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Spotify Starts Cracking Down on Friends Who Share Family Plans (theverge.com)

Posted by msmash on from the crack-down dept.

Spotify is emailing some users on family plans asking for their GPS locations in order to confirm that they live in the same location. From a report: Subscribers who don't confirm their home address could lose access to their plan, according to the email. The move is an apparent attempt by Spotify to crack down on groups of friends who save money on individual subscriptions by sharing discounted plans intended for families. The emails, which have been sent to a limited number of "Premium for Family" subscribers in at least the US and Germany, have been received with scorn by some who rightly point out that not all families live together. However, Spotify's small print does say that the family plan is available for "you and up to five people who reside at your same address." The amount of people subscribed to family plans suggests not all of them abide by Spotify's definition.

2 of 94 comments (clear)

  1. ROFL already gave in by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Quitters!

    https://techcrunch.com/2018/09/28/spotify-ends-test-that-required-family-plan-subscribers-to-share-their-gps-location/?yptr=yahoo

  2. I've had the opposite elsewhere by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Companies are really dumb when it comes to families. When I moved out decades ago, the cable company was offering new users of the service two free cable boxes for subscribing for a year. I took them up on the offer. They sent me a bill for $798 for the boxes. I called them up and they said I had already had the service several years ago. Doubt it, this is my first place.

    Turns out my parents had subscribed 10 years ago. Apparently emancipation means nothing to Look Communications. Sent a letter to the director, and their response was I could either return the boxes and they would not bill me (and would cancel my account) or I could pay for them and keep service. Best part was their technician had to go through all sorts of bullshit to install an antenna on the building for this, so the apartment complex would tear that down when I quit their service. I figure that alone cost them a couple of thousand dollars.

    I returned them, let the antenna rot, and went to Rogers who were happy to honour the deal Look should have given me (despite my parents having subscribed to their service 30 years ago). Look folded a couple of years later. I wonder if it had anything to do with being dumber than a rock.