Spotify Play Button Adds Music Streaming to Websites, Blogs

Spotify on Wednesday unveiled the "Play" button, which will allow Spotify content to be added to third-party sites.

Much like websites can add Facebook content to their sites via special widgets, the Spotify Play Button will also allow blogs, websites, and other social networks to add Spotify playlists or songs.

"Adding the Spotify Play Button to your Tumblr, website or social page will light it up with music in a flash and feature any song, album or playlist," Spotify said in a blog post. "To enjoy the tunes, all you have to do is hit Play. Totally free. Totally instant. Totally awesome."

Partners include Tumblr and Facebook, as well as magazines like People, Entertainment Weekly, Rolling Stone, and Time Out.

"Add a soundtrack to your Tumblr in a flash. Embed all your favorite music and search for the tracks you love within Tumblr's 'Audio' bar," Spotify said.

David Karp, Tumblr founder and CEO, said in a statement that his company "deeply value[s] music as a form of creative expression. That Spotify now lets our users share from millions of their favorite songs is revolutionary, and as huge fans of the product we are absolutely overjoyed about this partnership."

On Facebook, users can add songs to their Timelines via FanRx, while brands can do the same via Fan Bridge, which will allow them to "feature specific songs or albums, draw attention to new releases, fan-only demos or exclusives."

Spotify said the Play Button is intended to address "fragmented music streaming on the Web," including the inability to listen to music at the point of discovery, poor audio quality, distracting pop-ups ads, and the lack of a freely available tool for bloggers to embed legal music streams.

The Play button comes several weeks after Spotify delayed plans to cap unlimited listening for free users in the U.S. "We've been so overwhelmed by the U.S. response to Spotify that we've extended the honeymoon for unlimited free listening," the company said at the time.

For more, see PCMag's review of Spotify and the slideshow below.

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