Continue reading »]]> Spotify have just sent me an email which did get me rather overexcited. Check this one out!

I really would love to believe that you could buy 100 tracks for £1.15 – I guarantee you it would be a bestseller! Sadly, when you actually go Spotify’s site, the actual price of the package is £50. Slightly disappointed, I have to admit.

On a more general thought though, it does make me think of the amount of poorly written emails we get these days. You’d think, for a company of that size, they’d at least have someone to check over emails before they send them.

Rant over!

Continue reading »]]> Yes, the news that every Spotify customer has wanted to hear. Spotify finally supports multitasking on the iOS4 with the latest update.

You will of course need an iPhone 3GS/4 or an 3rd gen iPod Touch (unless you have jailbroken) to get the multitasking ability.

The new app also supports control from the lock screen and double-click control buttons, which does make the app much more usable. It also features a new “What’s new” section like in the PC application, so you can see the top tracks of the moment and any new releases.

A well deserved update I think.

Continue reading »]]> Spotify has today launched a new go-between package, presumably to try and increase the amount of paying customers.

The new package sells at £4.99 per month. It includes unlimited streaming (see Free package below), abroad usage for more than 2 weeks and no advertising. However, it lacks the offline syncing and mobile use. I actually think that this is a clever idea – not everybody has a phone or device that works with the mobile system so it makes sense to have a cheaper PC only package.

The £9.99 Premium package remains unchanged. However, Spotify have now introduced a new free package that doesn’t require an invite. You essentially get the same as the old free package, but you are limited to 20 hours streaming per month. You also don’t get the Spotify radio mode, but I don’t believe that many people use it.

Overall, I’m pretty pleased. It won’t really affect me, but for those who don’t have a compatible mobile device it makes sense to just go for the cheaper option.

Continue reading »]]> Yes folks, you are reading that right. If you are in possession of a Symbian mobile phone, you’ll be delighted to know that Spotify today launched Spotify for Symbian.

You’ll of course need a Spotify Premium subscription costing £9.99 per month, but I promise you it is well worth the money.

Sadly, I don’t have a Symbian phone so I wont be testing the new software anytime soon. However, if you have a Symbian phone, head straight over to m.spotify.com and you’ll be redirected to the right download. If you aren’t sure whether you have a Symbian phone or not, you can use that link anyway and the site will let you know whether you’re good to go or not.

This is good news for Spotify as the new release hugely broadens the market that Spotify can get to and will hopefully help the company to persuade more people onto their premium plan.

Continue reading »]]> Spotify, a big player in the music industry, has now introduced MP3 purchases.

They originally had it so the software could link you to sites such as 7digital, but it now looks like they are offering direct MP3 purchases.

The new Spotify update allows you to purchase tracks which you can keep forever. They are in MP3 format so they can be placed on any MP3 player or iPod. All purchased music is stored in your music directory and can also be accessed from Spotify.

It looks like the new concept is ran in partnership with 7digital, as the EULA mentions 7digital and their logo is shown.

Looks interesting – I won’t ever use it because I’m going to keep my Spotify Premium membership going as it works seamlessly with my iPod Touch. I doubt many long term Spotify premium users will use the new feature, but it might be handy for free users. Nevertheless, it is a nice addition to Spotify.

Continue reading »]]> Great news Spotifyers! The good people have posted up an update for their software on the iPhone and iPod Touch. I’ve just got my iPod Touch updated with the latest version and I am very pleased with the new release. It’s a big improvement on the last version and has fixed loads of bugs and niggles.

Here’s what has been fixed…

• The volume control within Spotify now only shows on the first gen iPod Touch. It now does not show on any other iPod Touch or iPhone.
• The app now does not allow you to see artist and album view when offline (I actually don’t like this fix – liked it before)
• The app will ask you to turn off “Offline Mode” when wi-fi is on – it’s optional but its a handy feature.
• There are loads of bug fixes which means crashes are much less frequent.

Overall I’m very happy with the update. The only thing I want now is to have the ability to run Spotify in the background, but that’s down to Apple more than Spotify really.

Continue reading »]]> I finally got some funds into my PayPal account, and since Spotify recently started accepting PayPal payments for subscriptions, I decided to get my act together and buy a month of Spotify Premium.

I have to say, it is the best £9.99 I’ve spent in a hell of a long time. The premium subscription not only scraps the ads, but gives me unlimited access to the iPhone and iPod Touch app. I had to try it out, especially with the “Offline Playlists” feature.

And take my word for it, it is brilliant! I can save up to 3,333 tracks onto my iPod Touch, and listen to them anytime I want – no matter whether I’m connected to the net or not. So if I’m on the train, in the car, or sitting at the bus stop, I can listen to all my favourite tracks over and over without any connection to the internet.

It is absolutely truly and utterly worth the £10 it costs per month. I also get the new offline playlists for PC, but I doubt I’ll use that half as much as on the iPod. The loss of ads on the PC will be cool too. I don’t have to buy music anymore, and it’s 100% legal .

If you have £10 a month available, and you love music, Spotify Premium is worth every penny!

Continue reading »]]> Spotify, the newbie music system that allows free streaming of many bands, has temporarily switched to invitation only in the United Kingdom.

This means that you can only join Spotify if:

• You get an invite from a friend already on Spotify (see below).
• You pay for £9.99 membership every month.
• You join their waiting list.

Spotify claims that the new implementation is due to a “huge demand in the UK over the last few days since we launched our mobile service” .

It’s a shame really – as much as GEEK! would love to help there’s little that can be done really. I guess you’ve just got to ask around. As much as GEEK! would love to say have an invite on us, you have to be a premium member to get invites, so you won’t be able to ask any big tech groups. Even if you’re a premium members, you only get 2 invites a month!

Continue reading »]]> Just some quick news for any Spotify lovers:

The Spotify app has now arrived on the app store, so you can head straight over there and download it.

Bare in mind you’ll need to be a full premium user to be able to make any use of the app, which will cost you a tenner a month!

Oh and the other thing to bare in mind is that apparently it won’t play music in the background which is a bit of a newsense, so close the app and you’re music will stop playing. Hopefully that will be fixed in an update before too long.

Otherwise, go ahead and try it out. Sadly, I’m not a Spotify premium member (for now) so I won’t be able to review it, but if you’ve got any opinions on it feel free to throw in a comment!

Continue reading »]]> Great news Spotify fans! The company has posted on their blog that Spotify for iPhone (or the iPod Touch) will become a reality.

The mentioned in the post that “the lovely people at Apple” had approved their software and that the app would soon be available on the app store.

It’s not all good though – as I may have mentioned already in previous posts – as the app will only be usable by premium members of Spotify, so free users won’t get the benefit of the app.

Still, I’m sure it will encourage plenty of people to upgrade to premium membership, which will be great for Spotify.

Thanks Apple, that’s the news we’ve all been waiting for! I can’t wait to see the Spotify app on the app store.