How tap-to-play works across three streaming services

One question comes up from nearly everyone who sees Spine — users and journalists alike: can you tap an album on the wall and play it?

Yes. And building that meant solving the same feature three different ways, because Apple Music, Tidal and Spotify don't agree on how playback should work.

With Apple Music, it's seamless. A tap on the Spine display starts the album playing through whatever the listener already uses at home — a Sonos system, or anything else. No phone in hand, no second step. That's possible because Apple's framework treats playback as something that can move to another device — the same machinery AirPlay rides on. Spotify and Tidal don't see it that way. For them, playback stays bound to the app session that started it, and a wall display isn't that session.

So Tidal and Spotify work differently. A tap on Spine sends a notification to the listener's phone; they press play there, and the album starts. One extra step.

That extra step was a decision, not an oversight. The honest options were a notification hand-off or no playback at all on those services — and a tap that takes one bounce through your phone beats a tap that does nothing. If Tidal or Spotify open up the way Apple has, Spine's behaviour changes with it.

Spine was never built to be a speaker. Sound comes from the equipment already in the room. What Spine adds is use: a wall of album art that responds to touch.

And the part that made the work worth it — watching someone sync their library, tap an album they love, and just light up. Tap, play, a smile. Building this, I did not once get tired of pulling up The Doors, or Caetano Veloso, or Adele, and hearing a room change.

Next: the software running on the real display.