Virgin Media signs a deal with Spotify

[Chad]

Originally Posted by batchain

As you said a little dated. At last count there were one million paying subscribers.

http://www.spotify.com/uk/blog/archi...n-subscribers/

I wonder how many UK based subscribers they have?

I think it would be great for Virgin customers if they can access the free version of Spotify, even if it means they will only be able to listen for a maximum of 10 hours a month, and can listen to any single track no more than five times.

[alwaysabear]

Originally Posted by Chad

I wonder how many UK based subscribers they have?

I think it would be great for Virgin customers if they can access the free version of Spotify, even if it means they will only be able to listen for a maximum of 10 hours a month, and can listen to any single track no more than five times.

Many people use you tube for free to listen to a lot of music , so the pricing of spotify on VM will be crucial to any success.

[passingbat]

I will have to see what the pricing is and if there are any extras. Currently I pay Napster 5 pounds per month for unlimited streaming via PC, but that includes 5 free downloads to keep (I actually use the option to pay 15 pounds every 3 months, which gives better value as you get 15 track credits and can get full albums for around 8 credits, and use the rest on single tracks)


The only advantage Spotify on Tivo will possibly have, for me, is it will eliminate the fan noise from my PCs, that does detract from feeding the music through good audio equipment.

The Spotify exclusive bit could be good and bad; we could get cheaper spotify pricing, but we may not see alternative music services such as We7, LastFm and Napster on tivo, some of which offer better or different options to Spotify in my view.

[muppetman11]

Originally Posted by Chad

I'm not really sure what to make of this deal. It's great news for current Spotify customers with TiVo but will this really appeal to the masses?

Through Virgin I've already got access to 38 radio stations, 15 dedicated music TV channels and thousands of music on demand videos. I've got thousands of legal music tracks on my PC, Xbox and ipod plus can watch thousands more music videos on Youtube via my Wii and PC. I've got all the music I need, in fact probably more music than I could possibly want and I'm a real music fan.

I'd never pay between £4.99 to £9.99 to listen to songs via my TV. Music via my TV needs to include the music video or I'm simply not interested. Sure if you subscribe to Spotify there's plenty you can do with the music via your PC too however let's not forget that not every Virgin TiVo customer has the internet.

It's great to see Virgin thinking outside the box, but for me this is a little too niche. You need to have TiVo, be a real big fan of music and be prepared to shell out an additional monthly subscription charge for this to appeal to you. I suppose once the Digital Economy Act comes into force, and Virgin start monitoring illegal downloads, this service might just become more appealing to some of our friends who choose to download their music from illegal sources. I've got a feeling Virgin are going to get very tough on peer to peer, torrent and newsgroup users real soon.

Brilliant post , my thoughts exactly. This is superb news for existing spotify customers but how many non spotify customers will want to pay extra. Will this possibly signal the end of Music OD.

[davidthornton]

Originally Posted by muppetman11

Brilliant post , my thoughts exactly. This is superb news for existing spotify customers but how many non spotify customers will want to pay extra. Will this possibly signal the end of Music OD.

How many non Spotify customers will want to pay extra depends on what the VM Spotify offerings include. The Premium (which costs £10pcm) offers streaming at a higher bitrate, offline music on iPhone and integation with Sonos. Some might be prepared to pay for it because now they can get it on their VM bill at a probable discount, rather than going through Spotify directly.

I do see music subscription services working in the future, although Sky couldn't make theirs pay, because managing a music collection is time consuming and there's the potential to lose the music. All one really needs to own/have access to is their playlists and a working Internet connection. I suspect the same will apply to films in the future. The customer will never actually have a copy of the content.

[muppetman11]

Originally Posted by davidthornton

How many non Spotify customers will want to pay extra depends on what the VM Spotify offerings include. The Premium (which costs £10pcm) offers streaming at a higher bitrate, offline music on iPhone and integation with Sonos. Some might be prepared to pay for it because now they can get it on their VM bill at a probable discount, rather than going through Spotify directly.

I do see music subscription services working in the future, although Sky couldn't make theirs pay, because managing a music collection is time consuming and there's the potential to lose the music. All one really needs to own/have access to is their playlists and a working Internet connection. I suspect the same will apply to films in the future. The customer will never actually have a copy of the content.

Yes I suppose your right with that , I've used a service on my connected TV called Acetrax , you can stream and watch ppv movies but you can also buy it and its stored in the cloud , you can access it on numerous devices.

[passingbat]

Subscription levels may depend on how many people have got their tivos hooked up to stereo/AV amps and speakers. Listening to music through the average TV speaker wouldn't be worth the extra cost for me personally.

[davidthornton]

Originally Posted by passingbat

Subscription levels may depend on how many people have got their tivos hooked up to stereo/AV amps and speakers. Listening to music through the average TV speaker wouldn't be worth the extra cost for me personally.

