EDIT: The only reason why I still had it at this point was because I could use it with other apps. However, now that my Spotify Subscription is cancelled, it doesn’t work with anything. It’s mildly infuriating because today, I can’t still use it with other apps like I was able to yesterday.
Please don’t make the same mistake I made. No one should buy this.
Under a rock question here, but do you know of any sites that map out radio stations so you can preview them or note them to check out when traveling about?
I mostly listen to my own music when traveling because I don’t know any radio stations that might click with me, and don’t really feel like or sometimes have the time to scan for them.
Oh, to clarify, when I said my own music, I meant my local files. I’m a weirdo that buys music & syncs it across devices.
That said, I did a little searching after asking this and found a cool little site called Radio.garden that helps find some radio stations around you, and found some cool stations I might give more of a listen to.
This is my point. The person I replied to said OP shouldn’t expect more than what they got. I pointed out this same business model has worked for decades so OP shouldn’t have expected the outcome of a bricked device.
I wouldn’t have expected them to do it any other way. The only reason why Spotify is still around is because every bit of competition is even more incompetent and greedy than they are
I tried Tidal back when “Amazon Music HD” launched and I was on a hunt for the best lossless streaming. My only issue with tidal is their catalogue. It is laughably deficient. In the end I found zero good lossless streaming options and went back to ripping my own CDs.
Spotify is the only subscription service in my life where I’d happily pay twice of what I am paying currently. I can miss all the other nonsense but not Spotify. It’s probably my most used piece of software. Just to throw another opinion in the mix here.
People suggest downloading and maintaining an MP3 library as an alternative, but my god, no thank you. I remember those days, it was awful. On average I’m adding like 10 new songs to my library per week, I’d dread having to scour piracy sites for those. Then you have to keep it all synchronized between your phone, laptop and pc. Some obscure stuff will inevitably be unfindable, which means you have to resort to youtube mp3 downloading. Half the time you’ll be forced to manually add tags and album art to your files.
Alternatively you could pay for each album individually. I’d estimate my entire library would set me back €2000 at least. And then you’re still missing out on the social features, music discovery and cross-device functionality, all of which I use frequently.
For me Spotify is an incredible product that is well worth the money it costs. I am a very happy customer.
I have hundreds upon hundreds of songs in my Spotify music collection. The people telling me to just pirate my library are absolutely wild. I can’t even imagine how long it would take me to find and download every single song. And then I wouldn’t have a simple way to discover new music. Spotify is the one and only subscription service I find to be useful.
Its crazy seeing people go apeshit just because spotify costs money. One of the least fucked up subscription services and yet they are mad because it isnt free. Come on guys :(
Are you kidding me? It’s been par for the course as far as car assessors go. Sirus radio was like 100 and still required a subscription. A lot of GPS were that price and most had subscriptions.
Just like they want to charge you to use the heated seats you’re paying the gas to lug around anyway
That’s not the same thing at all. As bad as e.g. Sirius or GPS subscription might be, at least with those the subscription is for ongoing access to new data being transmitted to you. In contrast, a subscription purely for the use of hardware already included in the car is literally theft.
Just because it’s percieved as normal doesn’t mean it’s something we should put up with though.
With GPS subscriptions (the ones I’m aware of anyway) they will still navigate you from A to B when you stop paying the subscription, you usually just miss out on traffic updates, map updates and other localized enhancements. If there are any that deny you navigation outside the subscription that’s plain scummy IMO.
I’m not familiar with Sirius Radio but from what I can see online, it’s a satellite radio subscription service that seems to bring new things to the table (like starting a radio station at the beginning of a last song etc). The hardware appears to actually serve a purpose, i.e. it’s the satellite receiver for the radio service subscription. I believe we could compare this to buying a Starlink dish for internet access, and paying the monthly subscription. The spotify device shown here is not a standalone device and is only fitted with bluetooth IIRC, requiring a phone for operation.
In comparison to Spotify, Sirius does not appear to have ever had a free plan - whereas Spotify does… I see is no reason why Spotify could not make their free plan usable on this device.
You can root it. Didn’t look too much into it but you might be able to do something with that.
Also failing that, get a short range radio transmitter. They’re cheap and the audio ain’t great but you can plug your phone in and get audio on your car.
Yeah it’s a dumb gadget even at the $45 they eventually cut the price down to. It’s basically got an always shrinking market of people who don’t have CarPlay or Android Auto, and the niche who don’t want to use a phone holder, Siri/Google, and car mode in the app.
I think I got an Echo Auto for $25 (during the public tests). It doesn't need any kind of a subscription to use as far as I'm aware. It only does streaming still, but there are Alexa skills that let you stream from your Plex or Jellyfin server.
Those I don’t fault. Sirius has satellites to maintain and they don’t get ad revenue.
GPS makers, well making maps on that scale is very expensive. Not everyone can be google and give it away to end consumers by harvesting user data and selling ads to businessplaces.
Spotify though, fair enough to charge for the hardware but once bought should work with the ad-supported version of their product…
I mean, it’s basically a cheap smartphone or computer tablet, with a lower resolution, but nice quality screen, and a giant volume spinner. $100 does not get you much at all in the phone and tablet space. I don’t think there’s much of any profit margin, if at all for it.
I considered getting one of these a couple years ago and saw Spotify was discounting them heavily and even giving them away for free in some cases. I didn’t wind up getting one but do wish they would release a simple player + speaker like this for home use.
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