Radio Feature - Recent Algorithm Change?

[ymn83]

Hi,

I listen to Spotify's "Radio based on an Artist" feature everyday and I've noticed within the past few days that only the Artist I select will play on the Radio station, rather than multiple artists similar to whom I've chosen.  For example, I was listening to Black Sabbath yesterday and instead of playing similar artists, it was playing songs only from the Black Sabbath catalog.  It did the same when I tried a Smashing Pumpkins station.  Which is fine, but I can just go to the Artist page and play those songs by turning shuffle on.

The radio was more varied up to a few days ago, so I was wondering if this is a bug or a change that you've made to the algorithm.  If the latter, I think people would prefer to have it as it was before, at least I do, because it allowed me to discover new songs/albums by different artists.

Thanks,

Yaseen

[dinomight]

I just had a truly adventurous radio experience. Made a station based on Gregorian chant, and the first song to pop up was Lynyrd Skynyrd's Sweet Home Alabama lol. I then got a variety of pop and country music. It did play one other track recorded by Gregorian monks.

[tkla]

This is a great question Brebos asks in his post: "Are you guys paid...?"

A few thoughts.  Seems there are only 3 possiblities here.  1, You've figured out a clever scheme to make more money for your compqny by giving your customers less of the music than you promised them.  2, You've just accidentally and incompetently fubar-ed up the programming of your entire system, or, 3, it's just an old fashion payola scheme.  

The problem were having with this, honestly, is that the whole thing is feeling like #1, and is kind of reeking of cynical manipulation of your loyal customers.  And if that's the case, this is what we have to say:  if this thing turns out to even faintly smell of corporate greed, you'd be wise to prepare yourself for our mass exodus.  There is a thing called social media that we're generally pretty good at, and if we discover some shenanagins on your part, you guys will most likely soon find yourselves trying to run a business with no customers.  If it's # 2, that's actually ok.  If t was an honest mistake, just apologize, fix it, and we'll all move on.  And if it's #3, well, that's the easiest.  Payola.  No big deal. You simply go to jail.

[user-removed]

What is wrong @dinomight Sweet Home Alabama not soothing to your Chi 🙂

[dinomight]

Haha, something like that @user-removed .

[nikdangr]

I'm a newcomer but I'll throw in my two cents on the radio thing. 

Yes, Pandora has you beat - badly- as of right now.  I thought I was being smart by choosing a compilation album (Monterrey Pop) as the seed but, with very rare exceptions, I keep getting the same artists, often the same songs.  I can add different stuff to the queue but the algorithm doesn't pick up on it AT ALL.   Strictly a one-shot deal.  I'm not a programmer, but that doesn't sound too hard to fix.

[JaysToolBox]

Well, back to FM radio.  This is unacceptable.  I cannot remove the songs i do not like anymore.  Maybe time to look into another provider.

[charmedkaren]

i can not understand when you open an artist radio that it has an ending.  I want to pick a style of music and just let it play.  I do not want to have to constantly monitor my homepage to make it continue.  it is very frustrating.  and if it does contine it repeats songs.  any station should not repeat songs at least for 2-3 hrs. 

keep tinkering with it.  please. 

[17andercar]

Yeah. I listen to classical and now it is playing pop music on the station and I waste all my skips trying to get past all of this **bleep** I don't like. It is happening to all of my stations. Seriously about to delete the app because it is so frustrating. If I liked that kind of music I would have a stations for it.

[17andercar]

I also tried making a new account and it still does the same thing to my music.

[cohenfs]

---

@tkla wrote:

This is a great question Brebos asks in his post: "Are you guys paid...?"

A few thoughts.  Seems there are only 3 possiblities here.  1, You've figured out a clever scheme to make more money for your compqny by giving your customers less of the music than you promised them.  2, You've just accidentally and incompetently fubar-ed up the programming of your entire system, or, 3, it's just an old fashion payola scheme.  

The problem were having with this, honestly, is that the whole thing is feeling like #1, and is kind of reeking of cynical manipulation of your loyal customers.  And if that's the case, this is what we have to say:  if this thing turns out to even faintly smell of corporate greed, you'd be wise to prepare yourself for our mass exodus.  There is a thing called social media that we're generally pretty good at, and if we discover some shenanagins on your part, you guys will most likely soon find yourselves trying to run a business with no customers.  If it's # 2, that's actually ok.  If t was an honest mistake, just apologize, fix it, and we'll all move on.  And if it's #3, well, that's the easiest.  Payola.  No big deal. You simply go to jail.

---

Highly inappropriate post, IMO. I wish radio had more variety as well, but nefariousness or incompetence, I believe, are not the reasons for Spotify not making progress in this function. I'm sure it is technically and logistically challenging. In the meantime, there are tons of thematic playlists that function like a radio station in that they can be chosen easily for great variety within any style or genre of musical performance. Also, pick 20 songs from 10 "Related Artists" and you have your own radio-styled playlist with a lot of variety. Yes, these are workarounds and don't suffice for "Radio" function development, but they are good in the meantime. So, as far as Radio currently goes, yes, I wish for improvement in variety of artists that enter into the mix. Also, the thumbs up and down have no practical effect on "improving station" even though it states that's what's being done. The same limited mix occurs no matter what.

[Jetse]

I love the idea of the spotify radio. But after listening many hours to a radio gives my mostly songs I already heard many times (also shown in my screenshot, 80% I marked already as like, most of the other 20% already played multiple times on this radio). I love to see more variation in the radio!

[searchingda]

Seems the most comments I saw with my complaint was for "radio" stations. I have had too many repeats on that AND on suggested playlists. Too bad, don't see how I can continue this as well. Also, those comments were in2014 - Now it's 2017 and same thing?

[pollyesther]

MORE VARIETY PLEASE

If there's been an algorithm change then I haven't benefitted from it. Spotify has always regurgitated not only the same artists but the same tracks by the same artists for every radio station I try to create. There are a kajillion artists and songs available; why do I have to hear Dr. Dog's "Where'd All the Time Go?" for every single radio/shuffle feature?? Even if Spotify put Dr. Dog (for example) into every one of my radio stations, there are 13 albums to draw from! Stop feeding me the same songs!

It's gotten so bad that I don't even bother ever listening to any of the "Top Songs" that Spotify creates for me every year because it continues to mess up the variety algorithm. The past 3 years are already so similar, that I'll never hear anything different!

The Daily Drive is even worse! It never changes the songs! Why would I want that??

Please, Spotify! You're killing me!

p.s. I would also love to never hear another song that has "remix" in the title. 🙉

[tawnyaloha]

i see this is old but maybe youre still on here. i cant find how to see/access where the playlist for the automatic radio thats plays when your songs end----WHERE is it?

[hans-jürgen]

If you are looking for the Song Radio option, you can access and start it e.g. with the 3-dot dropdown menu of each track:

If you are looking for the Autoplay option , you can only find it in the Preferences of the desktop app e.g. by pressing Ctrl+P or in the Edit dropdown menu in the upper left corner:

The web player does not offer to access any options, so you have to do this in the desktop app.