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I don’t get it. They are complaning that their limited free plan is limited?
They’re complaining that the limited, free-tier plan is worse than it used to be. And really, for no good reason.
When EA releases Star Wars 2: A Sense Of Pride And Accomplishment, we complain about how stupid that is, do we not?
for no good reason
Hosting costs a lot of money
The 1 or 2 kB of lyrics are a few orders of magnitude smaller than the song being streamed.
The album art probably takes up more space than the lyrics.
So, album art should also be a paid feature?Album art would make way more sense as a paid feature than lyrics, considering it’s a largely cosmetic improvement.
How does it make more sense that “cosmetic” features are in the paid-tier? Would it not be the other way around?
Because it improves the experience, but isn’t vital to it. If you want the free tier to be accessible to everyone, limiting things like lyrics that people like OP use as a disability accommodation isn’t the way to do it.
The whole point with features being paid for is that they incentivize you to pay. There is no universal right to have a free tier or certain features for free.
It just makes sense to lock features that users enjoy to incentives them to pay.
They’re complaining that one of the things the limited free plan takes away is something they were using to accommodate their disability.
wait why should deaf people enjoy music? And not through vibrations but LYRICS?!?!
I’m thinking it’s not Spotify that is keeping deaf people from enjoying music, but fuck the subscriptions also.
Some people use deaf and hard of hearing interchangeably.
Deaf (big D) culture spans various levels, like hard of hearing, yup!
Yeah it’s a whole spectrum. I hear normally out of my right ear but left is at best 50% volume. Just genetics my cousins have similar hearing profiles. If I listen to music with just the right ear I feel like I’m missing out even though I can barely tell what goes on in left ear outside of bass and drums.
I left Spotify for Tidal. But why would anyone feel obliged for free music from a commercial host? Just self host if you dont want to pay. Piracy is always morally right. It’s preservation of cultural heritage.
I choose to pay for Tidal because of convenience. I refuse to pay for more than 2 streaming services. It’s fairly easy for any adult to make choices like that.
This is an imagined problem and a fairly new one to.
Left handed people having to use tools and appliances designed for right handed people is an actual bigger issue.
(I don’t know how to pirate or self host but I think you’re cool).
I killed my Spotify account when they started shoveling millions of dollars at Joe Rogan, and everything they’ve done since then only confirms I made the right call.
I may have to try that again: at the time I got too many complaints from my kids. Now Spotify hugely increased prices, probably to pay for its attempt to collect Podcasts that I’m not interested in.
Unfortunately I agreed with my kids: other music services just don’t works as well
Tidal has been pretty good for me over the past 5 years. I don’t know what your criteria are, but for me it’s something like 1) is the catalog big enough to offer 90% of what I’m looking for and 2) no advertising if I’m paying for the service. It ticks those boxes. I imagine it’s only a matter of time until they introduce the bullshit tier where you’re paying and being advertised to, but for now you get what you pay for.
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My teens like it
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I can predictably ask for either an artist or “like an artist” and get hours of what I asked for. (Apple just segued into random stuff so I always had to get it back on track. Someone I want listen to specifically someone do if I ask for that I expect to get that)
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Me too. Migrating to Tidal was extremely easy. They even imported my Spotify playlists and follows. And they are cheaper. Fuck Spotify.
Actually it wasn’t easy, they rely on a third party service that charges the customer instead of Tidal footing that bill for you. I thought that was a bit tacky.
I would like to introduce you to [email protected]
I guess deaf people aren’t allowed to enjoy music like the rest of y’all.
I’m so sorry but this is the absolute funniest shit I have ever read. 😂
Being deaf is a spectrum. There are plenty of people who still have some hearing, and are “hard of hearing”. There’s deaf people who can enjoy music through the use of hearing aids as well. There’s also totally deaf people who can enjoy music because of the vibrations. There’s people whose hearing is just bad enough that they don’t understand what anyone is saying without subtitles/lyrics. Deaf in only one ear, etc.
