The thing is, the paid tier of GPM is really only for on-demand streaming of the music catalogue and removing ads in the radio. As an upload-only user, I really see no reason to pay money for a service that I am fully enjoying for free. If Google were to add back (and continue developing) the removed My Library features and decide to make a payment tier for use-cases like mine, I'd happily subscribe. Their focus on "your library anywhere, with extra features" is something that really stands out. I'd hate to see GPM turn into just another stream-what's-licensed service.
Actually Apple Music offers exactly this. There might be other reasons you'd prefer not to use it, which is fine, but in terms of offering they're actually quite similar.
Except Apple will actually allow you to upload more songs than Google Music, up to 100,000.
I did really like Google Play Music, and allowing the local library sync as a free draw was a really smart move. But the sour taste they left in my mouth by killing my discount plan and ruining the UX meant I looked at other options. Signed up for Apple Music day one and it has improved leaps and bounds since then.
It's very clearly a huge priority for Apple, and they aren't resting on it.
works on linux and there's also an unofficial API
https://unofficial-google-music-api.readthedocs.io/en/latest...
I make playlists almost daily for work and I use the API to manage them, dedupe, delete old ones, and what not. Super convenient.
But the web UX has gone to crap. There was an update a few months ago that really killed its performance and broke the playlist sorting. They need to eat some of their dogfood.
It's totally open source, has a relatively decent web player, allows you to stream your music anywhere, allows you to create accounts for others to have access to your music, can connect with Plex/subsonic to work with other devices/clients. I use DSub on my phone, and can sync music offline (like GPlay Music). Only downsides really is that it requires a web server and the initial import can take some time if your library is very large.
Describe yourself:
"I'll never let go of my Squeezebox and/or enjoy living in the past and/or need it to run on Windows" https://github.com/Logitech/slimserver
"I'm a sysadmin with a Roku SoundBridge" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firefly_Media_Server is another, specifically for Roku Soundbridge and iTunes streaming protocols.
"I'm running FreeNAS and just want to use a plugin" Subsonic is another http://www.subsonic.org/pages/index.jsp . Can also do Shoutcast streaming.
"I know what RMAF stands for and/or like messing with SBCs and/or spending $10k on audio equipment" http://www.runeaudio.com
"I run Arch with a tiling wm" Lastly are the mpd family of servers and clients. These are for the hardcore nerds who love recompiling ffmpeg from source. Servers: https://www.musicpd.org // https://www.mopidy.com
Clients: https://www.musicpd.org/clients/ // https://docs.mopidy.com/en/latest/clients/mpd/ // http://www.runeaudio.com/clients/
I keep hearing about how nimble and agile Spotify is, and how their tech stack and team structure lets them add features quickly. I wonder why they haven't offered upload storage yet, and whether that's coming?
They are stricter than Spotify with regional licenses unfortunately. I listen to a lot of Japanese artists that are on Spotify but not on GPM in Europe (but are there in Japan), I simply imported their albums and ripped them and uploaded them on the service and now they behave exactly the same. Not ideal, but still. For like 90% of the rest of the library (anecdotal experience at least) it's the same as Spotify, which is pretty great.
DISCLAIMER: I work at Google, but I've been using GPM long before that. These are my opinions and not those of my employer, yadda yadda.