Am I understanding correctly that you're looking for a HN poster to explain to you the complexities involved in maintaining compliance, legal and licensing for a globally distributed service, just so you can decide whether or not to be outraged by the size of Spotify's staff count?

I am not outraged. I am baffled. And yes, if somebody is willing to give a bit more details, they can be informative (and a few people already did).

Here’s just one example of where Spotify didn’t actually have enough staff to understand the legal requirements of one single product decision: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24764371

Pretty enlightening, thank you.

You can start by looking through their job board throughout time to understand the kinds of positions a company like Spotify need to fill in order to operate globally: https://web.archive.org/web/20230000000000*/https://www.life...

> I can accept that... if it's said how exactly.

You are assuming that Spotify is just the consumer facing app, but it's not. It's far more.

You've got all the bits of Spotify you don't see. Like:

* Apps and interfaces for labels to ingest their music

* Reporting and billing so all those labels get paid

* An ad platform to service free-tier users

* Embedded systems. Did you know Spotify has a commercial hardware division to integrate Spotify onto smart speakers and devices?

The surface is huge.