Playlists are the lifeblood of the Spotify service. How popular are they? There are more than 3 billion user-generated playlists, according to the company. Well, get ready for that number to grow considerably: Spotify has added the ability to create new playlists of podcasts, as well as the option of adding podcasts to existing music-only playlists.
Given Spotify’s huge focus on podcasts, the move isn’t surprising. Getting its subscribers to listen to more podcasts is clearly a part of its strategy here, and Spotify has previously said that it wants to be about more than just music. “Over time, more than 20% of all Spotify listening will be non-music content.” But the company also says its customers have been asking for this feature.
It’s not the first time Spotify has experimented with the idea of mixing podcasts with music. Earlier this year, the company created a limited-availability playlist called Your Daily Drive, which did just that, as a way of mimicking the morning format that is so popular among listeners of terrestrial radio. With the ability to add podcasts to playlists, users can make their own Daily Drive experiences — perfect for road trips, as Spotify correctly points out.
The new feature also helps to keep Spotify one step ahead of the competition. In September 2019, YouTube Music cloned one of Spotify’s most popular playlists with its version of Discover Weekly. Copying music-based features that Spotify has popularized is low-hanging fruit, relatively speaking, but podcast-based playlists could be a lot harder to duplicate — especially if the podcasts in question are owned by Spotify.
The new playlist feature is mobile-only for now, at least in terms of playlist creation. Once a new podcast-based playlist has been created, it can be streamed on any Spotify-compatible device. Here’s how it works:
Once you’re happy with your creation, you can share it with all of the usual folks, just as you would with any other playlist, and if you are a Spotify user, you should not miss out on the Premium version.
Instagram is making its way to yet another screen, and this time, Apple TV is getting a taste of the Reels rabbit hole. The company has launched a dedicated Instagram app for Apple TV, bringing Reels, longer videos, and live shows to the big screen. So, if watching one quick clip on a phone somehow turns into an hour of scrolling, there's now a much larger screen for that.
Instagram brings Reels and more to Apple TV
Audio-Technica, a brand well known for making some of the best studio and professional headphones on the market, has just come out with the ATH-AWX7000, which the company itself claims to be its "finest headphones ever." The new flagship closed-back headphone has debuted at an eye-watering price of $3,799. It combines hand-finished Japanese woodwork with a newly developed 58mm driver.
The earcups are made from Kiso cypress, a prized wood historically used for Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples. Each housing is finished by hand with traditional Echizen lacquer, which brings out the grain and is expected to darken over time. The frame and sliders are finished in a deep navy kachi-iro shade traditionally associated with samurai.
This post is brought to you in paid partnership with Best Buy.
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