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> What I care about is that, as a paying customer who has no interest in podcasts at all, I have a podcast section front and center at the top of my home page with no way of removing it. I'm annoyed that many of these podcasts have pictures that are not safe for work when I try to use Spotify to listen to music at work.

This plus threatening to kill the podcast open ecosystem by creating walled gardens is why I can't help but chuckle at the mess Spotify have gotten themselves into. How did no one at Spotify see this coming? By buying an exclusive deal, they are going to be seen as a publisher of content, and not just as a mere platform. Of course people are going to hold them responsible for that content.

Yeah, I think this is really what it comes down to. I'm in the same boat. I joined Spotify to stream music, not podcasts. Spotify has fully shown that they're going to put podcasts ahead of music at this point (probably because they can stuff in ads). This was the final straw for me. I've switched to a platform that focuses on music and pays artists more.

I don't care about Rogan, and I don't think many people who are upset with Spotify do. They care that music doesn't seem to be Spotify's top priority.

> I've switched to a platform that focuses on music and pays artists more.

What platform is that, and are you really sure?

Every platform that has a free tier has dismal pay per play numbers. But what I care about is how much of my $10 per month the artists and songwriters get. AFAICT it's almost universally 70%. But I'd be happy to be corrected, because I'd be really easy to convert away from Spotify at the moment...

Bandcamp, you “own” the music and get the source files, plus unlimited high quality streaming using their app. You pay what the artist asks for their work, usually 7-9$ for a full album.

They even have creators Fridays which removes bandcamps chunk of the revenue (15%)

After having met someone who’s making >$1m/mo from Spotify, I suspect that the reason they push podcasts over music is that someone listening to a podcast is typically listening for much longer than someone who’s putting on music.

(Even if you check your own experience and think back to times you start music and just let it play for multiple hours, consider that there are people who start one podcast and keep listening through multiple episodes)

I agree. Spotify is pushing features that benefit their bottom line but that most people don't want.

Even if you wanted to try Spotify as your main podcast client, some podcasts were never on Spotify because Spotify wouldn't pony up. Others went Spotify exclusive.

I cancelled Spotify and signed up for Apple Music. It's much improved from 2015, especially in terms of discovery and curated playlists. And it supports ALAC, which is a nice bonus (Spotify still has no FLAC option).

I'm in the same boat. I want my membership fee to go to the musical artists I listen to and not to podcasters whose speech I may or may not agree with. This additional $100M to minority voices is even more of my money not going to the artists I listen to.

I've been emailing and tweeting spotify since that podcast section showed up to get it the hell out of my sight or give me the option to do it myself, and they always point to feature requests or say they've sent along the feedback but it's nonsense. I have a family plan though and I've been putting off the discussion of "We're moving away from Spotify, prepare your playists etc."

It is really easy to switch to Tidal using tunemymusic. The audio quality is better and the artists will get the royalties instead of podcast hosts you never listened to. Still works with android auto and the UX is pretty much a clone of Spotify so the learning curve is very low. The migration dropped about 1% of songs from my playlists but nothing I'll actually miss.

I keep trying to like Tidal, but Spotify beats it for me every time.

On a content front, Tidal has 76% of my Spotify liked tracks and 83% of tracks from liked playlists (stats from Soundiiz). That's a not insubstantial amount of music to lose access to.

That might be okay, except nobody comes close to Spotify's recommendations for me. I can count on the overwhelming majority of the "Daily Mix" or "Track Radio" content to be a good fit for me, and to have passable choice in musical moods. By comparison, Tidal gives me poor individual recommendations, and can't keep a consistent atmosphere during a playback session. I'm sure Tidal has great music that Spotify doesn't, but it's not showing that to me.

I like that Tidal has higher-quality playback, gives artists a bigger cut, and has better controls over banning tracks/artists, artist credits, etc. And Tidal's recommendations are pretty far ahead of most other services for me. But I just can't count on turning it on without constantly skipping songs.

> stats from Soundiiz

Maybe tunemymusic is better than Soundiiz?

I do have pretty pedestrian music tastes though...

> I do have pretty pedestrian music tastes though...

That could very well be the difference. I don't know what normal numbers are, but Spotify says I listened to 2,518 artists last year, and I seldom listen to anyone that plays on the radio.

Streaming music services seem heavily geared towards mainstream tastes. That's understandable, but doesn't work well for me personally.

Spotify is good at helping me find non-mainstream electronic music.

That's the problem with our new app-based web, isn't it? No control to the user at all. To web companies you're just an imprinting machine for their corporate overlords trying new cool techniques of psychological manipulation and social control. Is it any wonder society is so fucked up?

Switched to Deezer years ago, not quite perfect but a much better experience in my opinion, I suggest you give it a chance.

I actually started a trial of Deezer a couple days ago. So far, I'm pretty satisfied with it. I'm going to be moving my Spotify family plan over to it soon. I was pleasantly surprised at the ability to just transfer all my Spotify favorites automatically, too. You'd think they'd advertise that ability more prominently, given that's probably a big thing holding many existing customers back.

Interesting... If I hadnt heard about the Rogan controversy I wouldn't have known Spotify had a podcasts section. I've never seen a podcast section in Spotify. I wouldn't even know where to go look for it. Maybe it is because I pay for it?

I pay for it, and the top panel of my home screen is "Episodes for you". I can not move or get rid of this section.

The ads-even-with-premium is why I no longer pay or really use Spotify. I moved back to just using VLC for my music stored on my phone.

Move to a platform that’s actually focused on music then- I’m happy with tidal and keeping podcasts in the podcast app

If you don't want to see ads in spotify then pay for it. I actually signed up with them to support them standing up for free speech.

I do pay for Spotify; still get ads.

I support free speech. I don't support treating your paying customers like an ad audience. "free speech" is a weak justification for scummy business practices.