Based on what I've read, this sounds an awful lot like lala.com (which is available in the US).
Lala started out around 05 or 06 as a CD trading service. I loved it...traded some stuff in my collection that I no longer wanted, and got stuff I wanted to explore in exchange. Unfortunately complete artwork wasn't required, so I often sent out complete and immaculate CDs only to get decent condition CDs with only the front artwork in return. But whatever. They eventually started offering online streaming of songs, and cut down on the CD trading. Meaning, when new members signed up they didn't have access to the CD trading section unless they requested it. And they'd have to know about it to request it. So the CD trading pool dried up. Plus, they shut down the message board, completely eliminating communication between members. This really sucked because the forums were a good way to "pimp" the stuff you wanted to get rid of, facilitating trades. Lala started putting more and more effort into their online streaming, they wanted to revolutionize music or some ****. They wanted your whole library to be portable. They came up with an app that would "upload" your entire digital library to their site, so you could stream it from anywhere. Basically when you ran it, if something was already in their database it wouldn't need to upload it, it would just add it to your library automatically. Pretty cool, but most of us have portable MP3 players anyway. And what of the sound quality? If it's not actually uploading your files, you don't know what you're actually getting. With all this, they made deals with record labels to be able to offer online streaming of full albums. Obviously not everything is available, and I'm not sure how that differs from Spotify. But it sounds like a very similar concept. A good way to sample an album for free, without pirating. But yeah, the sound quality is probably not higher than 160kbps...which I don't like but is adequate considering it's free and doesn't involve piracy. You may have noticed their player on Pitchfork.com. I think it's great that many of their reviews, news, best-of lists, etc. use the player, so you can listen as you read what they have to say about it. I'm no Pitchfork fanboy by any means, I just like that they integrate this on their site.
Anyway, sound like Spotify at all? I'm still pissed about the whole CD trading thing getting shoved aside, but figured those in the US interested in something like Spotify might want to check it out.
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