Just like Spotify and Grooveshark, songs can be cached for offline playback. It’s hard to decide which one to subscribe to – as all offer access to so many songs. But more likely than not, you’ve already taken a liking to one prior to reading this. And there, you’ve made your playlists and populated your music library through your personal account.

So why would you jump services if all offer the same features? You wouldn’t. And that’s why survival and growth completely depends on future device compatibility. As long as Rdio, Spotify, Grooveshark, and many others continue to support the latest firmware and devices – they’ll be able to retain there subscribers.

[via MobileBurn]

Sharing options have been updated as well, again, via Facebook. There was some controversy over the company’s recent decision to allow new users only through Facebook, and apparently, that is still the case with the new app. For those times when you’ve just got to get your Shania Twain on, a Private Listening mode has been added. Testers note that local file playback is still problematic, and there’s no support for browsing via folders – apparently a big deal for some commenters. I tried the local playback myself, and on CyanogenMod 7.1 at least, I haven’t experienced any crashes.

Spotify is specifically asking for user feedback with the beta app, and if you’re a loyal Spotify customer (as so many are) it might be a good time to voice some of your concerns and suggestions. You can download the APK here (the experimental version isn’t available on the Market) and leave feedback on Spotify’s community forum. If you want some input on the way Spotify’s Android app progresses, it might not be a bad idea.

[via TheNextWeb]

Before we go any further, if you don’t know what Spotify is, you should check out the full guide on Spotify your humble narrator wrote for SlashGear back when it was first released here in the states. After that, you should check out our review of the Spotify Premium app that you’ll only be able to run if you’ve got the Premium service hooked up. Right after the USA launch we also gave a whole handful of invites away as well as reviewing that app, that’s how super pumped we were.

And that’s only the USA launch, not even a few months ago! Back on the 28th of May, 2009, our man in England mister Chris Davies made a video demo of the Spotify Android app as it existed in its first state. It was already pretty super neato back then. Now the combined collection of premium users all over the world is at 2 million. Are you one of them?

Today the ageless Walkman brand continues with this Android offering. We have a decent little mid-range phone here and this Walkman will sport a 3.2-inch 480 x 320 touchscreen display powered by a single-core 1GHz processor with 380MB of RAM. You even get a front facing camera so you can video chat and listen to music at the same time. 5 megapixel rear camera and all those other goodies like Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, DLNA and even Sony’s xLOUD system for enhanced audio output.

The Sony Ericsson Live Walkman is set to arrive sometime around October and will have Android 2.3 Gingerbread on board. Sony mentions it will come featuring a built-in Track ID app as well as there usual Qriocity music and video streaming service. The press image does also show the widget for the Spotify music streaming service making us believe it might come pre-installed too, but we cant know for sure. Why they’d show that and their own Qriocity at the same time beats me. More details at the press release below.

[via Sony Ericsson]

Our sister site SlashGear has partnered with Spotify and we now have an official landing page over at www.spotify.com/us/SlashGear and everyone can get an invite thanks to SlashGear and Spotify. Make sure you thank Vincent over on Google+ and feel free to comment in this post. Our wonderful friend Deanna from Spotify set up the awesome landing page you see above just for us. So make sure to tell your friends or family and everyone else you feel like sharing with.

Spotify is currently available in the U.S. by invitation only, but SlashGear asked us to set aside some of the very first invites for friends. All you need to do is enter your email address in the box to get an invite.

It’s really simple just head here for the invite: www.spotify.com/us/slashgear/

That is it folks. Now wasn’t that easy? For all of our coverage of Spotify head over to our Spotify Portal. If you want to know everything about Spotify and not just about the Android side make sure you read SlashGear’s Spotify 101. Once again don’t forget to thank Vincent Nguyen at the via link below over on Google+.

[via +Vincent Nguyen]

Spotify streaming music service is one that not only allows you to upload your own music to the cloud, it allows you to play music from the Spotify archives: thousands and thousands of tracks, old to very new, all for that one monthly price. Spotify launched in the U.S. by invite only just last week, feel free to read our Spotify App Review to get the lowdown. The contest we’re running here is all on Google+ be sure to check out our Google+ 101 Guide, and don’t forget the Android App for that as well.

Now for the rules! All you’ve got to do is the following:

1. Add +Vincent Nguyen (url: vincent.tv/+) to your Circle(s) on Google+*
2. Comment in our Spotify+ thread [a new post each time the old post fills up!] with some witty banter
July 18 URL: https://plus.google.com/103911183408644149411/posts/aYUYXLFYYw7
3. You’re entered into the contest!

