Spotify officially launches its Follow tab globally on desktops, step one in its mission to become more social

Spotify has officially announced the global public release of its “Follow” tab on desktops, a feature which will replace the People tab to display basic profile details and recommendations.

We first revealed this upcoming feature back in December, and now, following Spotify’s confirmed yet slow roll-out, the feature is available to everyone. This release was timed to accompany an ad push, in partnership with the band Phoenix. We’ve included a video of the “Follow Phoenix’ campaign at the foot of the post, which is currently highlighted on YouTube’s homepage.

Here’s what users should now see (via our earlier look):

Here’s what Spotify’s People tab previously showed for us. Yes, it was useless:

As shown in the top screenshot, my Facebook friends using Spotify have been highlighted randomly, and below it, Spotify has recommended musicians as well. In my experience, the service also decided to auto-follow musicians I have starred.

Spotify says the Follow tab lets you “get music recommendations from your most trusted and most inspiring musical influences.” Spotify also shares that “you can follow friends, artists, influencers and media, including the likes of Barack Obama, David Guetta, Katy Perry, One Direction and Ed Sheeran, and get updated on what they’re listening to in real time.”

For now, there’s still no sign of the discover tab — the other half of the company’s big announcement back in December.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=PxrnyeaKmwk