Spotify, the streaming music service which is gradually gathering a large fan-base in Europe, has been plotting a mobile version. It recently hired a head of mobile and the speculation was that it would come out with an iPhone app first after releasing a teaser video. But today it’s released video of an Android app it’s being demoing to people at Google I/O.
The Android app is still very much a work in progress and subject to minor changes, but it gives a pretty good overview of their thinking. The demo highlights a number of features including playback, playlists, offline synch and music search.
For those of you who haven’t seen it yet – the service has yet to launch in North America, although I’m about to send some lucky TechCrunch writers some preview codes we’ve gotten hold of – Spotify is a lightweight iTunes-like application for Windows and Mac that lets you search, browse and stream a deep collection of music. Tracks are streamed via a encrypted P2P technology. The free service is ad-financed, hence a general comparison with Last.fm, but it’s primary service is subscription based. It works like a fully-playable iTunes store, creating playlists is easy and some bill it as an alternative to file-sharing, hence why it’s managed to sign so many music labels.
Spotify has raised a large round of funding so far, €15.3m from VCs Northzone Venture Partners and Creandum. It launched in the UK in February after building a big following in Sweden, it’s country of origin.
Epic.
Saw the new Spotify Android app and I jizzed in my pants.
This looks great…nowadays your company is nothing w/o a mobile app. The new kids on the block, http://www.jamwee.com, have made some hints at releasing an iPhone app too.
Move over last.F’em
time to get a girlfriend then
Sigh…
looks awesome, but no iphone
I haven’t had a cell phone since 2002. but sounds good. I did have a cell phone between 1990-2002.
What has that got to do with anything?
The offline sync looks amazing, let’s hope Apple don’t get all pissy and block it during the submission process for duplicating functionality…
@Edd Mills this is for Android, not iPhone, so they won’t have any say in the matter. Even if Google/T-Mobile refuse to add it to the market, provided Spotify are happy to host the application themselves, they can advise their users to connect directly to their website and download the application.
We’re not bound up by the problems of that platform
Yeah, this an important point.
Just to clarify for people who aren’t aware, the apps which a user can see in the market *can* be dictated to an extent by the carrier. Best example was the controversy over the tethering apps which T-Mobile had blocked from their users.
However, anyone can make an app and host it on their site for people to install. With a userbase like Spoitfy will no doubt have, this will possibly account for more installs than the presence in the market.
And you don’t need a rooted (hacked) phone to do this.
It’s going to be very interesting to see what Apple do. Best guess is they’ll try and negotiate some revenue share deal. I pray that Spotify have the balls to tell them to f*ck off.
hands down spotify is one of the most ground breaking apps to come out in years.
Super quick and the catalog is enormous across all types of music.
It may not be available in the US yet, so thats why proxies exist
Wow, thats excellent news, had been expecting them to go straight for the iPhone. Its looking like quite a well polished app, looking forward to seeing that on my G1. Any news on a timetable for this?
As an Apple user i REALLY hope that Android gets muuuuch more traction and many many cool apps – this might finally force Apple to rethink their “all your stuff belongs to us” aproach.
I love Apple for their hard- and software, but I really hate them for locking us in with shitty carriers, forcing us to pay 99 bucks per year just to debug on the device and allow someone to download our apps and finally rejecting our apps because THEY think they suck our might kill marketshare of their own stuff.
Go Android and kick the rotten Apple!
I hope they make a BlackBerry version of Spotify soon.
Apple seems relatively relaxed about streaming music apps – the main stipulation seems to be that these apps provide buying links to the iTunes Store – which given Spotify does that with 7digital on its desktop client, seems eminently doable…
It will be a really cold day in hell when there’s a Spotify app in the App Store. Apple, your move!
Any news of a Symbian version for 5800?
Listening to Roisin Murphy there. cool
Why is it so hard to get Róisín Murphy’s Overpowered album in the US?!
I’ve been using spotify for a long time now and I am well pleased to see the evolution of it onto the mobile platform.
Also glad to see its on my phone before the the iPhone. *Ha, that rhymed*
Anyone can make an app and host it on their site for people to install. With a userbase like Spoitfy will no doubt have, this will possibly account for more installs than the presence in the market, and you don’t need a rooted (hacked) phone to do this. i just found this amazing website, it has all kind of businesses from a cleaning companies to estate agents to banks, all I have to do is just type in the business type, and the location and it gives me all the results in that particular area, this website has a huge database of all sorts of businesses, I just joined a driving school which I found on this website. I would recommend this site to all the people out there.