Possibly aiming to enter the hardware market, Spotify rolls out a new feature, which allows you to request songs with your tongue.
Surprisingly. Spotify didn’t make a huge deal about the new function. There was no official announcement. Instead, users received notifications that said “Just enable your mic and say ‘Hey Spotify, Play my Favorite Songs.”
The new feature requires access to your microphone. And while it makes ordering tracks more conveniently, naturally it stirred some suspicion: what if Spotify records and collects your voice commands?
As it turns out. Spotify really does so. The app collects snippets of your voice and makes transcripts, which is stated in the official policy.
According to them, it’s necessary to learn about your music taste to give better recommendations, improve the voice recognition, as well as deliver targeted ads.
As of now, the feature is fully available on iOS and Adored. Simply:
Tap the microphone icon,
Say “Hey, Spotify play…”,
Name a track or an artist. Like, “Hey Spotify, play Megadeth” or “Hey, Spotify play Bicycle Race”
And the app will obey. With this feature, you can also put a song on pause, skip a track, replay it, stop playing whatsoever and manipulate playback in other ways.
It is suspected that the feature is a harbinger of the upcoming Car Thing — a music station produced for cars and houses.
Allegedly, it will mimic architecture of Google Nets Audio or Sonos One Stations, only focusing on music. Spotify failed to provide any comments on that.
While the feature is pretty useful, especially in terms of “hands’free” control, many wouldn’t be glad that snippets of their voices are collected and stored on the company’s servers. You can disable the feature in the settings — go to Voice Interactions to turn it off.
