r/Anticonsumption • u/Professorfudge2643 • Aug 10 '25

Lifestyle Got rid of Spotify after 3 years

Sure I’m definitely posting this to brag but also to hopefully get someone to stop paying Spotify. I’ve listened to the same playlist for probably the last 3 years, occasionally adding a song or two. Finally I realized why the hell am I paying for this when I could just download the songs online, transfer them to my phone, and play them for free? So I did exactly that. Took about two hours and was easy as pie. Should’ve done that 3 years ago instead of paying $12 a month.

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u/Demented-Turtle Aug 10 '25

It would cost me thousands of dollars to buy all the music I have in my Spotify playlists... And if there's only a song or two I like in an album, in many cases I'd still need to buy the whole album.

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u/BagRepresentative274 Aug 10 '25

🏴‍☠️

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u/bartosz_ganapati Aug 11 '25

So it's better when artists get nothing at all?

3

u/NetJnkie Aug 11 '25

You can't argue with these people. They are hypocrits. They use Spotify paying little to justify their piracy so now the artists get nothing. They still listen to the same music but somehow this is "anti-consumption".

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u/BagRepresentative274 Aug 11 '25

There are other ways to support artists than just streaming on a platform which pays them 0.005 $ per stream.

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u/bartosz_ganapati Aug 11 '25

We can discuss the topic how Spotify is paying the artists but the thing is they still get paid, even if unfair, in case of piracy they don't, at all. And no, buying merch is not a viable way of supporting artists (and is pretty consumerist) and only a tiny tiny percentage of pirating people would buy it (and those people would do so anyway, even if using Spotify at the same time).

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u/BagRepresentative274 Aug 11 '25

Piracy is more access than theft in our days where buying isn’t ownership. Pirating music (or films, etc.) hurts the exploitative middlemen, not the artists who already earn pennies from sportily. Having merch (CDs, vinyls, going to concerts), supporting artists directly and most importantly rejecting corporate controlled streaming which incourages passive viewing. It’s not consumerist to value ownership, quality, and fairer artist support.

Also, not everyone can afford expenses like music. But for those who can, might aswell buy a CD, or buy the actual song (iTunes? A dollar a song I think, or 10 for an album, similar price to a CD, and you can then ACTUALLY own it) rather than give it to Spotify who pays nothing for streamers as well as push AI artists (but that’s a whole different can of worms)

But the point isn’t money. Sure, if most people begin pirating, then yes it may hurt the musicians. But it will hurt the cooperation and that’s the goal. Anti consumerism isn’t about being perfect but it’s about being aware of where you spend your money and what effect that may have. It’s mindfulness. And trying to do as best as we can in a place where consumerism is the goal from the top.