Does the abusive downgrade change our agreement just by changing the name of existing subscription?

[Lanciano007]

Question about the new trick downgrading subscription name for the same product for existing users:

Is this legit? Turning everything around....unlogical.

And which international and/or regional laws and rights do I need to know?

Now in Europe we get a downgrade with our existing Premium subscriptions. Does it mean the trick is in the downgraded name in our (unwanted) 'new' subscription taking away the word Premium?

Why is Basic called Basic for the now existing Premium users, for the same product we have an agreement for? I have an agreement which names Premium and would not be bothered with ads. Please keep it like that. 

Does the downgraded name change our agreement?

I already got attacked by many intrusive new automaticly advertising and AI changes in my settings (PC, Mobile and Spotify App) without any tranparancy to us, and you don't give us time to find out what you, Meta, Apple, Microsoft and Google Android and Google Internet/Browser (Youtube etc.) did.... For over 2 months everything messed up and broke. Every song I move to a playlist or just move them within My Playlists has a delay of some fractions of a second now. Many times I place a song above another song in My Playlist but it is pasted/placed beneath the song, 2 centimeters from where I tried to place it with my cursor. I could not enjoy anything, and could nearly listen to music. And you all knew what was the cause all the time...?

In Europe neighboring countries get different lower prizes for the same subscriptions...It feels discriminating. Can anyone explain this to us?

[Lanciano007]

In another topic I read that many Premium users get Ads now. Some said it was a bug. Some said it got fixed. Some said they still get Ads after the 'fix'. 

I'm a Premium user too and should be freed from abusive ads harrassment.

So what is this (see pic, this AppGenerator wasn't there. Also not after the 'fix'), why is it suddenly installed few days later and what does it do? Why do I need this as a Premium user?

Few days ago it wasn't there and would never accept anything i don't know!

[Vasil]

Hey @Lanciano007,

Thanks for reaching out about your concerns, I'll do my best to address them here!

Spotify will never add third party apps by itself, so anything you see & don't recognize on that list should best be removed. If the service happens to have been something of use, it can always be re-added at a later point 🙂

As for your questions on subscriptions - Spotify sets their pricing in each market at the level that they believe is fair for consumers, rights holders, and Spotify, while remaining a low-margin business. The Basic Premium subscription tier offers the same functionality as regular Premium plans, with the only difference between them being the recent addition to Audiobooks. All Premium plans offer an ad-free music listening experience.

Note that Spotify will not change your subscription tier automatically and the only way to switch to a Basic plan is to do so from the account page while still having a regular subscription. To read more details about this, you can check out this page here.

Hope this clears things up! We're here for you if any further questions arise 🙌🏼

[Lanciano007]

Hey Vasil,

Thank you for your quick response and pointing out these sections and links.

In your message you mentioned: ' The Basic Premium subscription'.

Makes sense. So why doesn't Spotify do the same?

This is the same 'product' or 'service' we already have now. But Spotify changes the name to a Basic subscription and asks us loyal existing subscribers to 'agree' to it. Spotify comes with a new 'product' and puts it next to, or even replaces an existing product that people already buy/bought/paying for. Does this mean that we also get a new agreement/contract without Premium rights if we want to keep the product that we already 'bought' in the past and don't want to change ourselves?

Why does Spotify remove Premium from the name of the existing subscriptions if there are no changes now and in the future? This is where my concern lies...

PS: if we decide not to continue with the upgraded subscription including books.

Does everything related to that new 'product' (Audiobooks) disappear from my mobile and PC?

Is Spotify going to bother us with that other 'product' in the background?

Will I get a clean, comfortable Spotify layout for my music again and everything will work smoothly and without delays on my desktop app and web player?

[MihailY]

Hey @Lanciano007,

Thank you for your detailed response and for your questions.

We regularly review our subscription plans and occasionally make updates based on trends and the evolving needs of our listeners. While we don’t have any additional information to share at this time, please rest assured that we will notify our subscribers in advance if there are any changes to our subscription terms.

That being said, we believe Premium offers the best listening experience, with great value through ad-free music streaming and 12 hours of audiobook listening per month. For existing subscribers who want to keep enjoying the features they are used to without any audiobook listening time included, switching to the Basic plans is an option. Subscribers of the Basic plan can buy audiobooks separately as one-time purchases (which are independent of your subscription status after being purchased) and free audiobooks are also offered in rotation for a limited time. 

If you prefer not to see audiobooks in your account, you can adjust your content filters on the Home page. Regarding the technical issues you’re experiencing with the desktop app, we’re actively working to resolve them in the other thread you started. We're awaiting your response there so we can continue troubleshooting.

We hope this clears things up. Please don’t hesitate to reach out if you have any more questions.

