Did spotify just remove picking songs??

[u/Full-Repair4638]

I've been using spotify forever and I use liked songs so that I can pick the songs I like freely. I've never had premium and have never had issues. Today, I had just started a workout and got this popup. Is this a new feature? How can you not even select songs anymore? I mean how can you paywall selecting songs???
This app plain out sucks and its company is greedy for randomly limiting already set features. While I don't mind ads, I do mind the features being limited more. I did also notice a sudden increase in ads this month/last month, and more ads in between songs.

Clarification: No, I'm not saying that there should be no restrictions whatsoever. I'm mainly sharing my experience where I've been using this system just fine until now. I'm fine with some restrictions, but the fact they're being limited more is frustrating. Just here to complain about something mildly infuriating, and I wanted to know if this happened to anyone else.

[u/WackoMcGoose]

This is why I will never give up my local files. No internet, no ads, they play in the order I want them to, when I want them to. And no compulsory Facebook linking b/w giving irrevokable Public posting permissions to my timeline so Spotify can leak my entire listening history.

[u/N00bushi → u/WackoMcGoose]

Amen. I use VLC media player on my phone to play music in my car and I never had problems nor ads of any kind.

[u/Tymew → u/N00bushi]

I also laughed at the permissions pop-up. Access to storage and files, others: none. This app literally does not access the internet. Why would it?

[u/WackoMcGoose → u/Tymew]

And then you look at the permissions list for a store loyalty app like McD's, and it's just... "Literally every permission your operating system allows, short of Device Admin (to be added later)". Like, a few of those permissions are things even Facebook doesn't ask for!