In the past two years, Spotify has introduced two new AI features: an AI DJ who plays groups of songs it believes the user will like, and more recently an AI playlist maker. Users seemed to react positively to these features, but very negatively to Wrapped this year.
The missing features included Spotify aura, Sound Town, and Top Genre. Many users felt like this took away from the overall personalization and made it more general: IE feeling like Ai.
Spotify has increasingly used AI in various ways—like for personalized playlists, recommendations, and other algorithm-driven features—there's no official confirmation from Spotify that AI was the primary cause of the criticism about the design and creativity of this year's Wrapped. However, Spotify has made significant cuts to its workforce in recent months (including layoffs in design and other departments), and many users believe that these reductions might have impacted the overall quality of features like Wrapped. It’s worth noting that AI is often used behind the scenes in applications like Wrapped for curating playlists and analyzing listening data, but the creative direction and design work still likely rely on human input. The shift toward more automated or algorithmic-driven processes could certainly be a factor, though.
Overall, the increased usage of Ai in Spotify's technology and the lack of personalization in Wrapped leads many to feel like it was fully AI-generated. There is no source that can fully accurately confirm, but I do think it is reasonable to assume that a good portion of Wrapped was generated by AI.
https://newsroom.spotify.com/2023-02-22/spotify-debuts-a-new-ai-dj-right-in-your-pocket/
https://newsroom.spotify.com/2024-12-04/make-this-years-spotify-wrapped-even-more-about-you-with-these-ai-experiences/#:~:text=Through%20the%20combination%20of%20Spotify's,music%20and%20audio%20they%20love.
