Spotify

Spotify is currently beta testing integration with the new SiriKit audio APIs introduced in iOS 13. As demonstrated by The Verge’s Tom Warren, the current Spotify beta build lets you ask Siri to play music on Spotify.

This OS-level support has not been possible until iOS 13, a point which Spotify previously brought up to the European Union. It’s nice to see that Spotify is moving relatively quickly to adopt the new functionality.

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Spotify has attempted to curb abuse of its family plan in the past, and faced backlash for doing so. Now, Spotify is renewing its efforts to prevent abuse of its family plan by requiring that users occasionally provide access to their location data.

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We’ve covered Spotify’s move into podcasting multiple times over the past year. Spotify has spent millions of dollars to acquire content and they’ve built out an entire portal for shows to manage their content and view statistics. It’s clear that they are here to stay. I’ve even noticed non-technology focused advertising will now say, “Find us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.” Side note: I hate when someone says “Find our show on iTunes” as that helps almost no one. The data I hear is that across the industry is that Spotify makes up 10% of the market now while Apple is still at 60%. Apple’s market share is likely to keep shrinking as other players grow, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Today, I want to explain why we aren’t headed towards a Spotify vs Apple Podcasts war.
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A new Spotify free three-month trial offer begins today, and the company says that it is a permanent change from its previous one-month period.

This brings the streaming music service in line with the three-month free trial offered by Apple Music…

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Parental controls for Spotify Premium Family are finally starting to roll out, though oddly only in Ireland for now. The company said today that other markets will get the update later in the year, without explaining the reason for the delay.

Parents will now be able to control the Explicit Content Filter setting of all other accounts on their plan (these parental controls are a long-requested feature).

The update is now available in Ireland and will roll out in all markets with Premium Family this fall …

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There was something of a mystery report this week.

Apple and Spotify are reportedly in talks over potentially allowing Spotify users to control music playback with Siri […]

According to The Information, Spotify and Apple are discussing a “plan” that would “let iPhone users tell Siri to play songs, playlists, and albums with voice commands.” These conversations reportedly stem from new APIs in iOS 13 that make it possible for developers of audio apps to integrate with Siri.

As we noted, it’s unclear why that would require talks, as the SiriKit APIs will allow Spotify or anyone else to take advantage of Siri for music requests. However, there is one rather more radical possibility…

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Apple and Spotify are reportedly in talks over potentially allowing Spotify users to control music playback with Siri. The talks come as Apple faces increasing antitrust scrutiny, some of which has been brought on by Spotify itself.

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Ever since the story broke in mid-July that Apple was looking to fund some original podcast series, the tech-community has had a lot of opinions about what this might mean for the future of podcasting. On recent episodes of The Talk Show and ATP, there was plenty of discussion about why Apple might be considering funding podcasts, and what it might be for the industry as a whole. I think it’s an interesting discussion to have, so I wanted to add my opinions on why I think Apple is funding original podcasts.
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Amazon Music may not be in the same league as Spotify and Apple Music when it comes to subscriber numbers, but it believes it has a plan to help tempt students.

There’s one offer for those who are Prime Student members, and another for those who aren’t…

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Spotify paying subscribers hit 110 million by the end of June, up 31% year-on-year, announced the company this morning. This compares to 60 million Apple Music subscribers as of the last number revealed by Apple, also in June.

Despite this impressive growth, however, Spotify admitted that the number is lower than it had hoped…

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There’s been much criticism of streaming services like Apple Music and Spotify for paying relatively small sums to artists, but a new report today suggests there’s some good news in the mix.

Independent labels now represent 40% of the music market, twice the share they had back in the days of physical music sales, and they have never been more optimistic about the future …

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Apple and Spotify are engaged in a bitter antitrust battle in Europe, with Spotify claiming that Apple’s App Store rules give it an unfair advantage over competitors. Apple has now responded to Spotify’s claims in a new filing with the European Commission.

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The latest version of the iOS & Android Spotify apps provides users with much better organization of both their music and podcasts.

At the top of the screen, you now have Music and Podcasts tabs, so these are now kept completely separate …

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During the WWDC 2019 Keynote, Apple announced watchOS 6 for Apple Watch. While watchOS 6 didn’t get as much stage time as other new software releases, it still looks like a great release. One of the features that is most interesting to me is the API for streaming audio. In watchOS 5, Apple offered streaming on Apple Podcasts and Apple Music, but it left out the ability for third-party developers to access it. Spotify used Apple Watch as one of the reasons Apple isn’t play fair with how it treats its own products vs how it interacts with competitors. I argued that Spotify wants all the benefits of Apple’s platform, but without giving Apple any revenue. With the new streaming API for watchOS 6, it’s time for Spotify to ship or shut up.
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The European Commission is still waiting for Apple to formally respond to the Spotify complaint of anti-competitive actions, says Europe’s competition commissioner.

Margrethe Vestager said that the commission was officially investigating the claim, but hasn’t yet had a response from Apple …

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