Spotify

Music streaming has become a really big and profitable business and each service offers a slightly different experience to stand out from the crowd. Some let you manage your own playlists will others only offer "stations". Some let you upload tracks you already owned while others only have access to music in its collection. Almost all of them, however, let you mark certain lists or music as your go-to selections and Spotify's new home screen for its mobile apps will let you get to those faster.

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After six months of beta testing with major brands like Adobe, Spotify, and Method, Reddit rolled out "Trending Takeovers." This is an advertisement platform product in which the "trending today" system on Reddit can be "sponsored" by brands. They'll appear in links very similar to all other trending links, much like Google includes paying brands to appear in search results.

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If you're on an iPhone today, you'll see changes to Spotify in the next few hours. If you're using an Android device, you'll find Spotify updating "soon". If you're on any mobile device and you've been waiting for Spotify to give you something new - beyond new media, of course - you're in luck. Today's reveal from Spotify shows the app taken out a whole new door.

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Spotify has 'refreshed' its Podcast Show page with new tools to help users find the content they're most interested in. In addition to the new category tags that simplify finding similar content, the Podcast Show page also now features show trailers, which are exactly what they sound like. With these, users can get a quick preview of the show before deciding whether to stream or download.

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The year has just begun but you don't need to wait for December 2020 to discover or rediscover your favorite Apple Music tunes. Apple has now made available your 2020 Replay list, which may naturally be quite sparse at the moment. The website, which is still in beta, will at least let you watch your music tastes grow (or regress) as the days, weeks, and months go by.

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In 2018, Spotify began including songwriter credits with content, making the information available to the public. The company is taking this a step farther with the launch of proper songwriter pages, which list all of the songs written by the writer. This makes it easier for creators to showcase and share their work and for fans to find all of the songs from their favorite writers.

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Music streaming service Spotify has announced the acquisition of The Ringer, a website that, among other things, offers a large selection of podcasts on sports, popular culture, and more. Spotify will get these podcasts as part of the deal, as well as The Ringer website and its entertainment and sports team. If everything goes according to plan, the deal will close in the first quarter of the year.

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In an announcement on Friday, Spotify revealed that it will stop offering political advertisements on its platform starting in early 2020. This isn't a permanent suspension of its political advertisements, but rather a decision to 'pause' this type of ad during what is expected to be a contentious election season. The decision comes amid growing concerns over the role political ad manipulation can play in shaping election outcomes.

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Despite the PR and legal tussle with Apple, Spotify remains the world's biggest name in the music streaming business. How it got there, however, is the subject of much scrutiny, criticism, and debate. It definitely didn't get there by being a social network itself, something its own users have been wishing for years. Spotify may finally be ready to give in, probably not out of charity, and is testing a new feature called Tastebuds that will let users get some insight into what their friends have been listening to, perhaps repeatedly even.

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Once upon a time, social interaction between users seemed to be part of Spotify's strategy, but in recent years, we've seen the company pare back some social features in favor of discovery by way of curated playlist. If you're one of the users who laments those disappearing social features, there may be hope yet, as a newly-discovered prototype suggests that Spotify may be looking to bring back music discovery based primarily on what your friends are listening to.

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Spotify has finally given iOS users access to a nifty feature that first arrived on Android earlier this year. With the new Sleep Timer function, users can choose how long music will play before automatically turning off. The feature solves a common annoyance involving listening to music at night, one often responsible for disrupted sleep and grumpiness the next day.

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This afternoon Microsoft Chief Product officer Panos Panay announced a release delay for Surface Earbuds. Earlier this year, Microsoft's Surface Earbuds weren't given a definite release date - but were generally assumed to be coming to market by the end of 2020. As it turns out, and confirmed this afternoon, these earbuds needed a little more work than originally expected.

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