Spotify No Longer Just Music

When we look at the future of on demand and streamed media services the clue is in the word media. We are no longer shackled to thinking of vertical movie, music, games but media hubs that satisfy all under one subscription.

To bring the point firmly home Spotify has announced it is adding more non-music content to its app. The expanded service will include radio podcasts, news bulletins, video clips and moves their 60 million regular users which span some into a media one stop shop and they also have introduced a new running mode that matches music to the pace of the listener which is based on feedback from their smartphone's built-in sensors.

The news comes on the same day that The Verge disclosed the details of Sony’s Spotify contract and raised questions of whether the model worked in the best interest of the production companies, or the artists. The move is also intended to protect Spotify from competitive threats from Apple’s planned streaming service and YouTube’s expansion moves.

Spotify’s content partners include the BBC, TED, the science-tech talks organiser, Disney, Vice Media, comedy podcast The Nerdist and clips from Amy Poehler’s Smart Girls video channel. They will mix musicians and cooks in a show called Turntable.  

What is clear is that Spotify has a vision past music and one which if successful will help protect it from the new Spotify can provide music that matches a runner's pace.

The big question is whether Spotify’s 15 premium subscribers want and will use the extra services today and allow Spotify to float their service on the stock market.

TEDEd Continues to Deliver Lessons Without Walls

TED Ed is not a replacement for the teacher or the lesson but a complimentary guide a way of introducing the best teachers into the classroom in an engaging way that stimulates the student, validates their attention and allows the teacher to build on the sound bite and messages conveyed.

TED Ed doesn't try to own the classroom, build a walled garden around it and be the only source of information.

There is a ‘think’ features and quick quiz features  which enable students to answer questions and a , ‘dig deeper’ one which expands on the lesson and material and the teacher can take any of these and even the title and edit and enhance them to their needs. They can also flip the lesson to create their own rendition and URL which they can share with their own students.

When we first wrote about TED Ed it was being launched now some 10 months later it has a growing body of work with some videos across subjects; the arts, business and economics, health, mathematics, philosophy and religion, literature and language, psychology, science and technology, social studies, thinking and learning.

It takes the best and most engaging teachers and shares these with everyone for free.

Some great examples:

How simple ideas lead to scientific discovers

23 and ½ hours

How do cancer cells behave differently from healthy ones?

One is one…or is it?

Think Of Information As You Would Think Of Food

Every now and then we watch a TED conference and it makes us think differently. Examples we have shared are the likes of Larry Lessing on content creation, Parnav Mistry on intuitive technology and now JP Rangaswami. Rangaswami introduces the analogy of information as food and looks at it cultivation, preparation and importantly its consumption. If we are to avoid information obesity what do we need to do? Is there a diet plan for information? Will we need fact sheets summaries noting the ingredient levels?

 

‘ Information, if viewed from the point of view of food, is never a production issue. … It's a consumption issue, and we have to start thinking about how we create diets [and] exercise.’ (JP Rangaswami)