Spotify Newsletter #161

Your Weekly Dose of Spotify News

May 12, 2023

Hello! Welcome to Friday and the latest issue of the Spotify Newsletter!

Spotify recently purged tens of thousands of AI-generated songs from its vast digital music library. The problem doesn’t appear to have been the songs themselves—which were generated using a proprietary AI software. Instead, Spotify was concerned about the listeners—who, as it turns out, were also generated by software.

Here I am obsessing over my Spotify Wrapped and meanwhile the ‘AI Music War’ is in full swing.

It seems the AI Team at Spotify is going to be the place to be at headquarters.

I’ll be curious to see - down the road - how much Spotify will possibly acquiesce to the AI wave and begin to incorporate AI-generated music into their platform… assuming it becomes more prevalent. Perhaps none at all. The above note about the purge paints an aggressively anti-AI Music picture.

If there’s a balance to be had I’m not sure what it is yet.

They have already moved forward with AI to enhance music recommendations and personalized playlists. But AI-generated music is a whole other bag of potatoes.

There’s also the possibility that Spotify could partner with different companies that specialize in AI-generated music to offer exclusive content or features. I’m still not clear what the general consensus is among music fans / music streaming fans about AI Music.

Is there a demand I’m not seeing? Or is this simply the innovators flexing their creative AI muscle across the music business?

The AI and music symbiosis will be very interesting indeed. Have a great day - a super weekend!

★In the SPOTlight★

️⭐️ How Spotify Built an AI DJ

For Spotify, the creation of its artificial intelligence DJ — which launched in beta version for Premium subscribers in the U.S. and Canada on Feb. 22 — represents the culmination of what the company has been working toward for years.

⭐️ Spotify Cracks Down on AI-Generated Music Streaming Fraud

The problem of bot farms playing the same tracks over and over to manipulate streaming data may not be entirely new. However, as generative AI tools become increasingly mainstream, it is taking on a new dimension for the music industry.

⭐️ Boomy’s AI-generated tracks start landing back on Spotify amid growing battle against artificial streaming

Less than a week after uploads to Spotify from AI-powered music creation app Boomy were blocked over concerns about artificial streaming, Boomy says it’s back in business on the prominent music streaming platform.