Spotify lands in Australia
It took a few years, and probably a hell of a lot of negotiating, but finally, Spotify has landed in Australia and New Zealand.
Spotify is a lightweight software application that allows instant listening to specific tracks or albums with virtually no buffering delay. It was launched in the US in late 2008 and had approximately 10 million users by September 2010.
Spotify offers streaming music from major and independent record labels including Sony, EMI, Warner Music Group, and Universal. You can download Spotify and then log onto their service enabling the on-demand streaming of music. Music can be browsed by artist, album, record label, genre or playlist as well as by direct searches.
The big question mark that nobody seems to know the answer to, is the effect that it will have on the local market, and in particular, the smaller bands trying to break through.
In total, they’ve had over $189million in investment, ($100million just last year) but it’s not clear on how much money they are actually earning from users, or more critically, how much is given back to the actual artists which is a worry point for a lost of people.
Although artists may be looking at this all wrong, instead of thinking “we aren’t getting enough money out of this” they should be thinking more about how much extra exposure they are getting, which always leads to good things.
In my humble opinion, this is a good thing. Spotify helps to share music tastes and new tracks between friends faster and easier than ever before. And for an upcoming artist, exposure is a good thing and the faster word can spread about their stuff the better.
To say that pirating has hurt the music and film industry is a load of crap, you only have to look at the figures to see that it’s actually the opposite. People are finding out about things easier, and word is spreading faster… which has actually lead to an increase in sales.
For those completely against it, Triple J unearthed is an incredible place to find new talent, and it will probably remain to be for a long time to come, spotify won’t change that.
Agree, disagree?… let the comment war begin!
Plus… it lets us do things like this (in the early days while they iron things out… you may need to have Spotify installed for this to work):
Anyway, from the Spotify press release:
Spotify is available in Australia from today. We’re very happy to be here.
Simply search for any artist, song or album and start playing. Create playlists, share music with friends and check out what others are listening to. Spotify’s seamless Facebook integration takes enjoying music with friends to a whole new level. Music has never been this social.
Our new Australian friends can choose from three great Spotify services – from absolutely free to paid subscriptions.
Spotify Free – the unsurpassed, totally free music service. Enjoy free, on-demand, access to more than 16 million songs on your computer. No gimmicks. Just listen and love it, month after month after month. All Spotify users enjoy unlimited free, ad-supported music.
Spotify Unlimited – all the special features of our free service, but with uninterrupted, ad-free access to Spotify on your computer. All for only $6.99 a month.
Spotify Premium – the all-singing, all-dancing, top-of-the-range Spotify experience. Premium gives you access to all the music, all the time. Listen online or offline, on your computer, your mobile phone, tablet and a whole heap of other devices. Enjoy enhanced sound quality and access to exclusive content, competitions and special offers. Premium costs just $11.99 a month.
A special occasion deserves a special playlist. Here’s one we’ve put together just for you.
Spotify is available right now. Simply visit our homepage to sign up, or click on any of the play links you see in Facebook to get started for free.
Happy listening!
