Spotify head honcho, Daniel Ek, has admitted that its US launch will be delayed until early 2010. The announcement has led some commentators to speculate that free streaming from the service could come to an end. Is this just scaremongering? Read on to find out…
A post from Techcrunch founder, Mike Arrington, that begins “Free streaming may be history…”, quotes a tweet from Paidcontent writer, Rafat Ali, who attended Ek’s talk at the Monaco Media Forum:
“Spotify CEO: US.mkt delay: Publishers are a large grp to sign up. The penny per play model can’t work.”
But that’s not exactly everything Ek said. Quoted in The Daily Telegraph, he says:
“The US is a very different beast…the US music labels want to get there and are very excited about Spotify but there are thousands of publishers we need to get signed up and fully informed about the service.”
US labels have expressed reservations about Spotify’s free streaming with ads model but could it stop streaming songs for free in the UK? We’re used to the ads-between-songs offering. Would users remain if you only had the option to subscribe? It doesn’t seem likely.
Ek seems positive about Spotify’s future pointing to plans for a launch in China and noting that the large amount of user information Spotify has collected could allow them to create personally targeted advertising.
Streaming is seriously expensive for Spotify. The Guardian estimated earlier this year that it costs Spotify between £9m and £18m a month. That requires some serious ad sales or a hell of a lot of subscriptions. Maybe you should help them out and grab Spotify on your phone.
Out now | £free with ads or £10/month | Spotify (via Techcrunch)
