apple music vs spotify

spotify apple

In a post yesterday on Spotify Community, user riegelstamm stated that they could no longer use Spotify in their Safari web browser.  Despite the fact that Spotify’s system requirements page said that the service was compatible with Safari 6 or higher.  riegelstamm contacted Spotify, and they received the following response:

After taking a look backstage, we can confirm that after recent updates Safari is no longer a supported browser for Web Player. We’re always testing things by adding or removing features to make Spotify better overall. We’re sorry that this means you’re not able to use the Web Player like you could before. We can’t say if or when any specific features will be back. But as soon as we’ve got anything to announce, we’ll let everyone know via the Spotify Community.

Which, at first read, seems like a honest mistake.  But if you look on the system requirements page today, you will see that Safari is no longer on the list of browsers supported by Spotify.  Strange, don’t you think?  riegelstamm also suggested that if Spotify doesn’t restore Safari support, some people may take their music streaming elsewhere.

Which service do you use, if any?  And which do you think is better?  There seems to be some pretty serious competition between the two.  But it’s weird to me that Spotify is going to single out Safari users and tell them they can’t use that browser to use their service.  It’s a win for Spotify if they do because of the number of people that use Safari.  Sure, they might be pushing for people to use their app instead.  But it seems a bit more personal than that.  Or is it?

apple music vs spotify

Reigelstamm did some more digging and discovered that the discontinuing of Safari support might have to do with Google’s widevine media optimizer plugin, which Spotify requires for music streaming on the web.  And apple doesn’t like that, due to potential security issues.  So we are literally at odds with technology on this one.  If I go back to my original argument and flip it around a bit.  Perhaps this is Apple’s way of forcing it’s own consumers to start using Apple Music?  Like I said, Spotify does have a comptable Mac app.  And it’s not like Chrome won’t work on a Mac.  So you do have options.

But I still don’t think we have the full picture here.  And honestly it’s hard to determine who is to “blame” in all of this.  Like I said, maybe it’s just a glitch, in terms of the technology not being compatible.  And perhaps it will return later on down the road.  But it could be something larger in terms of competition.  We often see competing companies working together.  Like, I said, Google Chrome works on your Mac, and your iPhone.  Is it possible that there is some other reason for all of this?

I think I’m done speculating, and my answer is this:  the two systems aren’t compatible.  And while I understand people wanting to stream from a browser, you should use the app if you can.  And I think in these cases, it can be used.  This one will be interesting to follow to see if something more does come out of it.  But for right now, I suspect it’s just a matter of the technology not being compatible.  Like I said, for now.

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