[ptah]

that link does not show at all how spotify's policy counters loudness wars. it actually says that they apply a limiter the same as you would to get a loud master. so essentially if a musician avoids the loudness war, spotify applies its principles no matter what

[cthalupa]

I think you're misunderstanding what the issue is with the loudness war. The problem isn't making a loud master - it's that the dynamics are crushed and the audio signal clips.

Spotify normalizes volume to a LUFS level, which is not nearly the same thing as overly compressing dynamics and causing clipping.

https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/what-is-lufs-and-why-shoul...

[k__]

AFAIK they simply mess up your mastering if you don't comply.