I pay for streaming music because I've pirated all my other music, and it's convenient. Quality is subjective, I'm no audiophile and unless I'm using it on the go with low data mode on, I can't hear the difference... except the one time with a more obscure song, but I reported that and they fixed it. Maybe that was an accidental low data mode though.
I’m someone who has a large FLAC collection and an obsession with my private music tracker. I do it because of an obsession of collecting music, but modern streaming is “good enough” for 99% of cases. And unlike video streaming platforms, most audio platforms have “most” content that people want to listen to.
> And unlike video streaming platforms, most audio platforms have “most” content that people want to listen to.
I'm worried about the potential for this to change. Netflix used to have a much larger catalogue, especially for movies. Nowadays the things I'm interested in may be spread across a dozen different services.
Currently it seems that Spotify, and Youtube music (probably Apple music too, though I've not tried it) have almost everything I can think of. But I can certainly see a possible future where these services get much more fragmented.
For instance, I know Apple is already pushing a classical only streaming service. Could/would they some day remove classical from their other streaming services and instead offer a higher priced bundle deal? I think it's possible.
I stream my own music, because you can do that now. It's $0/month, and I never have to worry about some cranky millionaire getting pissed at Spotify and yanking their music off of it.
Nothing is so convenient that I'd ever pay an ongoing subscription. Those always feel like scams or ripoffs, and life in 2023 is so overfilled with subscriptions that they can't possibly be affordable to even you guys who make x3 what I do. Can they?
I have internet at home, but saying it costs $0 is stretching it, since you have to have a decent upload speed on the connection you're paying for. Not to speak of the server, in this day and age when most people only have a laptop.
