Spotify: My New Obsession

Image via CrunchBase

So I know there’s been a lot of hype about Google Plus, but if you can score an invitation, I think Spotify is much more exciting.

I’ve been a longtime Pandora user, and I have loved being able to create stations based on my favorite artists, and also have those stations introduce me to similar artists. However, Spotify has several advantages: a library of 15 million tracks, but also the ability to make, share and subscribe to playlists. For example, I made a playlist of my girls’ favorite dance tracks this morning, but I also subscribed to four playlists Britney Spears made (80s music, workout mix, her kids’ favorites, and a “me time” mix), as well as linked up with my Facebook friends who are on Spotify already and also subscribed to a playlist of Mercury Prize nominees as well as a 146-track “America” themed playlist, both made by Spotify staffers. I can see myself using this a LOT, both at home and at school while I’m working and grading. Once more of my friends are there, I’m looking forward to checking out their playlists, as well as making collaborative playlists.

Also, as a teacher, this may put an end to frantically scrambling on YouTube to find the right version of a song I’ve just decided I want to play for my students, and also with Spotify, I don’t have to feel guilty about copyright issues. If enough of my students end up there, we could make book-themed playlists, or playlists for a certain time period, or ones a certain character would like today–imagine a Holden Caulfield playlist, for example, that all students could access, or a playlist one character would make for another. I’ve done these kinds of assignments before, but this way, all the students could hear the results, or could easily work together. I think Spotify will end up having some really neat teaching applications.

I don’t have any invitations to share, but if you end up using, I’d love to hear more, or maybe share some playlists!

Related articles

• HOW TO: Share Spotify Playlists With Your Facebook Friends (businessinsider.com)
• Music Monday: Spotify (blogschu.com)
• Music Diary Deal: Round-Up of Spotify Invite Links (geardiary.com)
• Jorge Escobar: Google Will Acquire Spotify (venturelevel.com)