The ink isn’t even dry on the MySpace/iLike acquisition, and already Facebook has a new crush on a different music service, Spotify.
We’ve heard that Facebook has been talking with the European startup about a partnership for well over a year (about the time the Facebook music rumors heated up), but that the talks have intensified dramatically in the last week.
And just as we were digging into that rumor, up pops a Facebook status message from Mark Zuckerberg: “Spotify is so good.”
Wondering about the timing? Don’t. Facebook investor Li Ka-Shing is now a big stockholder in Spotify, too.
And it was clear that as soon as iLike turned down Facebook and accepted MySpace’s offer, Facebook would have to make some new decisions on music strategy.
iLike has always been the de facto music application on Facebook. A year ago Facebook named them one of only two “Great Apps” that would get preferential treatment on the platform.
But all that has changed. The Great Apps program was shuttered, and there’s no way Facebook is going to continue to shower the love on iLike.
So out with the old, in with the new. See ya, iLike. Helloooo, Spotify. So when are you launching in the U.S.?
At least he’s right. Spotify is amazing.
2531 inbox ? ouch.
First thing I saw as well
Guess our author’s Inbox is quite useless.
Wow, didn’t spot that.
Guess he’s not that keen on dealing with his public.
He wants the attention. Don’t feed the troll, even if he’s the owner
Yeah Arrington is a powerful dude
What Facebook should really focus on… In box overload
i would kill for a hint of javascript.
var hint = “delete them all”;
+1
Sorry, I meant +2531
A good Saturday/Sunday post would be to list out other things you would kill for. I imagine the list is growing with time…
it’s coming…be patient.
Facebook should just turn iLike off and go out for drinks and let Rupert enjoy the piece of crap he owns.
+1
Hilarious
Spotify is a failure for the artist:
http://www.guar...-labels-spotify
Artists make no money from Spotify.
And whose fault is that? Not Spotify’s!
If artists were allowed to deal with Spotify directly cutting out the labels, publishers and distributors, there would be a lot more money to go round.
Could not agree more.
Spotify is only in the startup phase atm. I bet they get better turn around once they get the mobile apps going ++. I like their latest addition, music videos. I would pay even more than $9 a month for that.
or you could watch them free on youtube!
agreed. artists are to blame them self for selling their souls to record lables.
http://www.tele...six-months.html
Artist’s who don’t make good deals with their label might not make any money, but who’s fault is that??…
Artists earn more from Spotify then they make from the radio per listened song.
if so, that’s sad.
As I really like Spotify. It’s the best music app out there and there’s still potential to improve it.
IMHO, Spotify is the future of music listening.
Now if just these mobile data plans weren’t so fscking expensive! We’d never have to buy and download mp3 files again. We could just stream ANY song instantly using 3G, WiFi etc.
I think spotify is a great site, but it is missing the social networking features we have all come to love. I have created a music site called the Onyx Player that has been recieving rave reviews from college students across the country. We have signed up 35,000 users in the last month! Send me an email if you would like an invite!
This is unfair, you can’t even use Spotify in the USA. This article just makes me jealous. I used to just use YouTube to stream… Now I’m using http://www.flybymusic.com. I hope they hurry up and launch Spotify over here. I have friends in Europe who RAVE about! Hurry up Spotify indeed!
We’ll give you Spotify access if you’ll give us Hulu access. Deal?
I’m not supposed to talk about it, but secretly, behind the scenes – Spotify and Hulu are discussing a merger in the future to combine both services into one.
It’s either going to be called Hulify or Spotilu.
We’re holding a double elimination Wii Bowling tournament right now to decide that.
More in a few…
Yeah, sure ya are…
To win you over, I would like to offer you one free Yak.
This offer is negotiable.
To be fair, Spotify is a Swedish startup in everything (except where the company is registered), not a European one. Give Sweden some credit, we’re small and need it!
Go Sweden! Sweden FTW!
ok?
Sweden is on the rise again, and taking over the scene.
We’re not big but sure are cutting edge!
The Pirate Bay
Spotify
Koeningsegg
Propellerheads
DICE
MySQL
Tobii
Starbreeze Studios
..to name a few
My question is: Where is the venture capital for the next companies on that list?
ahem.. MySQL is swedish and finnish
Don’t you forget that.
