Stop wiping my play queue!

[rtwheato]

I currently use spotify on 4 different devices - my laptop (OSX), desktop (OSX), home theater PC (linux), and my iPhone.

I generally use my desktop for discovery, my laptop for casual listening, and HTPC and iPhone to listen to my curated playlists.  I had a great workflow going for the longest time - all three worked independently of one another.

Recently (after upgrading to yosemite maybe), the currently playing track on one device becomes the currently playing track on all devices - wiping out the play queue on all 3.  This is a huge problem for me because I'll generally build up a giant play queue on my desktop and now all that discovery i've done is lost.  

i can use a playlist to build up that queue i suppose, but then i'll constantly lose where i'm at in the queue when listening from another device.  is there a way to turn this "feature" off and leave each device's play queue alone?  or, is there a workaround if this is a bug?

[dinomight]

This is actually by design. It's the new Spotify Connect feature, which was made to sync users' queues between devices for continuous playback and remote control. I've seen several posts from users who are interested in disabling the feature for various reasons, but there's currently not a way to do so beyond using Spotify in offline mode, which would let you keep separate queues but would also prevent you from doing discovery and so forth as you mentioned.

By the way, you might keep an eye on this idea and add your kudos/comments.

[rtwheato]

thanks for your reply.

neat "feature", but this is severely flawed and implemented poorly.  first off, it should give you a choice to resume playback on a different device.  it could be a simple click of "yes" or "no".

second, it should present a warning that you have queued items and it's going to wipe them out.  i just had over 200 items removed from my play queue without a prompt.

the way the iOS/mobile app is designed, is completely different than the desktop app.  the desktop app allows you to play full albums, in the order they're meant to be played - the mobile app is designed more around playlists, shuffling, and radio.  they don't mesh, and imho, shouldn't affect what the other is doing.

poor, poor design, spotify.

adding a way to change the behavior, or a way to disable it needs to become a top priority.  it completely wrecks how i use spotify, and will likely make me move to a different streaming service.  what's the possibility of getting my hands on old versions of the app to install so that i can get rid of spotify connect?

[runicles]

How do I save my play queue.  I recently spent quite some time assembling a play queue, turned off my computer overnight, and when I came back the next day found that the play queue had disappeared ?  I see from the chats that some people lilke this feature, but how do I keep stuff I want queued even when I shut down?

[AllenJB]

The most recent information we have from Spotify themselves is here: http://community.spotify.com/t5/ideas/v2/ideapage/blog-id/ideaexchange/article-id/44384

TLDR: They don't care that there's been literally hundreds of posts asking for the option to disable this "feature" from their paying users - it's "not in their current pipeline".

Your best bet to restore sane behaviour is to, like myself and many others, start looking at alternative services.

[Zephyr]

This is common pattern with the development of Spotify; they come up with seemingly smart and great ideas, but the problems start when they push them out without thinking about different usage scenarios or giving their users options. It's why my image of Spotify is at an all-time low and the only thing keeping me here are my own playlists.

Apart from having no ads, we're essentially paying to beta test their new "features," and the best part about that is, we seemingly have little to no say in the matter of which or how features are implemented. The idea exchange is a joke.

Anyway, to work around your play queues being removed I'd like to share how I do it on a daily basis before I close down:

Go to your Play Queue -> select your tracks -> right-click and Add to... -> New Playlist.

This way, if (or rather, when) you lose your play queue it's easy to re-queue it from the New Playlist.

[TwilightReader]

OK, so what I'm doing to combat the problem of the Play Queue not having a memory is that I set up a playlist, named it "Play Queue" and am dumping everything I want to check or listen to before adding to "My Music" there until I have time to check it or listen to it. Currently I have 149 songs and it's going to take 9 hours to finish, so obviously, I don't want to be here at the library that long if it's already 7 PM and I'm ready to go home. Then, as each song finishes or in batches, I can add songs to "My Music" and remove them from the "Play Queue" playlist. Yes, it's more work per song, but less overall if I don't have to search more than 100 songs next time I log on to Spotify. Good 'nuff!