this post was submitted on 11 Oct 2023
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I noticed these accounts are following a lot of ppl on Spotify including me nd it doesn’t seem like I’m the only one from looking on social media. Does anyone have an answer to this? Bots maybe, ppl spam following?

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[–] bappity@lemmy.world 70 points 1 year ago (1 children)

one of the following:

  • attention seeker
  • scraper bot
[–] xkforce@lemmy.world 34 points 1 year ago (2 children)

There are multiple copies of them too it seems because the ones that are following me have slightly different display names

[–] Schaedelbach@feddit.de 12 points 1 year ago

The two (also slightly different names) I see on my Spotify have a "Viral songs on tiktok" playlist in their profile. So it's probably a way to spread/spam songs around?

[–] Floufym@lemmy.world 8 points 1 year ago

I checked after seeing this post. Same for me. They had a slightly different names

[–] Dirk@lemmy.ml 32 points 1 year ago

Most likely bots for either data analysis or playlist generation.

[–] Moghul@lemmy.world 31 points 1 year ago (1 children)

... you can follow people on Spotify?

[–] u202307011927@feddit.de 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] Moghul@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago (3 children)

What does it do? Do you like... see what they're playing? You listen along or something?

[–] sunbeam60@lemmy.one 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Not a lot. Yes you can see what they are playing and they use it to make recommendations for you.

I think the primary motivator for Spotify is just data scraping. Everybody wants to know your circle of friends in order to advertise better towards you.

[–] mifan@feddit.dk 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I don’t know if it’s still a feature but I used to get phone notifications every time a friend put a song on.

I don’t recommend this.

[–] Gadg8eer@lemmy.dbzer0.com 0 points 1 year ago

But I remember we did it. "Okay, Brian, the record's five. The record's five... Okay ready? Go!"

[–] u202307011927@feddit.de 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

For me, I follow several artists and it gives updates on when they uploaded a new album etc etc And I follow my siblings and could see what they're listening to, live, if I activated the sidebar but I'm just here to listen to music

[–] Moghul@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

That first part works without following personal accounts too. I don't follow anyone but I get notified when the bands I listen to release new albums. Besides that, I use the release radar playlist.

[–] Interstellar_1@pawb.social 1 points 1 year ago

Yep, you can see what song they're playing if you follow each other. Not sure if it does anything else

[–] Squirrel@thelemmy.club 18 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I didn't even know people could follow me on Spotify. These two were the only ones.

[–] XbSuper@lemmy.world 13 points 1 year ago

You can follow people on Spotify?

[–] ianovic69@feddit.uk 13 points 1 year ago (1 children)

My question with all this is why hasn't everyone switched this off in the settings from the first moment they made an account?

It's no wonder we've become a commodity to the services we use, people just allow it to happen.

[–] kambusha@feddit.ch 19 points 1 year ago

Switched what off? I have my settings about as private as I can do, yet one of those accounts had followed me without me knowing. I blocked them now but I'm not sure what setting you're referring to, in order to prevent some random bot from following you on Spotify?

[–] Sylver@lemmy.world 11 points 1 year ago (2 children)

They would have to follow 44 people a day for 6 years straight to reach 98,000

[–] rwBoho@lemmy.world 63 points 1 year ago (1 children)

If they follow 98,000 people per day, it would take one day

[–] ryannathans@aussie.zone 26 points 1 year ago (1 children)

And if my grandmother had wheels she'd be a bicycle

[–] xmunk@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

But... I'm not a big fan of bicycles...

[–] Nougat@kbin.social 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm a big fan of your grandmother.

[–] u202307011927@feddit.de 1 points 1 year ago
[–] squiblet@kbin.social 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

is there a limit of how many people they can follow in a day? Why not 500?

[–] xkforce@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago

It does not seem so

[–] 0xC4aE1e5@lemmy.zip 8 points 1 year ago

Could possibly be OF bots. You reddit users, remember the bots that would follow you every week or so and had to disable following?

[–] AngryDemonoid@lemmy.lylapol.com 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

One of them is following me, but with a bunch of extra spaces after the exclamation point.

I don't usually check my followers, but I happened to be in there a couple days ago. The only person following me then was my wife, so this bot/spam is relatively new.

[–] BlueKittyMeow@beehaw.org 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Wtf me too - the Lucas one plus all the spaces. I never even really use Spotify. Creepy.

Edit they are literally my only follower aside from one single friend I know irl.

[–] sailingbythelee@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Wow, thanks. They were following me too, and I had no idea. Blocked.

[–] Dsklnsadog@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

You just lost your biggest fan.... Probably.... Not

[–] shiveyarbles@beehaw.org 5 points 1 year ago

They're

a. Fascinated with your content and commentary

b. Bots

[–] ExLisper@linux.community 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Wouldn't it mean they have 98k followers? Not that they follow 98k users? Bad UI?

[–] eezeebee@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 year ago

It doesn't show how many they follow, but it's probably in the millions

[–] passepartout@feddit.de 4 points 1 year ago

I have set the list of people following me and the ones i follow on private now. This seems to be the only useful thing they could scrape. Why would i care if they can see what music i listen to? It's not like they can see my personal info and link that or is it?

[–] mp3@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 year ago

Thanks, blocked.

[–] rob64@startrek.website 2 points 1 year ago

Oh no, not Lucas!

[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee 0 points 1 year ago

That’s not really what the word β€œfollowers” means.