After a long and rumor-filled life as one of the great tech-unicorns, Spotify launches in the US today. For those not familiar with the service, Spotify is a European music streaming service that has spent the last year negotiating for licenses with the four major American music labels. Now that the negotiations are finished, the music can start.
Music streaming services are in no short supply these days, so Spotify has some tough competition. What makes Spotify unique is their business model of “Any track, any time, anywhere. And it’s free!” Spotify is the only streaming service that lets you choose what track you want to hear while using a free plan (as opposed to streaming radio services like Pandora, which are free, but only let you choose the general type of music).
The free version is desktop-only, and ad supported, providing users with up to 10 hours a month of streaming music. For $4.99 a month, you can get unlimited service without the ads. At $9.99, you can use the service via their mobile apps for Android and iOS, connect to other streaming media devices from companies like Sonos and Logitech, and it includes an offline caching feature, so you can listen to your tracks even if you don’t have an internet connection.
The free service is invite-only at first, and rumor has it that invite requests will be shut down when the service launches today, so get to the sign up page quick, while you have a chance.
Update: Spotify has launched. Unlike the European version, Spotify in the US is not be limited to 10 hours. You get unlimited on-demand streaming with a free account. And you can still sign up for invites. Move, move, move!
Meh, I prefer grooveshark.