3 announces Spotify tariff for HTC Hero

Fancy picking up a virtually limitless supply of tunes to go with free minutes and texts on the HTC Hero? Thanks to a new tariff from 3, that will be possible from next month.

Just buy the Stuff Award-winning HTC Hero – the handset will cost £100 on the £35 per month, 2 year contract – and they'll throw in a two-year sub to Spotify Premium  worth £240.

That means unlimited free streamed music, minus the annoying ads telling you who to vote for.

Spotify's mobile app lets subscribers stream around six million tracks over a 3G connection, and can cache tunes for stints without reception. Unlike the desktop application, there isn't a free version available.

If the novel in-tariff sub scheme is successful, it could challenge Apple's dominant App Store model and turn app-land on its head with networks scrabbling to include popular software on their tariffs.

Would you rather have apps bundled into your phone contract, or pay your own way via an app store? Let us know below.