*if you don’t already have access to Google+, send your name and email to giveaway @ slashgear.com

You’re already well on your way to getting Spotify for yourself – hours and days of magical musical entertainment for all!

Once we’ve picked you, the following will happen:

1. Vincent Nguyen, Chris Burns or Cory Gunther will ping you on Google+ to let you know you’re a winner.
2. You respond to that post.
3. We give you your invite code!

That’s it! Get to it!

As of Monday, the HTC Status was available for pre-order. For an acutal demonstration of that built-in Facebook button, be sure to check out the video. Earlier on in the week we were informed of both the release date and price of the T-Mobile myTouch 4G Slide; the device actually proved to be a very solid in both Chris Burns official Android Community review, and in the hands-on/full walkthrough. Great aspects of this device include very impressive camera shots and great build quality. Yet another device handled the same day was the LG Thrill 4G on AT&T’s network. It is essentially the same device as the LG Optimus 3D, just re-branded. The Motorola DROID 3 arrived at our doorstep Thursday, and Chris Burns produced a quick hands-on and unboxing. A more thorough review of the unit will be posted soon, but if you can’t seem to wait that long – the DROID 3 hit Verizon stores Thursday as well.

The Motorola LTE-enabled XOOM crossed the FCC this week. XOOM [WiFi] owners have definitely been feeling the love lately with the 3.2 update to include SD card support; this update has been rolling out since Tuesday and is now available for download. Android 3.2 also features a “Zoom to fill Screen” option when using particular applications that would otherwise display improper aspect ratios.

Google announced their Q2 revenue statistics as a 32% climb over last years numbers. It’s not too suprising considering Android is seeing 550,000 activations daily! A few Nexus 3 rumors surfaced this week, one stating that a Samsung Nexus 3 loaded with Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich may be impending for late 2011. The other rumor specified that HTC would be manufacturing the device and labeling it as the “Nexus Google+”. Personally, I loved the build quality of the Nexus One and would love to see another HTC inspired Nexus device. The Android Market was updated this week to include books and movies. Now that movies can be rented directly from the market, the mini-HDMI included on many recent devices seems even more appealing. Be sure to check out a great review/hands-on of this latest version of the market by Chris Burns. If you want to grab the new Android Market, head over to this page.

One of two crazy stories worth mentioning this week concerned an avid Android OS lover building his own RC Android mascot out of a trash can… Wow! The other was a DoCoMo version of the Samsung Galaxy S II sporting an ancient telescopic antenna, when was the last time you saw one of those?

Spotify, the amazing music streaming application, debuted in the US this week. Don’t worry, we already have a review up of the Premium version of the application. If this seems like something you would like to download, Motorola has partnered with Spotify to give away 10,000 invites to the new service. These may very well be gone by now, but Android Community has a few of its own to giveaway! To win a free invite, just add +Vincent Nguyen to your circle(s) on Google+ and comment in the Spotify+ thread! If you’re an actual Android OS developer and want a chance at some actual cash ($200,000), don’t forget to sign up for the Adobe Air Developer’s Contest.

We’re awesome I know! Lets start with a little background info on Spotify and Google+ because we have covered em both. Spotify launched in the U.S. by invite only just yesterday, feel free to read our Spotify App Review. Now for Google+ be sure to check out our Google+ 101 Guide, and don’t forget the Android App. Now that you’re all caught up, check out the details below!

All you’ve got to do is the following:

1. Add +Vincent Nguyen (url: vincent.tv/+) to your Circle(s) on Google+*
2. Comment in our Spotify+ thread [a new post each day!] with some witty banter
July 15th Thread URL: https://plus.google.com/103911183408644149411/posts/aYUYXLFYYw7
3. You’re entered into the contest! (Exciting huh)

*if you don’t already have access to Google+, send your name and email to giveaway @ slashgear.com

You’re already well on your way to getting Spotify for yourself – hours and days of endless magical musical entertainment for all!

Once we’ve picked you, the following will happen:

1. Vincent will ping you on Google+ to let you know you’re a winner.
2. You respond to that post.
3. Vincent gives you your invite code!

Good Luck!

While I’m mentioning things just launching today, Spotify also was released to the public this morning and is currently in beta here in the U.S.. Amazon is back in the tablet news and sources are now claiming Foxconn will build Amazon’s 10″ Android Tablet. Foxconn as you know is the premiere builder for the iPad so this could be good news. Speaking of tablets ViewSonic has the VB730 they plan to sell for $229 if you need a cheap 7″ tablet.

