Samsung [2] and Spotify [3] have partnered [4] to bring Spotify's streaming service to European owners of Samsung Smart TV 2012 E Series sets. Support for other Samsung Smart TV models, Blu-ray players, and home theater systems will come later this year.

The deal puts Spotify, which will appear as a downloadable app, in a position to become truly mainstream, as this is the first partnership of its kind between a streaming music service and a hardware company.

One catch: You'll need to be a paying subscriber of Spotify Premium in order to use the app. Spotify will initially offer free trials of Premium to entice would-be subscribers, which would allow it to introduce new users to the convenience of having playlists that are always synced across devices that now include your television.

It's the latest example of a large tech company looking to get into the digital music fray through a partnership or acquisition of an existing music service that has already done the record label heavy lifting, rather than attempt to create its own service from the ground up. Several past attempts by such companies--including Microsoft's discontinued Zune [5], Google Music [6], and Samsung's own Music Hub [7]--have either failed to gain traction or have yet to prove long-term viability. It'll be interesting to see if Apple [8] will overturn that trend, should it continue [9] on with its plans to create its own Internet radio service.

[Image: Flickr user Lars Plougmann [10]]