ALLi News Editor, Dan Holloway
It’s been a busy week for Spotify. The audio giant has been working on more tools for creators and consumers alike as part of its expansionist agenda to become the world’s one-stop audio shop.
First comes a tool that has yet to launch, news of which comes from a series of leaked screenshots. It will allow people to cut and mix their own versions of their favourite songs, and will allow listeners to create seamless transitions just like they were DJs sculpting a set.
Techcrunch suggests this is a bid to deflect traffic from TikTok, which already has a “speed up” tool that is hugely popular, and has led some artists to release their own sped up versions of songs alongside the original in a bid to keep listeners coming to creators first hand. This, of course, is the issue tools like this raise.
Something that is out there already is a new partnership between Spotify and the popular subscription newsletter service Substack. I know of at least one writer who is both a podcaster and Substack creator (ALLi’s own Howard) and there are, of course, thousands more. Substack has just announced, in fact, that podcasters on its platform have earned $100m in the past year.
Consumers increasingly want the combination of high quality longform content, the kind that writers are used to crafting for their newsletters, direct engagement which a subscription newsletter can give, but also content they can enjoy in an audio medium, like a podcast. The partnership between Substack and Spotify will make Substack’s podcast available to the vast new audience awaiting on Spotify.
The integration will make Substack podcasts discoverable on Spotify, and will give podcasters access to Spotify’s superior analytics. Spotify subscribers will be able to listen to any episodes podcasters have made generally available but those only available to Substack subscribers will show as locked and require a subscription through a podcaster’s Substack.