[Lanciano007]

Hey MihailY,

I still had/have some worries. From your message:

"That being said, we believe Premium offers the best listening experience, with great value through ad-free music streaming and 12 hours of audiobook listening per month. For existing subscribers who want to keep enjoying the features they are used to without any audiobook listening time included, switching to the Basic plans is an option. Subscribers of the Basic plan can buy audiobooks separately as one-time purchases (which are independent of your subscription status after being purchased) and free audiobooks are also offered in rotation for a limited time."

There were 2 things in this explanation. First:

It says that Premium offers Ad-free music streaming. While every 'loyal' paying (immense amounts) subscriber should listen music Ad-free. You were talking from a Premium point of view, because Spotify turned the world upside down with their tricky "who remains silent agrees" policy.

It took a while to find some information about this. But here it is, and hope it stays like this.

https://support.spotify.com/us/article/spotify-basic/

Second thing about your explanation is: You are saying: 

"we believe Premium offers the best listening experience"

This made me worry about the audio/sound quality, and breaking the discography sections. For months/weeks I had a feeling there was something 'wrong' with my sound while listening to Spotify. Couldn't figure it out yet... I had a feeling 'Normalise sounds' didn't work properly and some other settings.

Now I see this happening a few months later, and I think this was/is or could be the cause of many things Spotify subscribers are experiencing issues. Is it possible that Microsoft is causing the problems we experience?

[Yordan]

Thanks for the reply, @Lanciano007.

We can confirm that Spotify Basic also offers ad-free music listening. The only difference with Premium plans is the lack of monthly allocation of audiobook listening hours. That being said, you can still unlock audiobooks if you'd like to.

Still, we understand where the confusion seems to stem from and appreciate your feedback on the matter.

As for audio quality, it appears that you're using the Web Player, which offers up to 256kbit/s for Premium/Basic subscribers (128kbit/s for free users) and in general has less features compared to the Spotify app, which can go up to 320kbit/s. There's more info in this article, feel free to check it out if you're interested.

Hope this clears things up. The Community is just a post away in case you need assistance with anything else.

[Lanciano007]

Hi Yordan,

With 3 elements on the web player I now get a download request. See pictures above. This is new to me. Everything worked fine in my browsers before. I checked two different browsers and both now have the same download requests.

* Do you mean these audio elements somehow got corrupted or removed in my web player or desktop app? I thought this was a new 'design'. My desktop app seems to be fine.

Most often I use my desktop app. But I visit the web player to check my settings there and check differences between devices if I have a problem. Normally I can change the settings on the web player without any problems. The only thing is, that it  seems like this Canvas button is sometimes switched 'on' by itself.

It seems that the bug with the horrible and loud sound of the 'new' preview tracks popup has been fixed. Somehow I think it might be related. And maybe also the 'Spotify can't play this...' messages skipping tracks in Discography sections on webplayer and desktop app, because we often have to search for solutions in our audio settings and things that are occured around the same updates in that period.

* Can it be that some users that are having this 'Spotify can't play this...' messages since the updates from February/March, could have an audio driver problem? I saw that this could be a cause, but what I mean is could this be related to the updates.

Regarding the differences in audio quality and the article you added, I see that Podcast listeners actually have better quality in webplayer than on other devices. Interesting....but gives me thoughts.

Adjusting audio quality in Webplayer looks like a 'new' and 'extra' added feature to me.

I get this message in your added article:

* So if users don't go into their settings and discover it, they won't know that they can have better audio quality? I had this Normalization volume 'turned on'. I checked my settings multiple times on my webplayer a week ago. Somehow it got 'turned off'.

With these Streaming Quality settings, I have it on Automatic (now, and before). This suggests (with information from your added article) that it gives me maximum quality when my internet is stable and fast enough. But when I try to switch to another option, I will get the message to download this element. So, do I have maximum quality without downloading this? It aready says it is set on Automatic. Very confusing.

Equalizer settings were also set by me before. Now it is set back to default again, and I have to download a separate 'free' app for that, which does not say where it comes from, like the other elements do give an option to download it either from Spotify or Microsoft. So what am i downloading, and who 'offers' me this 'new' element that was already there until a few days ago, but 'someone', for 'some reason', took it away...and changed my settings.

Kind regards

[MihailY]

Hey @Lanciano007,

Thanks for your reply.

We'll do our best to address each of your questions/concerns:

• Regarding the Download the app prompt when trying to access the audio settings in the web player - these settings are still only available in the desktop app. What you're currently seeing in the web player are placeholder menus that aim to showcase the level of customization available in the desktop version.
• There's currently no Canvas toggle in the web player - are you sure that's where you saw the setting?
• We're happy to hear that the sound of the previews is fixed for you. Unfortunately, the "Can't play this right now" issue wasn't related to it. If it still persists, please let us know in the other thread you've started.
• Regarding the audio quality settings - depending on the individual user set-up the default settings might indeed not result in the best audio quality and this is fairly common for most media apps.
• The Automatic setting for the streaming quality - it should technically mean the highest possible depending on the connection, but as mentioned above, it's one of the placeholder settings (along with the equalizer), hence it's currently not supported in the web player.

