Apple has just been hit with a massive €500 million fine by the European Union over a complaint filed by Spotify over anti-competitive practices. The crux of the complaint is that while Spotify subscriptions purchased on its website are competitive to those of Apple Music, subscriptions purchased on Apple devices via the App Store incur a 30% commission to Apple, which would result in Spotify having to increase its subscription prices, making Spotify lose competitiveness to Apple Music, which comes pre-installed on iOS devices, is deeply integrated with the operating system, and costs less. The Spotify complaint was filed with the European Commission way back in 2019, with the ruling coming out just now. Apple is already facing the EU's heat over barriers to App Store alternatives in the Epic Games case. The company is implementing several platform-level changes with the upcoming iOS 17.4 update scheduled for March 2024, as well as changes to its terms of service. Hopefully Spotify gets its due.

Whether it's the ultimate sound system in the home or a single point of sound, Beolab 8 can be used as a system speaker to create an immersive home cinema setup using the latest high-end Bang & Olufsen speakers or even heritage speakers dating back to 1984. Stereo pair two Beolab 8 speakers to create powerful and precise stereo sound for a high-fidelity music experience. Beolab 8 is also a stand-alone speaker delivering depth with an intense bass for its size.

"Our goal is to create powerful and immersive listening experiences for our customers. Beolab 8 provides exactly this. It is a scalable speaker that is all about flexibility, performance, and innovation", says Michael Henriksson, Vice President of Product Marketing at Bang & Olufsen and continues: "Drawing inspiration from the high-end Beolab range, our aim for Beolab 8 was to distil the acoustic essence of these impressive speakers into a compact offering that maintains the directivity and sound beam control for optimal sound reproduction in any environment. Bringing immersive experiences for every moment".

Introducing the JBL Authentics series. Striking sound performance meets timeless retro design inspired by JBL's heritage. The portable JBL Authentics 300 is a true decorative piece of the home, an all-encompassing Wi-Fi and Bluetooth smart speaker delivers room-filling professional sound to envelop you in 360-immersive audio - with portability to carry your music anywhere in your home. The JBL Authentics 200 and JBL Authentics 500 home speakers complete the all-new JBL Authentics series, available September 17th.

Room-filling sound throughout the home
Be at the center of your favorite song as the JBL Authentics 300 invites you to experience music like never before. For those looking for superior sound in and around the house, the JBL Authentics 300 offers portable high-performance sound with a built-in 8-hour battery. Delivering distinctive highs and deep bass, enjoy amazing audio performance wherever you are - from the kitchen to the garden or the next outdoor party.

Epic Games have recently released the Spotify app onto the Epic Games Store, the app is now available to download and appears alongside your games. This is an interesting move from Epic Games as they capitalize on the reach of their storefront and launcher thanks in part due to Fortnite and the many free game giveaways. An Epic Games representative informed Destructoid that we can "expect more non-game applications" to hit the storefront in the future. With a userbase of over 350 million people, Epic Games is uniquely positioned to take on the Microsoft Store and become the go-to storefront.

Sonarworks, the company behind precision audio software used by Grammy-Award-winning engineers to record top artists like Lady Gaga, Madonna, Rihanna, Adele, Coldplay and Kanye West, announces its partnership with Gateway, the beloved cow-spotted PC brand, integrating its SoundID sound personalization technology into Gateway's new tablets. With SoundID enabled The Gateway 8" and Gateway 10" tablets, users can enhance their listening experience - at home or on-the-go - on some of the most popular music streaming services including Spotify, YouTube Music, Apple Music, and more.

"We're proud to partner with an iconic brand like Gateway to deliver a seamless experience of SoundID to its Gateway tablet customers," said Martins Popelis, Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer at Sonarworks. "SoundID enabled Gateway tablets deliver premium sound tailored for each individual with no extra costs. We at Sonarworks believe sound can be enjoyed to the max irrespective of how, when or where you listen. And we're excited Gateway has joined us on this mission."

Sonarworks had caught our eye back at CES 2019, when they showed off their then-still-in-progress mobile app for personalized sound signatures called True-Fi. The Latvia-based company has credentials to back all their claims, and the in-suite demo was impressive to say the least. Getting it out in the real world meant that the company had to build up their database of compatible headphones to first normalize the sound signature, and then work on the best option for recuperating R&D costs without breaking any wallets. As it turns out, the company had more insight on this at CES 2020 but are only now ready to show their retail plans in the form of SoundID.

SoundID, as both a mobile app (iOS, Android) and the new desktop SoundID Listen experience, takes over from where True-Fi started. The interface is more colorful and user-friendly to the masses, and the mobile app in the current beta form is being marketed more for profile-creation than usage, although it has the option to plug into your Spotify library. The older A/B tests are retained here, and at CES 2020 the app only had the "Core" experience. As of May, the app has new features to coincide with the desktop client's release, and read past the break for more on both.

In case you didn't know, Valve Studio Orchestra is the group behind the iconic soundtracks of many Valve games including DOTA 2 and Team Fortress 2. This week, the soundtracks for both DOTA 2 and Team Fortress 2 became available to stream on Spotify, Valve Studio Orchestra has also hinted the Left 4 Dead soundtrack may soon be joining them.

The soundtrack for Valve's Portal series already exist on Spotify, as do tracks from Valve's Half-Life series. You can find the Valve Studio Orchestra Spotify page here.

Microsoft today announced a new partnership with Spotify for new users of their Xbox Game Pass service. The new partnership is only open for U.S. and U.K residents, though - anyone else will have to pony up for both services, if interested. In essence, should you upgrade your existing Xbox Live subscription to Xbox Game Pass (either on PC or console), which you can currently do for just $1, you will also get access to Spotify's Premium plan for a long 6 months. Fuel for thought and whatever you feel like doing - just diving into one of the more than 100 entries into Microsoft's Game Pass, or the millions of songs available with Spotify.