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Pretty sure a high percentage of these listeners are using free tier. And most of them using it just to brag that they are listening to music on Spotify. Their

Pretty sure a high percentage of these listeners are using free tier. And most of them using it just to brag that they are listening to music on Spotify. Their music collection is one of the worst among all services present in India. Lots of major international records are not available. Regional music collection is not good. Only the mainstream/popular content is available. Bought the premium subscription on very first day of launch. Tried using it for few days. Found major stuff missing. Cancelled and got the refund. Kudos to them for prompt service on this. But very bad in comparison to Apple Music and other Indian services. Apple Music costs similar for individual account and much cheaper with a family account, has much better International and Indian collection and really good playlists collections, at least in India.

r_singh 8y ago
Keeping in mind the current collection available through Spotify, the more appropriate way to state the first sentence would be: > Pretty sure a high percentage of these listeners have downloaded and tried the free tier. Because most of us aren't really using it, are we?
- sanketskasar 8y ago
  Pretty much not. I installed the app. Bought premium. Cancelled it. Uninstalled the app. All in a matter of few days.
adventured 8y ago
What are the top local competitors in India? I'm unfamiliar with the streaming music market there.
- r_singh 8y ago
  JIOSaavn, Gaana, Amazon Prime Music, Apple Music (which is much cheaper as a family account), Hungama, Wynk. All the above currently have more songs (except Prime) on them than Spotify in India does.
  - billfruit 8y ago
    Google Music is a major competitor, with a massive catalogue at the right price, but they don't have a free tier.
    - r_singh 8y ago
      You're right, it's just that their sign up is so complicated / glitchy / buggy, that I've never been able to get it and as a result completely forgot about their existence.
blocked_again 8y ago
> And most of them using it just to brag that they are listening to music on Spotify. 1 million people using Spotify and wasting data pack to brag to their friends? Seriously?
- notafrog 8y ago
  When you put it that way it almost doesn't make sense, but if you change "1 million" to 0.075 percent of the population, it starts to.
- rrrazdan 8y ago
  Data is cheap in India.
  - chosenbreed37 8y ago
    I'm amazed at how cheap it is. I think that even after adjusting for purchasing power the average person can afford generous data packages.
    - harias 8y ago
      Data tariffs fell 93% and usage surged 25x in three years (2014-2017)[0]. This was brought about by Jio, which targeted to increase revenue per user which it actually did. https://telecom.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/data-tariffs-fall-93-in-last-three-years-telecom-department/63537339 https://telecom.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/data-tarif...
- namanyayg 8y ago
  1GB/day 4g for 90 days costs a total of ~$6 in India.
  - colinbartlett 8y ago
    I recently visited India and was shocked at how cheap the data plan was. By far the cheapest data I’ve used anywhere in the world.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
bad_user 8y ago
You're speaking of Apple Music, however this implies mostly Apple hardware. How many Indians own iPhones? (and for Android, last time I tried the app, it was a piece of shit). And personally I'm not happy with the selection of Apple Music from my country (Romania). Not only that but their radio recommendations are absolutely shit. All music streaming services actually pale in comparison with YouTube in terms of availability and even recommendations. The only problem with YouTube is that the Premium service is only available in a few select countries. If only Google could pull its head out of its ass and give customers that want to pay money a way to do so. What Spotify has going for it is integration with most devices you care about. Can you stream Apple Music on your Playstation? No you can't. Their apps also have an obvious feature that's sorely missing from alternatives: the ability to remotely control a device, or to painlessly switch devices and pick up where you left off. Spotify are also the only ones with a usable Linux client, with all the others you have to settle for the web interface, which sorely lacks integration with the keyboard's playback buttons. And their selection has been improving. This reminds me of when Netflix came to Romania in 2016, their selection was shit and they didn't even have subtitles. Nowadays Netflix is widely popular and has really good shows (compared with the established alternatives). That said nowadays I seem to get along better with Deezer (https://deezer.com https://deezer.com), as their automated recommendations seem to work better. And btw, I tried most streaming services available, even local ones (e.g. Zonga.ro) and Apple Music is the last one I'd pick.
