As an FYI, Spotify has just announced they’ll either suspend or terminate accounts which use adblockers as of 3/1/19:
Does Spotify play ads on free accounts, like Pandora?
I’ve been a subscriber for ages, but as far as I know, yes.
Yeah, me too, so I guess I’ve completely forgotten.
They do play ads on free accounts, but they’re not too bad tbh
Do they mean ad blockers inside Web browsers? Or are there multiple types of ad blockers?
People distribute hacked versions of the Spotify app file for cellphones that block the ad functionality. My guess is that they are specifically referring to those, though other cases may fall under the new policy as well.
I just use Spotify on my desktop. The ads are very annoying. But I had no idea there was a way of blocking them. Most of the time I just turned off Spotify and then re-started it, which is a way of getting around the ads.
I know some of you guys link to spotify playlists on Qt3, which takes me to a spotify webpage, but I don’t know what my login is, so i can never sign in that way.
I don’t really mind the ads in Spotify, I listen mostly at work and it just becomes background noise, but I started noticing “video” ads in the desktop app which is annoying because unlike an audio ad, I can’t find and queue up my next song while the ad plays - the video ads completely take over the focus of the app and disable the mouse. Very annoying.
I haven’t figured out yet how to simply play an album or playlist without Spotify switching to something else that it chooses for me. And if I just want to listen to one track I just go to YouTube instead.
On the Spotify PC app (windows 10) you just select album and double click on the first song. After about 10 minutes it will play the first ad, then go back to the album.
I tried the Spotify app on a phone once, and that sounds more like what you’re describing, where it just plays a radio station based on that first song you wanted to play.
Both versions play albums pretty easily; that core functionality is separate from the radio-style shuffle feature.
I’m playing Spotify now, and it hasn’t shown me an ad in 20 minutes. I’m getting very nervous now. Did they get my credit card information somehow? What is happening?
I wasn’t able to figure this out. I tried playing A Saucerful of Secrets, and after the first (random?) song on the album it played a John Lennon song. My phone runs Windows 10 Phone. I am not a subscriber.
Huh.
I swear I remember this differently from my time as a Spotify user (admittedly at least five years ago), but it looks like y’all aren’t crazy after all. Free version of the mobile app only shuffle plays albums. Desktop and tablet work properly.
Which is…a special kind of hell.
I notice an upcoming notification on my phone that my 6 months free Spotify is about to come to an end in about a week, the last one that I got through Ultimate Game Pass perks. Looks like they have that perk coming up again in May sometime.
Of course, that’s only for new Spotify users, so basically any time I want to use these perks, I have to sign up for a new account under a new email. So far I have 3 accounts:
- Original account I signed up years ago. Always a free account, I never got premium on this account.
- Account I got first time to try Premium.
- Account I currently have, whose 6 months is almost up.
What’s funny is that for each one I’ve gotten better and better at actually using Spotify.
For account number 1, it took it years to finally figured out what I liked and start giving me good recommendations.
For account number 2, when I signed up, it had me choose a large number of bands as favorites, and it customized my daily mixes and things from that. This was much better.
For account number 3, the first thing I did was find as many albums and bands and songs that I liked, and I clicked the little heart symbol. So it knew a TON of music that I liked. What was interesting about this iteration is that my Daily mixes are 99% composed of music that I’ve already “liked” using the heart symbol. So it’s all music I’m very familiar with. The Discover Weekly list is now much better, since it actually has music I’m actually not familiar with (unlike previous accounts, where it was mostly stuff I already knew).
Anyway, so what I’ve learned is that Spotify can work pretty well for me if I give it more data. And the more I give it, the better the recommendations. It’s still not as good as Pandora for discovery, but it’s getting there.
I guess with my premium period running out, I have to decide if I want a non-premium version of my current account, or start over with a new email address and teach it even more and differently from the beginning.
Not sure about this new desktop client
I have Apple Music!
Where do you guys recommend I start if I’m not familiar with Neil Young’s music?