You Have Not Yet Heard Your Favourite Song

Why it’s on the list: McDonald spent a decade as Spotify’s data alchemist, building the listening maps behind Wrapped and Discover; this is his book on what streaming did to how music is found and heard.

Where I saw it: Recommended by @GergelyOrosz on X (December 15, 2024), who came to it by way of a disappointing Spotify Wrapped and then went looking for whoever had built the earlier ones: “His name is Glenn McDonald and he is the author of this book.” McDonald had left Spotify by then.

Connections

• Spotify — the company McDonald built the data work inside.
• Gergely Orosz — the recommender.