Podcasts have really ruined Spotify's mobile app. The worst part is that there is space for a "Podcasts" tab in the bottom bar that would have made everyone happy by clearly separating types of content.
Apple has gone a similar route recently with reducing the Activity/Fitness app to just two/three tabs, mushing all sorts of content together. I hope this doesn't become another user-hostile UI trend.
Spotify have obviously weighed the pros and cons of being actively intrusive into their user's experience in order to build brand awareness of their nascent podcast business.
Personally they keep advertising podcasts by people who I find morally or politically objectionable, which makes me quite unhappy that I cannot hide or remove their content (and podcasts as a whole) from the Home Screen.
Good point. Honestly, in Spotify I don't even want to see political content from people I agree with. Sometimes I just want to take a break from my European duty to care about US politics 24/7, but it's getting hard to do so anywhere on the internet.
Apple has gone a similar route recently with reducing the Activity/Fitness app to just two/three tabs, mushing all sorts of content together. I hope this doesn't become another user-hostile UI trend.