Daily updates on the business of digital music.Digital Notes
When Spotify opened in the United States last summer, it offered new users six months of free listening without limits. After some confusion early this year about whether it would begin to add restrictions, as it has in Europe, the company announced on Thursday morning that it had “extended the honeymoon for unlimited free listening.”
Just how long that honeymoon has been extended is unclear, and might depend on how long the honeymoon lasts between Spotify and the record companies whose licenses it depends on. Spotify is now available in 13 countries and has three million paying subscribers (who, unlike the free users, get the service without ads), and is reportedly trying to raise investment money at a multibillion-dollar valuation.
At the same time, Spotify is removing one of its main listening restrictions for nonsubscribers in Sweden, Finland, Norway, the Netherlands and Spain. Free users there will no longer be limited to five plays of any given song, although they will still be kept to 10 hours of listening a month.
Ben Sisario writes about the music industry. Follow @sisario on Twitter.
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