[bigstrat2003]

> I used to be one and even I’ve given into the convenience of Spotify in recent years.

What convenience? Unless you're constantly going out to listen to new music, which most people aren't, Spotify is a raw deal indeed. You can easily stream the music you own through various means, and you don't have to pay a monthly sub to do it.

[dangus]

Technically you don’t have to pay for a monthly sub for Spotify either ;-)

Also, it’s not a raw deal. In 1995 a single CD cost about $30 in today’s money (look up old Best Buy ads and you’ll find $16-18 CDs). Buying a Spotify subscription is equivalent cost to buying only 4 albums per year in 1995. It would be very easy to listen to more new music than that every year.

If you want proof, look at revenue charts for the music industry. Streaming music still hasn’t reached the previous level of revenue generated in the pre-Internet era when you adjust for inflation, despite the global population increasing significantly since then.

[ubermonkey]

You're asking about Spotify, but the situation is the same with Apple Music (the streaming service, not the purchase-digital-files thing).

I have an enormous ripped collection of digital music from my similarly enormous collection of CDs. Just managing that is a hassle, especially when it comes to curating the subset of things on my phone -- and on my wife's phone.

I initially signed up for Apple Music MOSTLY to give my wife easy access to whatever she wanted on her phone without requiring her to go to the office, plug her phone into the media computer, etc. And honestly, for $12-15 a month, I'll make that deal. It's a good deal for ME, too.

The other fun thing about at least the Apple offering here is that they have a "matching" service built in, so if you have some random local bands in your iTunes library, YOU CAN STILL ACCESS THOSE VIA APPLE MUSIC because AM will upload them into their cloud and allow you to access them because you have them in your local library. This is super cool; I don't think anyone else does this.

And yes, finally, the new music discovery thing is pretty great, too. I credit access to an all-you-can-eat music service with helping me stay curious and interested in discovering new music in my 50s. If I read an article about some random band, and think "gee, I wonder what they sound like?", well, I can play it right now. That's powerful.

[Hasu]

> so if you have some random local bands in your iTunes library, YOU CAN STILL ACCESS THOSE VIA APPLE MUSIC because AM will upload them into their cloud and allow you to access them because you have them in your local library. This is super cool; I don't think anyone else does this.

YouTube Music has this feature too - my library still has stuff I uploaded over 10 years ago that I can stream on my phone.

Spotify has a local files mode that used to be pretty good and allowed for syncing devices, but they've crippled it, made it harder to use, and hidden all references to it deep in submenus (at least this was the state of things the last time I used Spotify, it's been a couple years since I subscribed, I wouldn't be shocked if they've killed it entirely by now).

[hnlmorg]

You’re talking about cost, not convenience.