Virgin Mobile plans to throttle data starting in October, while the Google + Android app received an update today so now I can ignore circles I don’t want to talk to. The Motorola Droid 3 went on sale today in-store so head over and get one, We already did and you can watch our Droid 3 unboxing by clicking here. Oh and while we are mentioning DROIDS the original Moto Droid has a new Android 2.3.4 ROM as well as tons of kernels available.

Am I going to fast for anyone? Because that is the point!

The Motorola Atrix bootloader is now unlocked for the entire world to enjoy, and lets talk about leaks, yes leaks. The Samsung Admire with Android 2.3 was leaked for MetroPCS, we saw the LG Bryce (aka Revolution) packing 4G and also headed to MetroPCS today.

Google announced their Q2 Earnings and lets just say they have WAY too much money and I’d love like 1% of it — that is still like 10 billion dollars (not really but close). While Google was bragging they also let us all know the Market now has over 250,000 applications for download — a number they’ve been aiming for since Apple hit it last year. Don’t worry that’s not all as Google loves the news, Android is now activating over 550,000 phones every single day. That explains why they are making so much darn money.

Lets end this on a short note. Motorola is giving away 10,000 Spotify invites so you’ll probably want to click here. Canada will be getting the Droid 3 later this summer. Last but not least and speaking of Spotify, I’ve done a full Spotify Premium App Review that you don’t want to miss. More news will keep flowing today but that is all that really mattered to me today, so enjoy!

Oh yea, Qualcomm released a new browser benchmark app for mobile phones. It’s worth a look or two but it takes forever to finish a single test so you better have a few minutes to spare.

Have a nice night!

Spotify has partnered with Motorola and are giving away 10,000 invites to the new service. Apparently all you need to do is give them some information and sign up and hopefully you get an invite, the page just went up today but you better hurry. The link is below for those that just can’t wait to get in.

We also did a nice review on Spotify for Android this morning and you should check that out for full details on the amazing new service. I love it personally and don’t think I’ll ever stop using it unless something better comes out.

Sign Up Here

[via Motorola]

To start I want to thank Spotify for granting me access to check out this amazing new service and for finally bringing it here to the U.S. as I have friends and co-workers that have been bragging about its awesomeness for months. Spotify is basically the new frontier in music in the cloud if I can call it that, like Google Music Beta you can access to all this music without wasting storage space, but with spotify it isn’t just songs you own, its the millions you don’t and they are right at your fingertips only a half a second and a single click away — utterly amazing! They are launching in limited beta so you better sign up for an invite, and quick. Here are the plans they are offering:

Spotify Free – With an invite, enjoy on-demand, buffer-free access to over 15 million songs on your computer, great social features, manage your own music files through Spotify, and sync with your Android or iPhone. Features occasional advertising.

Spotify Unlimited – all the special features of our free service but with uninterrupted, ad-free access to Spotify on your computer. All for only $4.99 a month.

Spotify Premium – the all-singing, all-dancing, top-of-the-range Spotify experience. Premium gives you access to all the music, all the time. Listen online or offline, on your computer, your cellphone and a whole heap of other devices. Enjoy enhanced sound quality and access to exclusive content, competitions and special offers. Premium costs just $9.99 a month (that’s the equivalent of a few fancy coffees).

Spotify is sort of like iTunes just way better, all those millions of songs you can actually listen to, not just preview. For $10 a month like shown above you’ll have access to almost every song your heart desires anywhere you have the internet. Your favorite music you can store locally offline in the device or computers cache. When you start the app it opens right to the picture shown above. Instantly check for new music, your inbox shows music friends and family can send your way, or quickly hit search and find that song you just heard last night. Star your favorite songs, access your playlists and more.

When searching it brings up almost instant results for everything you can imagine and you can them filter my tracks, albums, or artists. You can then choose just the song you were looking for or the entire album and hear new songs to love and enjoy. One of my absolute favorite features is you can select an artist and it will show you “top hits” so when your looking up a unique group like MGMT as I’ve done or a band you don’t know very well, you’ll see the top hits and immediately hear some of the good stuff.

SMALL TIP: I did search for Mumford and Sons and got zero search results, but search for Mumford & Sons brought all the music up. It gives suggestions but try different things if your first search doesn’t work, but that only happened once for me.

When a song is currently playing you have a easy to use and simply designed user interface for controlling everything. Artwork is shown and there is the slider up top, simply flip down the currently playing tab and instantly you are back at home to check inbox, search for new songs or find something from your playlist. Being able to switch between the app home and currently playing this fast and easy makes it super convenient.

