Forgotify plays never-listened-to Spotify songs Published duration 31 January 2014

image copyright Forgotify image caption Users have to be logged in to Spotify for the new service to work

A new music streaming service that only plays songs that no-one has listened to on Spotify has been launched.

According to data released by Spotify only 80% of the 20 million songs on its site have been listened to at least once.

The founders of Forgotify said that the four million unheard tracks were "a musical travesty".

Users of Forgotify have to be logged in to Spotify for it to work.

Once logged in, listeners are presented with a track that they can listen to and share. If it is not to their taste there is a "next" button that will offer them another previously unplayed track.

'Neglected songs'

Jazzy American Ballads for Piano, and Sally in Our Alley, Op. 108, No. 25 by Robert White from the album "Robert White Sings Beethoven (Remastered)" were two examples of the unheard tracks listed on the new service.

Lane Jordan, J Hausmann and Nate Gagnon, who set up Forgotify, said that they were lovers of music and that they were giving "these neglected songs another way to reach your earholes".

Mr Jordan said in an interview with Time that the website uses an embedded Spotify player and runs a program searching Spotify for songs with a "0″ popularity rating, indicating that the song has never been selected by a user.

He said any song that has been played even once is removed.

Although he added that the four million unlistened-to tracks are unlikely to decline as Spotify adds new music all the time.

Twitter users were keen to talk about the new service but one did wonder how popular the music would be.

"Lovely idea, surfacing songs that have never been played on Spotify. However, there's usually a reason they're ignored," tweeted @superglaze.

A spokesperson for Spotify said they had no comment to make about Forgotify's launch.

Music is listed on Spotify via record labels or "aggregators" that already have a delivery model in place with the company.