Joining Spotify now requires a Facebook account
You're now required to have a Facebook account if you want to sign up to music streaming service Spotify. Acceptable?
Fancy trying out Spotify but don't like Facebook? Bad news champ, in the wake of adding new social features, Spotify appears to have made it impossible to join unless you already have a Facebook account.
As The Next Web spotted, if you pay a visit to the Spotify sign-up page, it'll say: "You need a Facebook account to register for Spotify. If you have an account, just log in below to register. If you don't have a Facebook account, get one by clicking the 'create an account' link below."
If you're already logged into Facebook, then Spotify will prefill the registration form using your information from Facebook, including your email address and date of birth.
While Facebook has a huge number of users (750 million and counting), there are loads of people out there who for whatever reason don't like the all-encompassing social network. So why has Spotify done this?
Well, seeing as Spotify recently announced some seriously tight Facebook integration that sees what you're listening to popping up in your friends' news feed, it could be that ZuckerCo requested that all new Spotify members are also on board with Facebook. It probably doesn't hurt that Sean Parker (you know, Justin Timberlake in the movie), is on Spotify's board.
If you already signed up for Spotify then you're okay, you don't need to tie your account to Facebook. There's no reason Spotify couldn't add that requirement at a later date though.
The move is sure to ruffle some feathers among music fans who don't like Facebook, but do like streaming music. If you're looking for a way around this, you could create a private Facebook account with nothing in it, and sign in using that one, but it's still a lot of effort to go through.
Spotify lifts time limits -- sort of
Meanwhile, Spotify is lifting the 10-hour per month streaming limit for free users, as well as the five-play limit for individual tracks. Well, kind of. In reality, it's just delaying how long those limits kick in by six months.
That means your Spotify account gets six months without limits, then the old restrictions kick back in. We know the limitations on free listening haven't been very popular, but we've seen reports that suggest it's been very profitable for Spotify, as free users sick of the limits start forking out for the paid version, which has no such caps.
Is it fair for Spotify to exclude those who don't like Facebook? Let us know on our Facebook wall. But if you don't like Facebook, we'll still let you sound off in the comments.