FUN TIP: Swipe the album cover left or right to access the next or previous track. This is the most appealing visually when you’ve got a playlist of many different albums, but works on a single album too.

Buffering… what is that? Here on Spotify buffer times are seriously a thing of the past as songs begin instantly and sound great. I thought if I fast-forward a minute into the song it might have to play catch up but amazingly it just keeps churning out the song without skipping a beat. This was by far one of the things that really made me realize the power of Spotify.

The i button in the bottom left is an “info” button that keeps you on the now playing tab but throws some additional options on top to easy search the currently playing artist by name and album, they also let you star the song or quickly add it to a playlist for later listening. I added so many songs to playlists, then they all appear neatly and right on the PC when you sign on. Your iTunes playlists also will sync just to make things easy — I’m in love!

Like I mentioned the Playlists sync from iTunes and that is a nice touch, but creating your own with Spotify is just as easy and there is so much music to choose from I’m having a hard time deciding what to add into my playlist. Add single songs right from the “i” button while listening, or add entire albums to your playlist. On the PC you just click and drag for adding to the playlist. Everything is very easy and well designed.

I’m sure you are wondering about any and all settings, options and sound quality so I’ll cover that now. Lucky for us in the U.S. Spotify has already done plenty of testing and learning over in the UK because all the settings I was looking for they already had. You can completely push Spotify offline to save data, sync over 3G or W-Fi only — or both, clear cache and more. They also let you set the quality of streaming music.

The quality I found overall quite amazing. The mobile app by default sets audio quality to 96 kbps but this is because you are streaming over most likely a cell phone connection. they also allow a 160 kbps option for those that want a higher bitrate song. CD’s are 128 but most music these days I have are in 320 and iTunes sells 256 kbps. For me setting it to the higher setting of 160 kbps there was once again ZERO butter time, songs started instantly and now I’m wishing I had a higher bitrate option. Streaming in my truck over bluetooth was exciting and I think I’ll be throwing my iPod away this week.

To wrap things up I just want to once again mention how amazing the sound quality was. For being streamed over my 4G (and sometimes 2G/3G) connection here on T-Mobile things were extremely fast and stable. I actually NEVER had a song skip or freeze the entire time I’ve used it and that includes going 80 MPH on the freeway. When I get in my truck it syncs over bluetooth and I have the huge library of over 15 million songs right at my fingertips and luckily for me I don’t have to attempt to fit that on my 16GB MicroSD card.

Spotify makes services like Amazon MP3, Google Music Beta, and anything else “in the cloud” to an entirely different level with the huge library they offer. Spotify really has one-upped them all with this and so far I love it. The UI is fluid and easy to use, the widget may need a little work but so far it works great. The free account may be great for some, but the premium account is MORE than worth it to have both unlimited home and mobile access to the world of music.

Invite and purchase Spotify right now by heading to www.spotify.com

For now the Spotify service in the US is in a beta trial mode and you have to get an invite to get in on the beta trial. The full service will be launching “soon” whatever that means. The full premium service in the US will sell for $10 monthly and is the version that brings support for mobile users. The app in the photo here is the Android version. A basic service for computer use only is $4.99 monthly.

The review over at SlashGear goes in depth into the use of the Android app and it sounds really cool with tons of options and features. If you pay for the Premium service and get your mobile app you can play the tracks in your car if you have an aux input. That sounds like a good alternative to satellite to me. In the end, the Spotify service is something that any music fan needs to buy.

[via SlashGear]

Luckily for me, I’ve been using it for the past few days and can say that so far I love it. Being able to access hundreds of thousands of songs in a matter of seconds, and have them stream literally instantly right over my Android phone or PC is awesome. We are still waiting for more details and they will most likely emerge tomorrow morning at 8:00 AM ET when Spotify officially announces its entry to the States. From what we do know it will be available by invitation and subscription.

Spotify is a new way to listen to and manage your music, discover new tracks and share songs and playlists with friends – music whenever you want it, wherever you are.

As soon as we get more details we will be sure to include them all for you. The app is currently available on Android but not for the U.S. so searching for it brings zero results for the moment. We can expect them to launch the Android app along with the service tomorrow morning so we are excited to see this take off. The desktop client is smooth, stable and works great. Being able to tag songs and add entire albums to my playlist, then listen to them in the car via my Android phone has been a blast the past few days.