giancarlostoro 8y ago
I used to pay for GrooveShark (which clearly was sketchy lol) and then Spotify, since I subscribed to Google All Music Access I have never had to pirate music just to get access to it. I can cache all the music I like (download it for offline listening) and it works on my iPad too. I wish they had an official desktop client for offline sync, but Google seems allergic to non-web desktop solutions. I try to avoid getting sucked into Google's Ecosystem, but GAMA is pretty damn good. Sadly I don't know what the situation for GAMA looks like outside of the USA. Edit: But my point is, I hated Spotify, I still found myself forced to "acquire" music. This is the digital age, sell me digital music I fully own. People who don't want to pay for music will not pay for it no matter what you do. At least with Google when I buy music I can sync it to my local machine, but with GAMA I don't have to. The other upside is I get no ads on YouTube since I got grandfathered into YouTube Premium. Yes, I know, AdBlock, but I got grandfathered in to no ads, why would I care about AdBlock?
- rch 8y ago
  I've enjoyed my Google music subscription for years as well, but I think it's pretty shady that lately they keep trying to bundle in a free YouTube subscription. I still buy movies, and I have a fair bit of purchased music from before the subscription, so I'll be more than annoyed if I end up with my media library sitting in YouTube Red if they try to converge the products. Spotify would be high on a short list of alternatives if that happens.
  - giancarlostoro 8y ago
    I think if it does happen I may not bother anymore, it'll just save me $14 a month (I pay for my wife to have it too, apparently I can add 2 other family members or something at no extra cost).
  - jimmydddd 8y ago
    @rch -- What's the shady bundling? I haven't been paying attention. I think I'm in the same position as you -- early Google music adopter, previously uploaded my legacy mp3 library to Google music, and get ad free Y-tube.
roguesherlock 8y ago
I've been a long time Apple Music user. Spotify definitely has weaker collection. But, I like the cross platformness/integrations of it. I can cast to chrome cast, play it on linux, and other third party integrations. Also, spotify connect is really nice. That said, Apple did start integrating Apple music with third party providers too (alexa, google home comes to mind). We'll see how it goes.
- sanketskasar 8y ago
  There are web players coming up which are really polished for almost all desktop platforms. Not sure about their Android situation. Looks optimistic.
  - krageon 8y ago
    You say it looks optimistic, but you don't know about the Android situation and the only thing you have to go on otherwise is a web player that is "coming up" (and therefore does not exist). I don't see how you can come to this conclusion based on this data - you may as well say you are feeling positive for no reason at all.
- tzs 8y ago
  I have a wonderful thing that Creative used to make, now discontinued I believe. It consists of a USB dongle that appears as a pair of USB stereo speakers to the computer but is actually a radio transmitter, and a matching receiver unit that has stereo line level outputs. No need for any special drivers, or any special support on the part of music player apps. As long as whatever the player is running on knows how to use USB speakers, I can get the sound to end up at my A/V receiver. I don't know why this approach was not more popular.
  - dexterdog 8y ago
    People do the same thing with bluetooth speakers now and you can get a simple bluetooth dongle for about $15 that will output to any speakers/amps/headphones.
r0h1n 8y ago
How did you get a refund when their premium plan comes with the first 30 days free? I signed up for the premium plan too, without having paid anything for the first 30 days. https://www.spotify.com/in/premium/?checkout=false#PLANS https://www.spotify.com/in/premium/?checkout=false#PLANS
- sanketskasar 8y ago
  I bought the prepaid plan for whole year. I was so excited. But alas!! Got the refund.
notyourwork 8y ago
How does Amazon Music compare?
- sanketskasar 8y ago
  I used it for a while as it came bundled with Prime. It has good collection of tracks, international, mainstream and regional. But the interface is clunky and curation and discovery is almost non-existent.
  - notyourwork 8y ago
    Is this specific to India or in general?
billfruit 8y ago
Google Music perhaps the best value in India right now, massive international and local catalogue, with the right pricing.
yash1th 8y ago
Not just in India, in US too. The only reason i’m using AM is because of their library in many languages. I can find indian songs (of many languages), english songs and songs from other languages

