Spotify CEO reveals new painful (?) reality, saying devs "have not written a single line of code since December"
Spotify developers can now get the job done on their way to work.
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Spotify developers can now get the job done on their way to work.
- Spotify’s Co-CEO Gustav Söderström stated the company's developers "have not written a single line of code since December," highlighting a major shift in their workflow.
- This shift is driven by an internal AI system that allows engineers to build features and fix bugs remotely and in real time without writing traditional code.
- Spotify is building a dataset to improve personalization, ensuring users in different locations get unique, context-aware answers to queries like "workout music."
Key Takeaways by nexos.ai, reviewed by Cybernews staff.
Turning to AI for help isn’t new. It’s not even surprising when companies do it to the point of even firing employees so they can be replaced by AI.
If there was a time when people often skipped mentioning they were using AI, now it's normal to talk about how AI helped automate one’s work. At least that’s the case with Spotify.
One of the company’s CEOs, Gustav Söderström, shared that Spotify’s developers haven’t written “a single line of code since December,” cites TechCrunch, a statement that was made during the company’s fourth-quarter earnings call.
The “culprit” of this is a system called “Honk,” which Spotify engineers use to accelerate coding. Thanks to this system, the code can be set up remotely and in real-time using AI.
In reality, the system helps engineers by allowing to fix a bug or add a new feature to an iOS app while on Slack, for example, on their way to work, explained Söderström.
The CEO also mentioned a dataset that the company is building. For example, if a user asks about workout music, they would get a different answer from a user who asked the same question but lives in a different location.
Among Spotify’s AI-powered features is “Prompted Playlist,” which allows users to describe exactly what they want to listen to.
Despite the company seeking ways to employ AI to make its services more convenient to use, it has also been involved in distributing AI-generated music.
Last year, the band The Velvet Sundown sparked an online debate after receiving backlash for being an AI-generated product, which racked up thousands of monthly listeners on Spotify.
It was later reported that the company has partnered with some well-known names in the music industry to shape “responsible AI” to avoid artist exploitation.
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