Oct 21, 2023
I can't leave Spotify
I've tried
On my journey to use as much open-source software as possible, I couldn't replace Spotify.
From the "open-source perspective", Spotify is evil. We don't exactly know what the Spotify clients do and especially how Spotify interprets data. For example, Spotify might know how you felt from what music you listened to at what time for how long.
The music you listen to mirrors how you feel, who you're with, and what you're doing.
Alternative
I had multiple attempts to switch to local music files. I started to own most music I had already listened on Spotify. But these "experiments" lasted no longer than a month or two.
I've failed
A lot lead to the failures, but I think that there were two major causes. Spotify provides more than just music streaming: really well portioned recommendations using AI and social features.
Recommendations
"Discover Weekly" is a good example for it's recommendations. Every week, a playlist is updated to show you new songs according to your preferences. For me, it is not only a great way to discover new music, I am straight up excited to listen to the new songs Spotify has prepared for me every week.
Another example are "Niche Mixes", for every sub-genre of a genre or for every situation, there are playlists adjusted to your liking.
Social aspects
The social features may be even more important to me. You want to listen to music with others but want to have everyone's favourite music in a playlist, easy: Spotify creates that playlist. You then want everyone to be able to control the music like pausing and skipping, also easy: Spotify allows for that too.
And if someone played really good music from a playlist, the playlist can be shared. It's just one link.