Spotify... how???
I saw a lot of people who had Spotify listening updates roll through their Facebook pages recently. I didn't really know what it was, but just assumed it was another type of Pandora radio. I never cared for Pandora - a few too many comercials and their recommendations were atrocious. Regardless, I listen to a lot of music while at my computer and when writing, so I strolled over.
That was two days ago. I don't think I've turned it off yet.
Unlike Pandora that attempts to build a radio station around your listening preferences, Spotify actually lets you browse for certain bands, listen to individual tracks, pause and skip, find similar bands, and even build playlists. It's basically an online version of iTunes. I have no idea how they're getting away with this. Sure, there are audio adds, but no where as many as Pandora and the visual ads (really clever, to keep you accidently clicking on them when you try to scroll) just keep taking me back to their homepage.
Download a program and a massive music library is instantly accessable. I mean, I already had near 60gigs of music, but this is insane. My best friend had come into town, and we tried to think up the most obscure bands we could think of - indie punk, unsigned electronica, failed metal acts, and DYI Post-rock - and we found all of them on Spotify. Hell, we found more albums by these bands and links to groups we had never heard of. Impressive!
Supposedly this is all legal. There's even a comercial that says "Pirating is so last year" or something, and says the bands get paid. I can't fathom how. The service is free, the program unlimited, the commercials few. And honestly, I can't see those RIAA lawyer bastards going along with this. None-the-less, with the new Puscifer album already on here (it just dropped Tuesday), I suppose I won't have to... acquire it... by any other means.
And I find I'm quite okay with all of this...