For our last look at the Spotify Android app check out this story, we go over the new features last time it was updated. Stay tuned to Android Community because we will be posting a full review of the current service for Android as soon as we can tomorrow.

Streaming music is obviously a pretty big deal, with giants like Amazon, Google, and even Best Buy trying to get in on the game. Spotify however is more akin to Pandora, offering music purely for streaming (rather than storing your own a la Music Beta by Google). The difference between Pandora and Spotify is that the latter lets you choose what song to listen to.

So what does this all have to do with our beloved Android? Well no music streaming service is complete without an Android app of course, and Spotify is no exception. Soon you’ll be able to listen to whatever song you want (sponsored by visual and audio ads) on your Android phone or tablet.

Streaming is really cool, but with capped data spreading, (PSA: Verizon’s moving over to capped data starting tomorrow) will services like Spotify be able to take off? I for one have seen my data usage creep higher each month recently, and Android users are among the heaviest data users. What do those of you with capped data plans think? Will you be able to spare the data usage for the awesomeness of Spotify? If so, head to their site here and request an invite.

There are also fixes for voice search and missing cover art, along with how audio restarts after phone calls. Devices with dedicated media buttons are also supported in v0.4.9 too.

The Spotify app for Android is, as before, a free download. However you’ll need a premium account with the service in order to actually use it when mobile.

• Ability to choose storage location on devices with more than one memory card.
• Changes to user interface.
• Reduced startup time.
• Improved battery life when using Spotify.
• Volume control now always controls media volume, even if music is not playing.
• Support for media buttons and audio focus APIs introduced in Froyo.
• Much improved music syncing over WiFi.
• Voice search now works properly when in Spotify.
• Scrobbling issues have been fixed.
• Bug causing missing cover art for local files has been fixed.
• Failing to sync with locked screen has been fixed.
• Music starting by itself after a phone call has been fixed.
• Many other stability and performance improvements.

You’ll need a premium Spotify account in order to use the Spotify Mobile app, and Shazam apparently are yet to add the integration support to their free app, but it’s said to be coming soon.

[via SlashGear]

Spotify for Android is a free download from the Android Market, though you’ll need a premium account with the service in order to use it. Changelist below.

• All the graphics have been re-done and are now available in high-definition.
• The overall design has been re-done.
• Support for almost any screen resolution, rotation and density, even tablet resolutions.
• On-the-fly screen rotation support, used on devices with fold-out keyboard.
• Multiple performance improvements to increase applications speed.
• Improved error messages with better descriptions.
• Improved detection of network connection and faster reconnections.
• Fixed the texts and controllers that were cropped in some places.
• Fixed the album art view which was often inconsistent with what was playing.
• Fixed when the widget was not showing the correct content.
• Fixed an issue with the application not playing the next song in certain cases.
• New devices supported: HTC Desire HD, HTC Desire Z, Huawei U8300, Motorola Cliq, Motorola Cliq XT, Motorola XT720, Samsung Galaxy 3 (Apollo), Samsung Galaxy Tab, Sony Ericsson X10 Mini Pro, Sony Ericsson X8 and ZTE Blade

A CNET News piece from yesterday (Feb. 3) adds more details: citing “multiple record industry sources” who claim, “Spotify would like to announce a launch date at the South by Southwest conference on March 16.” The article goes on to state, however, that “Spotify has yet to acquire U.S. music rights from any of the four largest recording companies.”

Spotify is currently available in six European countries, as are its mobile apps for both iPhone and Android. Availability in the U.S. would be welcome news, indeed, for Android users.

[via Billboard, CNET]

The app only recently hit the Android market, and if you didn’t grab it whiel you could you may be too late. The app has reportedly gone back to invite only status because the company couldn’t handle the glut of new registrations.

This is not such a surprise, Spotify had said before that if too many people signed up it would go back to invite only. If you really want Spotify, you can still sign up for a premium account only the free ones are via invites only. The service currently has about a million users.

The offline playback means that playlist contents are cached, and can be replayed while the Android device is temporarily without a 3G or WiFi signal or indeed switched to airplane mode.  A third-party app delivering catalog access was released back in August, but removed at the request of the company themselves.

Spotify Mobile for Android (and the iPhone/iPod touch app, which has also been released today) is available for download now, and requires a subscription to Spotify Premium.  That costs £9.99 per month ($18); currently Spotify is only available in the UK, France, Sweden, Norway, Finland and Spain, though a US launch has been tipped for as early as the end of 2009.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ALGPknOsiU[/youtube]

[via SlashGear]