"Glory/Us" by Acceptance + Spotify Wrapped (Artists Edition), Friday, January 5, 2023

Spotify Wrapped probably flooded your social media right last month. Two years ago, I got jealous, so I subscribed to Spotify. Apple Music started Replay in response to that Wrapped jealousy, but I still don't see many people posting their Replay stories on Instagram. I never stopped listening to Apple Music, though. I have different habits for listening to Spotify and Apple Music, and today I'm going to discuss the differences between those two listening habits.

HONESTY WAITS HERE FOREVER. I started using Spotify last year. I decided to start linking the artist, album, and songs on Spotify if available because it seems that Spotify has more listeners than Apple Music. Last year, I used Spotify mostly for my blog and didn't listen to it much. I listened to Apple Music on my own time, and whenever I was in the middle of writing my blog and needed to listen to a song, I listened to it on Spotify. This year, I listen to Spotify for my blog but I also switched to Spotify at work. Apple Music for Windows was awful and took a long time to update. Furthermore, Apple Music for Windows is integrated with podcasts and Apple TV. The platform constantly downloaded my podcasts on the computer, and some of them were NSFW. I turned off the setting but decided just to listen to Apple Music at home. So this year, the difference between Spotify and Apple Music is work and blog time versus home and phone listening, like when I'm at the gym or out for a walk.  Of course, this isn't always the case. I might pull up Spotify when I'm on my phone, but it's not my general habit. Another habit I have at work is to skip explicit tracks. I listen on headphones, but I have a code of conduct for my work music. I put a kind of FCC radio ruling on my work hours, imagining that I work at a place where I would have to share my music in a common space. It's a stupid rule, but maybe it helps me not curse so much at work and not have a slip-up when I'm teaching.

COLD AND WIRED. Of the 25,061 minutes of music last year, Spotify says that I listened to Taylor Swift the most followed by Anberlin. Apple Music, in the 16,723 minutes I listened to music on that platform, reverses the order, saying that I listened to Anberlin the most and Taylor Swift the second most. To be fair, it seemed like Spotify's algorithm played "Cruel Summer" as part of their "non-stop up next" suggestions after listening to any pop song or album, which probably increased my Taylor Swift play count. But Acceptance's "Cold Air" was my second-most-played song on Spotify and my third-most-played song on Apple Music.