Premium and adblockers

[SuperFreak]

Hi all,

I am a premium member, but I do use several ad blockers in my network and browsers. According to the new policy this is not allowed anymore. I can't find in the new policy if Premium accounts are excluded from this.

If I search other websites they all report it only applies to the free version. But I haven't found any formal proof.

Can anyone confirm the new policy for ad blockers is not for Premium accounts?

Thank you very much!

[Billy-J · Accepted solution]

Hey @SuperFreak, and welcome to the community.

Hope you're doing great! 

As mentioned in the Terms of Service, you're not supposed to use Adblockers for Spotify at all, so yes this does apply for all accounts.

Since you're on Premium - you shouldn't be getting ads anyway because that is one of the benefits of getting Premium.

I hope that helps! If you have any more questions, just let me know 🙂 

[KSBGAMING]

Hi @SuperFreak

Premium Accounts don't get ads, that's a perk for paying. So you don't need the ad-blockers. Also according to the TAC, you can't use ad-blockers. 

Cheers!

KSB

[SuperFreak]

Thank you for your quick answer Billy-J. Very helpful.

That leaves me no choice, but to quit Spotify. As a paying customer I don't like companies to tell me what I can or can't do. Especially concerning ads and privacy. I think the Internet is corrupted too much already by many companies by constantly serving us ads and stealing and invading our privacy.

I use browser ad-blockers and a pi-hole to get rid of all that. I pay for services I gladly make use of or use whitelisting to permit it when I still want their service. I don't see any reason for Spotify to disallow ad-blockers for paying customers. If they did things right there should be no need.

This can means two things:

1. They still try to use you as a client for ad-serving purposes.

2. They just generalise every client and treat them the same way, which means they can't get the abuse of free Spotify use under control. Which was a bad idea in the first place. User who want to block the ads in the free service will always find a way. Just like with DRM in movies or software Spotify is only harming the legitimate clients by making things more difficult.

I shouldn't be a victim of both. If they would ask me friendly to whitelist Spotify to help them improve their service I would gladly do it. But demanding to uninstall ad-blockers is a no-go for me.  Especially since it would not only touch my Spotify-traffic, but it would also open the door for other intrusive companies like Google and Facebook and even worse traffic. That is too much of a sacrifice for me.

Thanks again for your help. My apologies for the wall of text, but I hope a Spotify employee will at least read this.

Best regards,

SuperFreak

[SuperFreak]

Thanks KSB! Really helpful.

[user-removed]

Banning adblockers was a bad move. That means if i was to try to use spotify on a network that blocks ads i would automatically lose my account. The high school i went to blocked most of spotify's ads without my control and if i was still in school and i lost my account because of this i would be angry as i lost my playlists and songs i spent years building. The 2% of users that use adblock will leave spotify basically making this rule pointless and ineffective. Theres a reason youtube doesn't ban adblockers and because its users would throw a fit. Adblockers are just like any content blockers/internet filters like Iboss. (and yes iboss and other internet filters block ads too.) If you ban adblockers your also banning something parents and businesses use to regulate it's internet service which is unfair. While i agree ads provide revenue it doesn't mean that a customer should be forced to get rid of something they choose to have in their own free will. It is also not illegal to use adblockers. Not too many people know how to even use adblock or even care to but i care greatly about it as ads disrupt my ability to think when they come up every 10-15 mins or every 3-4 songs played.

[Luciano13]

Thats unfair. Why dont you be like Dtube and use cryptocurrency instead?

[user-removed]

This post might get me banned or be deleted but...

You don't need adblockers to bypass spotify ads! You can just block their host servers! You don't need to be a programmer to do this, and more people should know about it!

Check out this repo: https://github.com/x0uid/SpotifyAdBlock

if you have any trouble doing this, send me a friend request on discord 00100000#2124 and I'll help you!

Don't let administrators tell you otherwise, this method is 100% legal, free, and works. It's your internet, and you can choose what data you want to allow passing through your system

[SuperFreak]

Thank you for your suggestion.

But I think you misread. I'm not trying to block Spotify ads. If I would use the free client and Spotify needs ads to fund that, it's fine with me. That's a choice for each customer to make. I'm not okay with being judged for using ad blockers to keep out other **bleep**. It should be of no concern to Spotify.

Just like I accept Google tracking me when I use Google products.

But I'm not okay with Google (or even worse, Facebook for that matter) following me when I don't use their services.

It's all about leaving your customer a choice or forcing them to your standards.

[user-removed]

The block hosts method only works on certain versions of spotify on desktop. All current versions have patched this method and will essentially refuse to load the spotify client. Android still has modded apps that bypass detection but i find they close for no apparent reason.