I was thinking this earlier. It'd also be great if the music on each TiVo, streamed from Spotify, could be controlled by a web application so no requirement to even turn the television on to control the playlists. If you're familiar with Sonos, imagine a TiVo or multiple TiVo's acting in almost the same way all controlled by a web application.

[Chad]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/09...ent_platforms/

"New sign-ups to Spotify must be Facebook members - the non-Facebook world will have to go somewhere else."

So the big question is, how does this impact on the deal between Virgin and Spotify, if at all? If someone is interested in getting Spotify via Virgin, surely they won't be forced to open a Facebook account first?

It also looks like people with a Smart TV, with access to the Facebook app will be able to access their Spotify account / tunes via the Facebook website.

It would appear selling Spotify as an app to TiVo customers is going to be more challenging than Virgin thought? Surely this move by Spotify actually devalues the deal agreed with Virgin a few months ago. Could Virgin renegade on the deal due to this move by Spotify?

[passingbat]

Originally Posted by Chad

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/09...ent_platforms/

"New sign-ups to Spotify must be Facebook members - the non-Facebook world will have to go somewhere else."

So the big question is, how does this impact on the deal between Virgin and Spotify, if at all? If someone is interested in getting Spotify via Virgin, surely they won't be forced to open a Facebook account first?

It also looks like people with a Smart TV, with access to the Facebook app will be able to access their Spotify account / tunes via the Facebook website.

It would appear selling Spotify as an app to TiVo customers is going to be more challenging than Virgin thought? Surely this move by Spotify actually devalues the deal agreed with Virgin a few months ago. Could Virgin renegade on the deal due to this move by Spotify?

Link doesn't work.

I'd be very surprised if you had to be a f/b member to use spotify. The record companies, who really run spotify, won't want to lose out on potential customers IMHO.

[BenMcr]

Originally Posted by passingbat

I'd be very surprised if you had to be a f/b member to use spotify. The record companies, who really run spotify, won't want to lose out on potential customers IMHO.

Actually it's true http://www.pcworld.com/article/24064...ing_users.html

New Spotify subscribers can only sign up if they have a Facebook account, a move that suggests that the online streaming music service is fully embracing its new Facebook partnership.

How this affects the Virgin deal I haven't a clue

In regards to record companies losing out though, there are a lot more Facebook users than there are Spotify users. As Spotify listening will now appear in the FB timeline, it's more likely increase rather than decrease usage, but by a different crowd that do at the moment

Hopefully there will be a middle ground reached

[Chad]

Sorry Passingbat, not sure what's happened there. Cheers for the link Ben. Alternatively the story is covered here too:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technolog...-the-race.html

[passingbat]

Originally Posted by BenMcr

Actually it's true http://www.pcworld.com/article/24064...ing_users.html



How this affects the Virgin deal I haven't a clue

In regards to record companies losing out though, there are a lot more Facebook users than there are Spotify users. As Spotify listening will now appear in the FB timeline, it's more likely increase rather than decrease usage, but by a different crowd that do at the moment

Hopefully there will be a middle ground reached

Originally Posted by Chad

Sorry Passingbat, not sure what's happened there. Cheers for the link Ben. Alternatively the story is covered here too:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technolog...-the-race.html

Thanks for the links guys.

That is a surprise, and a stupid move on Spotify's part IMHO, a view that seems to be shared with many others.

I was eagerly awaiting spotify on Tivo, but more apprehensive now. I do have a (free) spotify account, so I guess not affected ATM. And of course, tivo users may be exempt from that requirement?

I said on another thread that we7.com would have been my preference for VM to do the deal with; think that even more now.

[BenMcr]

Originally Posted by passingbat

I said on another thread that we7.com would have been my preference for VM to do the deal with; think that even more now.

Except they wouldn't based on We7 have just done to themselves

[passingbat]

Originally Posted by BenMcr

Except they wouldn't based on We7 have just done to themselves

Yep, just seen that following Chad's link.

Now, if Napster could just get their Automix function to be better, they could be a better option.

---------- Post added at 13:38 ---------- Previous post was at 13:28 ----------

It looks as if the changes to we7 aren't that bad?

We value your membership

As someone who's used our service in the past we wanted to give you an enhanced experienced. You can access your existing playlists as radio stations and we've given you up to 50 requests (on demand tracks) per day. We're also offering you a 3 month free trial - see the promotion code below.

Want the Premium Service?

Want the on-demand service youve used before? You can still visit and listen to previews - your playlists and personal music library are still there. You can also take advantage of our 3 month free trial by entering the promotion code

Presumably if you pay, you get the same service as before, with no enforced facebook. And 50 on demand tracks per day sounds reasonable for the free account.