This is just some nerd looking to be angry.
Maybe, but spotify is an actual scam so fuck them
I might get a bit of hate for this considering the community name, but Spotify is the one subscription I pay for and don’t feel like I’m getting ripped off. Basically every song I want is on there, they very rarely remove content, and the algorithm actually comes up with decent recommendations. I even like some of the other random features like Spotify wrapped.
But the main difference I see vs other subscriptions is that I don’t feel locked in, since there are no Spotify originals etc if they ever make the service too shit (which admittedly they might since they keep raising the price and trying to shove podcasts down everyone’s throat) I could easily switch to a different streaming service or even go back to just buying music outright
I don’t feel locked in, since there are no Spotify originals etc
I don’t use Spotify so correct me if I’m wrong. But I think Spotify has podcasts that are only available there.
I told my wife about other open source apps that have music without ads, and even though it had the music, there were some podcasts that were not available without Spotify premium outside of Spotify.
You’re probably right there, I don’t listen to podcasts so I was just talking about the music
I used to like Spotify. Right now YT music feels just way better. No fluff yet, just music. Plus all of the unofficial covers which are on YT are on YT music
YT music does have a problem with reuploaders stealing revenue through “topics”, Upper Echelon made a video about it a few weeks ago
Sounds like a temporary issue but google does take its time to fix anything
I like Spotify, and when I want to support and artist I buy their merch, or I go see them live (the amount of money they get from ticket sales depends on if it’s a live nation event or not).
I just started using Spotify for the first time last year, mainly because I got tired of trying to figure out what this meat paste wanted to listen to
YT is great when you know what you want to hear, but it’s garbage at (music) recommendations (I haven’t tried YT music)
Spoofie isn’t the best, but for right now, it’s worth the price just so I can actually get back to work, and not fiddle with YT for 3 hours looking for music this meat paste wants right now
Although, I’m open to alternatives, if they’re viable
I have Tidal. It costs the same as Spotify but pays artists more and actively promotes up and coming musicians. Also they aren’t part of the military industrial complex, so that’s cool.
Same, Tidal also has better sound quality and a shuffle that actually works
I’m with you on that one. Yeah they are not great. But there are far worse companys.
I know Lemmy hates Apple, but if you want a Spotify alternative with good accessibility, then this is pretty cool:
Music Haptics is a new way for users who are deaf or hard of hearing to experience music on iPhone. With this accessibility feature turned on, the Taptic Engine in iPhone plays taps, textures and refined vibrations to the audio of the music. Music Haptics works across millions of songs in the Apple Music catalogue, and will be available as an API for developers to make music more accessible in their apps.
Oh that’s cool.
Apple Music also has read-along lyrics without any extra cost.
So does YouTube Music.
This is actually really cool. And now I wonder if you could use this to produce music specifically designed for haptics only
It’s like we’re circling back to those “extreme bass” CDs from the 90s.
Why do they think that they are entitled to free lyrics?
Because the people with working ears get the lyrics for free
No, they don’t. This feature works exactly the same regardless of what your ears can or can’t do.
If you have working ears, you can hear the lyrics.
Can’t believe I’m explaining how hearing works
You are not explaining how hearing works. You are manipulating. You are manipulating by equating one’s ability to hear with a Spotify feature. These are not the same thing, and comparing them is not correct.
Oh no, manipulating people into thinking deaf people deserve equality. How horrible!
But the feature works exactly the same for deaf and not deaf people, we’ve established that already. Well, at least you agreed that you were lying and manipulating. I will take the win.
That argument style is main thing that props up all sorts of discrimination. The truth is that applying the same rule to everyone often does not effect everyone the same way. You can argue about the rule being the same, but it’s generally more useful to focus on the effects.
Go fetch some more training data, you useless LLM troll.
Just because I can hear the lyrics, doesn’t mean I know the lyrics.
I have working ears. Still don’t understand most lyrics.
