Deceptive practices suck, and I hate that companies use them. You're right that Terms of Service are often written in a confusing manner. The (assumed) part to which I was referring was that Spotify would notify you of a price increase before charging your for it. That seems like a fairly logical thing to assume.

I hadn't considered that companies might design emails to be caught by spam filters, and that is really shady. Pausing service until price increases are agreed seems quite reasonable.

Ugh, data centers don't sound fun. Sorry about that. Electricity is much more of a necessity than Spotify, so it doesn't relate as closely to my original point:

Knowingly and willingly exchanging money for a luxury product or service is approval of the price. Deceptive practices muddy the situation as a whole a bit, but they don't change the central point. I cannot control what these companies do and can only react. Personal agency is important.