r_singh 8y ago

Keeping in mind the current collection available through Spotify, the more appropriate way to state the first sentence would be: > Pretty sure a high percentage of these listeners have downloaded and tried the free tier. Because most of us aren't really using it, are we?

sanketskasar 8y ago
Pretty much not. I installed the app. Bought premium. Cancelled it. Uninstalled the app. All in a matter of few days.

adventured 8y ago

What are the top local competitors in India? I'm unfamiliar with the streaming music market there.

r_singh 8y ago
JIOSaavn, Gaana, Amazon Prime Music, Apple Music (which is much cheaper as a family account), Hungama, Wynk. All the above currently have more songs (except Prime) on them than Spotify in India does.
- billfruit 8y ago
  Google Music is a major competitor, with a massive catalogue at the right price, but they don't have a free tier.
  - r_singh 8y ago
    You're right, it's just that their sign up is so complicated / glitchy / buggy, that I've never been able to get it and as a result completely forgot about their existence.

blocked_again 8y ago

> And most of them using it just to brag that they are listening to music on Spotify. 1 million people using Spotify and wasting data pack to brag to their friends? Seriously?

notafrog 8y ago
When you put it that way it almost doesn't make sense, but if you change "1 million" to 0.075 percent of the population, it starts to.
rrrazdan 8y ago
Data is cheap in India.
- chosenbreed37 8y ago
  I'm amazed at how cheap it is. I think that even after adjusting for purchasing power the average person can afford generous data packages.
  - harias 8y ago
    Data tariffs fell 93% and usage surged 25x in three years (2014-2017)[0]. This was brought about by Jio, which targeted to increase revenue per user which it actually did. https://telecom.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/data-tariffs-fall-93-in-last-three-years-telecom-department/63537339 https://telecom.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/data-tarif...
namanyayg 8y ago
1GB/day 4g for 90 days costs a total of ~$6 in India.
- colinbartlett 8y ago
  I recently visited India and was shocked at how cheap the data plan was. By far the cheapest data I’ve used anywhere in the world.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

bad_user 8y ago

You're speaking of Apple Music, however this implies mostly Apple hardware. How many Indians own iPhones? (and for Android, last time I tried the app, it was a piece of shit). And personally I'm not happy with the selection of Apple Music from my country (Romania). Not only that but their radio recommendations are absolutely shit. All music streaming services actually pale in comparison with YouTube in terms of availability and even recommendations. The only problem with YouTube is that the Premium service is only available in a few select countries. If only Google could pull its head out of its ass and give customers that want to pay money a way to do so. What Spotify has going for it is integration with most devices you care about. Can you stream Apple Music on your Playstation? No you can't. Their apps also have an obvious feature that's sorely missing from alternatives: the ability to remotely control a device, or to painlessly switch devices and pick up where you left off. Spotify are also the only ones with a usable Linux client, with all the others you have to settle for the web interface, which sorely lacks integration with the keyboard's playback buttons. And their selection has been improving. This reminds me of when Netflix came to Romania in 2016, their selection was shit and they didn't even have subtitles. Nowadays Netflix is widely popular and has really good shows (compared with the established alternatives). That said nowadays I seem to get along better with Deezer (https://deezer.com https://deezer.com), as their automated recommendations seem to work better. And btw, I tried most streaming services available, even local ones (e.g. Zonga.ro) and Apple Music is the last one I'd pick.