Volvo
Saab
err….
Well, nevermind. I love Sweden! Particularly its girls. And of course Spotify and most of the other hot things you mentioned.
Don’t forget skype
tack så mycket!
er… Sweden’s in Europe no?
Is Li Ka-shing the character in the Six Flags commercials?
http://www.yout...h?v=LU2yt6wOoK0
Spotify is owned by Sony. Sony = riaa = mafia.
http://www.p2pn...net/story/26736
Sony Music’s guy in Sweden, Mark Dennis, has been waxing lyrical about Spotify, lately.
Billed as a, “proprietary peer-to-peer music streaming service that allows instant listening to specific tracks or albums with almost no buffering delay,” it’s outpacing iTunes, The Local has Dennis saying gleefully.
‘Gleefully’ because Sony has a stake in Spotify, says Swedish musician Magnus Uggla, “a member of the Swedish nobility and a descendant of several European rulers, among which John III of Sweden and Gustav Vasa,” according to the Wikipedia.
“Imagine my surprise when I recently read in the newspaper that Sony Music has acquired nearly six per cent of the Spotify for the modest sum of 30,000 kronor,” he says on his site (Google translation, with a little help).
“It was a good buy.”
It was, especially considering K30,000 is worth around a paltry $4,541 Canadian.
Sony Music, one of the companies that “sued the shit out of Pirate Bay,” is now sneaking around in the dark and acting like The Pirate Bay, he says.
What else is new?
“I have repeatedly asked Sony’s CEO, Hasse Breitholtz, who’s always spoken lyrically about Spotify, why I should be there,” he says, pointing out that first statement from Spotify said he’d earned as much in six months as a halfway decent busker would have been able to earn in a day.
Uggla has yanked his music from Spotify.
Stay tuned.
Get your files free via p2p applications. Do not support the mafia & cartels. Anyone who supports the mafia needs to do their research.
“Mark Zuckerberg: “Spotify Is So Good””
Are you part of the mafia? You are promoting organized crime, money laundering, illegal payoffs, bribes, & more. Do your research before you promote a company.
I am terribly disjointed in your post and I am deleting you off of twitter.
Bittorrent everything folks, screw the mafiaa, they are screwing you always, remember that!!!
Damn. The pirates must be desperate. Now they even have to troll TechCrunch with their anti-Spotify stuff.
That’s not trolling, that’s just common sense.
WHY is Spotify growing so quickly while other similar sites are being crushed? Think about it.
If you love the way the Music Industry has acted towards its fans and its artists over the past few years, then by all means, rock out with your spot out.
If you’d like to see things change for artists and enjoy the thought of the Music Industry crumbling into its rightful dustbin of history, then avoid Spotify like the plague…. it’s a swizz.
Uggla has not yanked his music from Spotify, it’s still there!
None of Uggla’s tracks have been removed, due to the fact that Sony owns the rights and not him, and they have told him that only they can remove them from Spotify.
I sympathize with Uggla, but on the other hand he is taking a very short term view. While it’s true that he is not making much money from Spotify right now, as the service grows the income will become greater. If current trends continue and CD sales keep going down he will be glad of this income in the future. If he is not happy with the share that he get’s from his record company for the plays he gets on Spotify, then that is a fight he must have with them and is nothing to do with Spotify. Spotify license his music from the label and not the artist himself. If Uggla feels so strongly why doesn’t he cut out the middle man and try and make a deal directly with Spotify?
Funny!
Mark Zuckerberg writes 4 words and TC makes an entire article about a possible acquisition from it.
That reminds me of Kremlin astrology during the Cold War where Western experts analyzed every Pravda word to deduce that Stalin was seriously ill.
The art of fad creation, u’ve gotta appreciate it
I read he had cornflakes for breakfast – “Facebook to acquire Kellogs?’
I thought the same thing. Can’t a guy just like something? Why is this an acquisition hint at all? If Steve Jobs said “Spotify is useful” does that mean he wants to acquire it and roll it into iTunes?!
the music player industry is booming.
I’m not hearing anything about an acquisition so far. Just partnership talks.
This would be smart as long as Facebook doesn’t have to take on the payments to the labels. I worked for a music company that submitted to be part of “Facebook music” and the terms Facebook were asking for were outrageous.