^ Verification can chugger
Because that’s how it worked until Spotify wanted to wring more money out of people.
You say “more money,” but this person is on free tier. They are paying nothing and they expect more. Is that not entitlement? I’m not some raving capitalist, but isn’t it okay to charge money for certain services?
When a company offers free services and then starts charging after people start using them(or in the case of OP, become dependent on them) then it’s complete bullshit. Now you can’t trust free services because a company can just decide it’s not free whenever they want.
You gave me a free sample in the supermarket? I demand free cheese for life, you monster!
The fact you’re reaching this far means you got the point but you have to “win” or some shit. Bye.
I’m a bit confused. Do deaf people listen to music? Lyrics are generally freely available via Google.
Deafness covers a broad spectrum of hearing difficulty, not just completely deaf. Most people that identify as deaf still have some hearing. I always forget that and had the same question as you until I read a comment further down.
It’s likely that the person isn’t fully deaf and so can still hear some music, but deaf enough that they can’t understand the lyrics. Having the ability to view the lyrics in real time is handy rather than having to search them up all the time. Spotify also shows what lyric is currently being sung in real time, whereas you can’t get that with a Google search.
Aha, I didn’t know that. Thanks for the explanation! I’m going to edit my comment above to point to it.
To be fair, it’s more likely the person isn’t deaf at all and is just complaining.
You are a shitty person, good sir!
Why is that more likely?
Agreed.
I spent the last month converting all of my Spotify likes to MP3 files and ended my subscription in Mid-June.
Their greedy, shrinkflating, enshittifying asshole CEO can go fuck himself.
How would one go about this? So I can avoid doing it accidentally, of course.
Well, I’m not advising that you do this, but I’ve read that there are tools on the Internet for converting Youtube links into MP3 files, and even better, I’ve read that the quality is a jump up from what Spotify streams to your device.
Interesting reading.
How much did the artists get when you downloaded the MP3s?
0 dollars and 0 cents
How much did the artists get when you streamed the music?
Maybe a couple cents. Not that much different
Doesn’t everyone deserve a living wage?
Including the people who work at Spotify?
they would have a livable wage if they weren’t so fucking bad at business.
They literally outsource the one part of the music industry that makes money publishing
The ONLY source of revenue they have is from subscriptions, and literally all it does is pay the publishers that use spotifys platform. And also VC but that doesn’t count since it’s VC.
damn thats crazy, i’m out here with my 300GB collection of music that i own and control and i can just, add lyrics to shit if i want to.
I don’t because i’m not deaf and i don’t really care for lyrics all that much, but it’s also just, automated.
Could you add wrong lyrics to songs for me…
You can look up lyrics on Google for free, or what?
The lyrics on Spotify play along/highlight as the song plays so you can read along in time with the song.
This is actually a vital accommodation for the hard of hearing and partially Deaf because we can often hear/feel the beat and sometimes the melody, but we don’t know exactly where in the song were up to because the tune of all the versus sounds the same, or vocal breaks of “ooooooh, lalala” can be mistaken for the start of a new line of lyrics.
So if you’re just reading along with a static page of lyrics, it takes a lot of mental energy to figure out what’s happening with the song, especially if it’s a new song you’re discovering.
We’ve had static lyric sheets for decades, you’d unfold the sleeve in your record and try to read along as you listened, never 100% sure you were doing it right unless a fully hearing friend was there to point at the words and be your version of the bouncing ball.
So to have this technology that almost completely solves this problem for a vulnerable community… Then to put it behind a pay wall despite the fact that Deaf people are more likely to be underemployed and socially disadvantaged than the general hearing populous is just callous.
Our experience of music is fundamentally different to hearing people, and yet Spotify will charge us the same rate for a sub par experience.
As a non-deaf person, I came in here looking exactly for your comment. Reading the post, I was confused as to how deaf people even enjoy music. You told me exactly the things I wanted to understand in a very good, and even relatable way. Thank you!
