Unlike arch-rival Apple Music, Spotify has both free and paid service tiers, which explains why the industry-leading streaming platform jumped to a mind-blowing 248 million monthly active users at while racking up "only" 113 million premium subscribers.

Of course, it can be profitable to get people to use Spotify without paying a $9.99 standard monthly fee too, both because those users are likely to be inclined to upgrade to a Premium subscription in the long run and because one of the downsides of not paying for unlimited music streaming is being served the occasional ad, which ...