But at the end of the day, they don’t need to have a music component to them. People don’t go there to socialize around streaming audio or music videos. Let YouTube and others pay those hefty bills until the labels have no choice to be offer sustainable deals.
Until then, continue on the path of greater social connectivity. That’s what they do really well. No reason to try to become myspace.
was that 2531 new emails!! ahem.. yeah so iLike dumped facebook … so something new had to come up. I actually like the idea the Mark is supporting a not to successful music app..
If you want to get a spotify account in the US just read this – http://bit.ly/4jxQvF
wow, that’s a painful way. this is much simpler: http://bit.ly/19phLt
Mark Zuckerberg rocks!
Ok, so iLike ditched Facebook, and Zuckerberg states that he is liking spotify. Maybe were reading too much into this, but some sort of Facebook Spotify convergence would no doubt be wonderous.
the effing service is available nowhere, so why all the hype – why do they need 2 years to get ready for US, or Germany or Spain or France or somewhere where people actually live
Well I “actually live” in the UK, where it’s ready, and it’s great.
America isn’t the centre of the universe.
umm, yes it is…
as a 24yo startup CEO, who has watched spotify’s 25yo CEO from a distance, I’d be a little shocked if he sold his company this early on. Then again, he probably has some common ground with 25yo Zuckerberg.
Facebook + Spotify could be a serious game-changer
Spotify and Last.fm makes more sense. Spotify has a great music service with a crappy way of discovering new music. Last.fm is an amazing way of discovering new music with a so-so music service attached to it. This is a marriage made in heaven.
I agree, combine Spotify and Facebook and things could change. There’s power in numbers.
Cool MarK , Super rockface, rockyour live, ilike .
La musica te alegra la vida!!!!!
hahahah too funny
the deal myspace made with iLike just went down in value.
To get Spotify access for 2 weeks, just spoof your IP to be from England and sign up for a Premium Pass. I made 10 accounts that way, and have been enjoying Spotify from the USA ever since
I thought Spotify was based in Luxembourg (near Belgium and The Netherlands) not Sweden.
Luxembourg is where they are registered as a company (probably some strange tax reasons behind this). However, all the development goes on in Sweden and most of the sales goes on in U.K. (which currently is their largest market).
The two founders of the company are both Swedish.
Everything with it is Swedish. They’re just registered there because of the favorable taxes (I suppose).
Screw Spotify, Grooveshark already does everything you would need in a streaming app and it’s available everywhere. They’re new 2.0 interface is a lot easier to get around. http://www.russ...getting-better/
That would be great to have a facebook integration within spotify
Rock n roll!
does anybody know when Spotify was founded ? it says on crunchbase june 2009 but the post said Facebook has been talking with them for over a year.
@liberta-togo.com
They were founded in 2006.
If you can read Swedish this site will give you all the info you need about Spotify AB: http://allabolag.se/5567037485
why would spotify work when rhapsody and every other subscription service fails to make money? if you say spotify will make $ through ads, then read about imeem
Spotify-like services are the future of music distribution. Content ownership is dead. “Access” is the new ownership.
Yes!!! It’s official! The new Spotify app for IPhone has now been APPROVED by Apple!! Will only be available to Spotify PREMIUM members, but should be worth every cent!
Go Spotify!
Seeing that Mark Zuckerburg has over 2,500 messages in his inbox reminded me that in my facebook profile I have 240 odd messages that says unread. However i have read them all but they stay there on the top of the screen. Does anyone have this problem and if they do is there a way of fixing it.
Oh yeah good job FB on the new app!
Getting some serious reviews.
http://www.iwik...ebook-hits-spot
wow! I didn’t know Li Ka Shing is a major investor in both!
This bloke is amazing always with his financial nose in the right place.
And also if he is really involved with both do not be surprised to read sometime in the near future the headline “spotify buys facebook”.
As a background: Li managed to arrange that in the last decade Vodafone bought Mannesman and not the other way round! At that point Mannesman was bigger than VDF but he had shares in both but his shares in Mannesman were tied up for 3 years. After the sale he was free to dispose of his shares and setup Orange with the profits…
Spotify is really a good stuff!