We hope this answers your questions. Let us know if there's anything else. 

[Lanciano007]

Hello MihailY,

Thanks for the reply..

First:

*You're talking about 'placeholder menus' that are supposed to show the level of customization available in the desktop version.

The web player settings don't affect the desktop version, do they?

I don't really understand what 'placeholder menus' are I think, and what you mean by them.

I didn't know that these were separately downloadable 'extra' audio elements in the web player. I've visited the settings there quite often. If I download those elements in the web player now, does that mean I'll get better quality than I already have without having the downloads installed, and better quality than I've had in the past years, while it seemed they were already installed?

For years I've been able to adjust my settings in the web player in my browser, and on my phone and PC desktop app without having to download anything again.

Second:

*There's currently no Canvas toggle in the web player - are you sure that's where you saw the setting?

Yes. I have a Canvas element with a slider in my Spotify web player on Chrome and on the Brave Browser. I've attached a screenshot. I had checked I turned it off on all my devices a week ago. I noticed a few days ago, that it had been turned back on in my browser. That's why I asked about it. I have turned it off again and went back to my 'SystemPropertiesAdvanced' to uncheck the 'Animate controls and elements within Windows'. I hope to have blocked it that way. I only did this after I saw that the slider around the Canvas element in my browser webplayer settings was turned back on.

But the button shouldn't be there at all, you say?

Third (coming back to that placeholder menu's/settings):

*"it's one of the placeholder settings (along with the equalizer), hence it's currently not supported in the web player."

I don't understand. Now 'Automatic' in the Streaming Quality section means 'nothing' or Basic, and is just a (visual) 'placeholder'? It says 'Automatic' and gives me the feeling I don't have to download anything. 

Kind regards,

[MihailY]

Hey @Lanciano007,

Thanks for your response.

The web player settings indeed don't affect the ones in the desktop version. By placeholder menus I meant that the audio settings you currently see don't actually change anything and are instead aimed at showing you what you can adjust in the desktop app. The "Download the Windows app " message you see when you click on them refers to the Spotify app for desktop, i.e. these settings are not separate downloadable features, they just point you to the app for further customization. We can confirm that in in the past in the web player we didn't have many settings, which did confuse some users, so in more recent times we have started adding some more options for customization and tips for the difference between the platforms

Apologies for my misleading statement about the Canvas toggle. It is indeed available in the web player and if it's turning itself on after you turning it off, it's a good idea to make sure that your browser is not removing any cookies between sessions. It's also worth checking if it's toggled on in both Chrome and Brave or only in one of them. 

Regarding the streaming quality, the setting can't be changed and again, clicking on it points you to the desktop app, so the previous statement by @Yordan still holds true - the streaming quality in the web player is 256kbit/s.

Cheers,

[Lanciano007]

Hey MihailY, 

Thank you for your reply. 

It's a bit more clear for me. Sorry, i'm a bit off-topic too. I think there's a confusion. I have the Desktop app installed already.

It seems these 3 elements don't install correctly. I tried to install via the download prompts that I get in the webplayer settings when I touch: Streaming Quality, Normalise Volume and Equalizer settings. 

I uninstalled the app, and re-installed it via the Spotify download link. I still get these download prompts in both browsers: Brave and Chrome. I tried to download via these download prompts and I just get the same Spotify installers I already have and tried to install. I didn't uninstall the desktop app before trying these installers, but it asked me if it could close my desktop app to install it. I press yes/ok. But no change. 

Yesterday I listened in my desktop app (Windows 10) to a song in an artist's Album "Color" - Connor Gilbert:

The song "Lowkey" was very soft. I checked my settings in my desktop app but Normalise sound was switched on. When I switched it off nothing changed, but while playing the song, switching it on again gave a second louder 'normalised' volume but seemed to 'break'. I tried multiple times. Same thing occurs.

I saw in my settings of my desktop app it mentions Normalize Volume with a 'z', and in my webplayer it mentions Normalise Volume, with a 's'.

Don't think this could be the problem but there's a difference...

Any suggestions?

Kind regards,

[Lanciano007]

I see in my Desktop App that Chrome Webplayer is a device and I have multiple entries. Can't remember i've seen Chrome webplayer as a device there...Only my Mobile and Laptop device.

[Novy]

Hey again @Lanciano007,

We appreciate the feedback you've provided in the points above, and although we can't commit to a specific timeline for those to be addressed, we'll make sure to pass all the comments to the relevant teams. 

Now, there are a couple of things we can suggest for the multiple Web Player entries on your desktop app:

• Try performing a clean reinstall of the app. If the multiple entries are related to cache, this could do the trick. 
• Make sure you only have the Web Player open on one browser at a time. If your web session is open on more than one device or there are other sessions active in the same network, it could cause multiple Web Player entries to be shown in the desktop app.

Let us know how it goes.