giancarlostoro 8y ago

I used to pay for GrooveShark (which clearly was sketchy lol) and then Spotify, since I subscribed to Google All Music Access I have never had to pirate music just to get access to it. I can cache all the music I like (download it for offline listening) and it works on my iPad too. I wish they had an official desktop client for offline sync, but Google seems allergic to non-web desktop solutions. I try to avoid getting sucked into Google's Ecosystem, but GAMA is pretty damn good. Sadly I don't know what the situation for GAMA looks like outside of the USA. Edit: But my point is, I hated Spotify, I still found myself forced to "acquire" music. This is the digital age, sell me digital music I fully own. People who don't want to pay for music will not pay for it no matter what you do. At least with Google when I buy music I can sync it to my local machine, but with GAMA I don't have to. The other upside is I get no ads on YouTube since I got grandfathered into YouTube Premium. Yes, I know, AdBlock, but I got grandfathered in to no ads, why would I care about AdBlock?

rch 8y ago
I've enjoyed my Google music subscription for years as well, but I think it's pretty shady that lately they keep trying to bundle in a free YouTube subscription. I still buy movies, and I have a fair bit of purchased music from before the subscription, so I'll be more than annoyed if I end up with my media library sitting in YouTube Red if they try to converge the products. Spotify would be high on a short list of alternatives if that happens.
- giancarlostoro 8y ago
  I think if it does happen I may not bother anymore, it'll just save me $14 a month (I pay for my wife to have it too, apparently I can add 2 other family members or something at no extra cost).
- jimmydddd 8y ago
  @rch -- What's the shady bundling? I haven't been paying attention. I think I'm in the same position as you -- early Google music adopter, previously uploaded my legacy mp3 library to Google music, and get ad free Y-tube.

roguesherlock 8y ago

I've been a long time Apple Music user. Spotify definitely has weaker collection. But, I like the cross platformness/integrations of it. I can cast to chrome cast, play it on linux, and other third party integrations. Also, spotify connect is really nice. That said, Apple did start integrating Apple music with third party providers too (alexa, google home comes to mind). We'll see how it goes.

sanketskasar 8y ago
There are web players coming up which are really polished for almost all desktop platforms. Not sure about their Android situation. Looks optimistic.
- krageon 8y ago
  You say it looks optimistic, but you don't know about the Android situation and the only thing you have to go on otherwise is a web player that is "coming up" (and therefore does not exist). I don't see how you can come to this conclusion based on this data - you may as well say you are feeling positive for no reason at all.
tzs 8y ago
I have a wonderful thing that Creative used to make, now discontinued I believe. It consists of a USB dongle that appears as a pair of USB stereo speakers to the computer but is actually a radio transmitter, and a matching receiver unit that has stereo line level outputs. No need for any special drivers, or any special support on the part of music player apps. As long as whatever the player is running on knows how to use USB speakers, I can get the sound to end up at my A/V receiver. I don't know why this approach was not more popular.
- dexterdog 8y ago
  People do the same thing with bluetooth speakers now and you can get a simple bluetooth dongle for about $15 that will output to any speakers/amps/headphones.

r0h1n 8y ago

How did you get a refund when their premium plan comes with the first 30 days free? I signed up for the premium plan too, without having paid anything for the first 30 days. https://www.spotify.com/in/premium/?checkout=false#PLANS https://www.spotify.com/in/premium/?checkout=false#PLANS

sanketskasar 8y ago
I bought the prepaid plan for whole year. I was so excited. But alas!! Got the refund.

notyourwork 8y ago

How does Amazon Music compare?

sanketskasar 8y ago
I used it for a while as it came bundled with Prime. It has good collection of tracks, international, mainstream and regional. But the interface is clunky and curation and discovery is almost non-existent.
- notyourwork 8y ago
  Is this specific to India or in general?

billfruit 8y ago

Google Music perhaps the best value in India right now, massive international and local catalogue, with the right pricing.

yash1th 8y ago

Not just in India, in US too. The only reason i’m using AM is because of their library in many languages. I can find indian songs (of many languages), english songs and songs from other languages