Chances are that you've at least tried streaming music by this point — whether you're willing to pay for a subscription is another story. Streaming subscriptions add up, and it can be difficult to justify adding another $10 to $15 to the pile. TikTok owner, and absolute monster of a startup, ByteDance plans to release a competitively-priced music streaming service for budget-minded consumers.
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Earlier today, Spotify announced that it was rolling out a whole new look for the Library section of the music streaming app, subdividing content into two general categories: Music and Podcasts. This change is supposed to make the podcast experience on the platform a bit easier to manage. There's also a new "Liked Songs" playlist that we're surprised didn't exist before.
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Just a couple of days ago, we reported on a new "car view" mode being tested by Spotify, which (as the name might suggest) optimizes the app's interface for use in a car by making everything a whole lot bigger. Turns out, that might not be the company's only plans when it comes to in-vehicle entertainment. Financial Times is reporting that Spotify has hardware goals, planning what it calls a "voice-controlled in-car music player."
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Whether it's a sound bar or an elaborate surround sound setup, a lot of people's best speakers are attached to their TVs. A lot of people also have Amazon Music, whether or not they realize it; the service comes free with Amazon Prime. Owners of Android TV hardware will soon be able to use those speakers to listen to that music, as a Play Store listing for a TV version of Amazon Music has appeared.
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Today Sonos has revealed its latest product: the Sonos Amp. As the name might imply for those into home theater tech, it isn't just another standalone speaker for the company's lineup. The new Sonos Amp is... well, an amp. It's twice as powerful as the previous Connect:Amp at 250W (125W per channel, two channels), and it has less of the Connect's cheese-grater look going on, with a slightly more modern and shorter matte black package. It'll also be a bit more expensive at $600, with availability set for February 2019.
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If you enjoy listening to music or podcasts while driving, you may be using Android Auto and Google Maps in conjunction with Google Play Music, Pocket Casts, or Spotify. But those of you who prefer Waze for directions and traffic updates may often find themselves juggling it alongside their audio app throughout the drive. That's neither easy nor safe, but it's about to get better.
Spotify and Waze are partnering up to make each app's main features easily accessible in the other. You can start a Waze navigation and see turn-by-turn directions within Spotify, and you can access your Spotify playlists and control playback within Waze.
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While Spotify remains primarily a streaming music service, the apps and web portals have become more and more capable as the company continually tweaks them. That looks to continue as Spotify has acquired Sonalytic, a tech firm dedicated to audio and music recognition systems. The terms of the acquisition weren't disclosed in the short announcement post on Spotify's blog, but the company did say that Sonalytic's expertise would be used for "improving Spotify’s personalized playlists, matching songs with compositions, [and] improve our publishing data system."
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Starz, the premium cable channel that offers movies and original series, now works with Spotify, the premium streaming music service. Which is... odd. An updated version of the Starz Android app now includes integrated streaming tracks from Spotify, all of which are either original music or soundtrack selections from those Starz series and movies. Apparently there are "more than 3,500" selections that are at least tangentially related to the Starz catalog.
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Scoff all you like, Google purists: there are a lot of people who double-dip Android and iOS/Mac platforms, and we have the analytics to prove it. Those of them who subscribe to Apple's paid Music service (which is built off the bones of ye olde Beats Music) will be happy to hear that the Android version is now out of beta. It was available publicly on the Play Store before, but now it's formally released for everyone. Huzzah.
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Chromecast owners know that even though Google's tiny stream machine is one of the cheapest on the market, it occasionally gets freebies for online video and music streaming services that add some major value. The latest goodie to come to owners of the original Chromecast and the Chromecast Audio is Pandora One, the music service's premium advertising-free tier. New owners can get two months of listening free, which has an approximate value of $8.
Offers tend to come and go, and it isn't always clear who's eligible based on when they bought their Chromecast. This one isn't showing up for me, so neither my original Chromecast model nor my Cast-enabled SHIELD TV are eligible for the promotion.
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