Spotify Original podcast ads with premium

[FiveLeafClover]

I am listening to The Besties podcast, a Spotify original, on my premium account on both my phone and my computer. In the past, I have been able to start listening to the podcast with no ads before the opening. In the middle, they say "we'll take a break", and have an ad break. Previously there would be no ad, and it would go straight back into the hosts talking, which I assumed was because I have Spotify premium, and I know that this podcast can be listened to for free. However, the past week or two, there have been ads both at the beginning of the podcast and in the middle. Well, it's one ad, for SquareSpace, which is incredibly loud and feature's a woman's high pitched and very annoying in general voice. It is over 30 seconds and hard to skip every part of it, and it legitimately hurts my ears and makes me incredibly uncomfortable, due to my neurological hypersensitivity to audio. Suffice to say I will never be using SquareSpace. Am I wrong in thinking that because I pay for Spotify premium that I should not have to listen to this ad? Is this a glitch? Should I stop listening to this podcast and only listen to podcasts that I burn onto a CD and play in a portable CD player, or record onto a cassette so I can listen to them on a Walkman?

And honestly, if I have to listen to it, can it at least be in a voice that is easy to listen to, perhaps one similar register to the hosts of the show, which I have chosen to listen to because their voices do not drive me crazy, so it's not so jarring?

I apologize if I sound hostile. I despise advertising (why I pay for premium) and certain sounds/tonal frequencies like the ones in this ad I am talking about can severely negatively impact my mood.

[appledude9]

Quick followup, more ads within a few minutes of the first set of 3 ads. Used to have NONE. Very concerned about this, it is a dramatically different listening experience than the one I've had forever. Hope this is a bug?

[Jeremy]

Hi there folks,

Thank you for your replies and feedback.

As part of the Premium subscription, all music can be enjoyed ad-free. And while Spotify doesn’t play ads that interrupt the music listening experience of Premium subscribers, some podcasts may include advertising, host-read endorsements, or sponsorship independently of the streaming platforms featuring such podcasts.

This doesn't mean that your feedback isn't heard and that this request couldn't be fulfilled by some other means in the future. On the contrary, this is being monitored and we invite everyone to share their opinion in a constructive manner. We will then ensure to pass it on to the relevant teams.

Let us know if we can help you with anything else.

Take care!

[appledude9]

I don't think this addressed my question. I scoured the forums before posting and understood that podcasts feature advertisements regardless of premium subscriptions, and I learned two key things: 1) advertisements can take the form of commercials which are unique/independent "tracks" as shown in my screenshots above. They can also consist of in-podcast advertisements which are included in the time length of the podcast track, and can be fast-forwarded through. The latter I've encountered before and am totally fine with. The former I have never experienced in all my time using Spotify Premium until yesterday. 2) Based on a lot of the generic Spotify employee posts, it is my understanding that the advertisements are at the discretion of the podcast publisher. This I believe is alluded to when you say it's "independent of the streaming platform". So my understanding is that the podcast author chooses to feature ads or not. 

If all of the above is true, I'd like to ask again my question to Spotify, since Spotify is the one who produces and authors the Spotify Original The Get Up. Does the Spotify produced show The Get Up now include ads as part of a recent change? I've been listening almost daily since the show started in October 2020, as a premium subscriber the entire time, and I had zero ads until yesterday 10/7/21. Either I somehow fell through the cracks in the algorithm for ~11+ months, or a change was made in the last few days that introduced ads into this show. Please help me understand which is the truth. 

[gtrmike5150]

My feedback:

Mandate that the podcast producers eg Joe Rogan that they provide 2
versions of the podcast. One without any ad cuts or reads and one with ads
for non-premium users. Surly he can figure that out or have his staff
figure that out with the multi-million deal he got. Also, how can a
Spotify produced podcast not already have 2 versions? I'll stay with Apple
music until this is figured out along with the horrible queue workflow.

thanks,
Mike

[appledude9]

.

[gtrmike5150]

My suggestion, vote with your wallet like I did and go over to Apple Music
and use Downcast for Podcasts. Downcast has skip buttons in the app and
you can skip past the ads by setting skip length in the app. Still have to
manually intervene but at least you're not paying to listen to ads.

Unfortunately, until more people like me cancel their subscriptions nothing
will change and with younger people considering Spotify to be more "cool"
than Apple Music that is not likely to happen.

[appledude9]

Spotify staff, I hope you can please read my above post and reply. Boiled down, my question is: does your Original podcast "The Get Up" feature advertisements to Premium members as of recently? I have never had an ad until October 7th, 2021. Something seemed to have changed recently, just want to confirm that as the authors of the podcast, you did indeed elect to introduce ads into your in-house podcast show for Premium members recently.

[appledude9]

bump again in hopes of Spotify reading and answering my question. Copied/pasted for ease: 

"I scoured the forums before posting and understood that podcasts feature advertisements regardless of premium subscriptions, and I learned two key things: 1) advertisements can take the form of commercials which are unique/independent "tracks" as shown in my screenshots above. They can also consist of in-podcast advertisements which are included in the time length of the podcast track, and can be fast-forwarded through. The latter I've encountered before and am totally fine with. The former I have never experienced in all my time using Spotify Premium until yesterday. 2) It is my understanding that the advertisements are at the discretion of the podcast publisher. This I believe is alluded to when you say it's "independent of the streaming platform". So my understanding is that the podcast author chooses to feature ads or not. 

If all of the above is true, I'd like to ask again my question to Spotify, since Spotify is the one who produces and authors the Spotify Original The Get Up. Does the Spotify produced show The Get Up now include ads as part of a recent change? I've been listening almost daily since the show started in October 2020, as a premium subscriber the entire time, and I had zero ads until yesterday 10/7/21. Either I somehow fell through the cracks in the algorithm for ~11+ months, or a change was made in the last few days that introduced ads into this show. Please help me understand which is the truth."

[appledude9]

Hello Spotify staff, please can you answer my 2+ week old question?

[appledude9]

Bump again. Hoping Spotify can confirm that Spotify produced podcasts (such as The Get Up) do contain ads as of a recent change about a month ago? In short, I never had ads in The Get Up Morning show, but starting one day in October 2021 they appeared. Confirming that this is not a bug and was a choice by Spotify, as the producer/author of the show

Specifically I'm looking for an answer like this: https://community.spotify.com/t5/Subscriptions/Got-an-audio-ad-from-Spotify-despite-premium/m-p/5200... (the solution post).... where the Spotify employee confirms that the podcast in that post has dynamic ads enabled. I am looking for confirmation that the Spotify produced show, The Get Up, has recently enabled dynamic ads. 

[appledude9]

waited a month and no reply, lol.... Spotify are you reading this? 

[1232789041]

For the record, I DID, in fact, have an ad pop in while listening to a music playlist this morning; very frustrating considering I bought into Premium two or three months ago, specifically so that I would not have to be annoyed by unwanted, unnecessary, unsolicited ads, ever.  If this continues, I will drop this service with no regrets.