By Illustration by Nick Barclay / The Verge
A number of Spotify users began to notice something strange over the last day or so: the in-app lyrics, which typically pop up under the currently playing song, were suddenly locked away under a paywall. Instead, they saw only a notification bubble saying, “Enjoy lyrics on Spotify Premium,” with a link to sign up. Many Spotify listeners were not enthused.
Spotify tells us that the feature is only a test. “At Spotify, we routinely conduct a number of tests, some of those tests end up paving the way for our broader user experience and others serve only as an important learning,” says CJ Stanley, Spotify’s co-head of global communications. “We don’t have any further news to share at this time.”