There has been a lot of hoopla lately about streaming music services in the US. Both Amazon and Google launched big music lockers where you can store all your downloaded music. Apple is about to launch a cloud music service, where you can backup all your music (all the stuff you bought from them for free, and if you want to stream your own music you have to pay $25 a month). But all of those services require your music already be downloaded. Spotify takes a different approach. Stream any song from any album, anywhere, any time. It is the greatest music experience you will find online and it just launched in the US.
The beauty of Spotify, besides being able to stream every song you've ever wanted is the social integration. Spotify asks you to connect with Facebook, and automatically creates a buddy list of all your friends using the service. Then, all the playlists you and your friends create are also sharable. So that one co-worker that keeps asking you for an ultimate prog-metal mix can finally hear exactly what you want him to hear with a playlist generated by you. The possibilities are endless.
Now you're asking how does anybody make any money off of this? Well, anytime a song is streamed, a band gets paid. Free users are limited to 20 hours of streaming a month (with ads). If you find yourself to be a true Spotify power user, you can subscribe for $4.99 a month and kill all the ads, and increase your streaming time.
The free service is invite only right now, but you can sign up to get an invite code. Users willing to take the plunge for the premium service can sign up instantly. We will keep you posted on invites. Apparently, Klout is doing daily invite giveaways.
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