be questionable whether Grooveshark is legal.

Grooveshark is legal. It's been around for a while now. They've been sued, but nothing has ever happened. How is it possible, you ask? Well, to put it simply, they pay a percentage from the ad revenue they get to the artists (or labels): Every. Time. Someone. Plays. A. Song.

And no, I don't work for Grooveshark, I just like the service.

 

[Guest]

Spotify operated on a very similar policy in the uk.

Until.....

Reduced forty hours a month to 10 hours a month for free users.

Added limits to how many times a song can be played.

 

[gobbybobby]

yea not fair

UK it used to be unlimited like the US


now its limits are:

MAX 5 plays of same song in a month
MAX 10 hours playtime overall


Clearly there is more competition in the US, I don't know of any other music streaming services in europe I can use.