Political Economy/Ecology of Streaming

[barfle]

Spotify openly declares it will squeeze anyone who's not a mega-artist even more than it already does:
https://www.therestisnoise.com/2023/11/new-hatefulness-from-spotify.html

Makes me glad that I’ve never given them a nickel.

 

[humprof]

A former exec at Google (and policy advisor at the FCC) explains how streaming services make money and why their model is terrible for all but a tiny minority of musicians--and now, as streamers move into audiobooks, authors. (She cites Rolling Stone's analysis that in 2020, "90 percent of . . . royalties . . . went to the top 0.8 percent of artists . . . That leaves a vast majority--including many in even that small group--struggling to earn a living.")

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/13/opinion/audiobooks-spotify-streaming-algorithm.html
(Here's a "gift" version for non-subscribers who have used up their monthly allotment of free articles.)

 

[par4ken]

One thing that I hate about streaming is that it gives information about what people are listening to and how often. What is wrong with that is that it gives the streamers licence to pay the already popular "superstars" even more while screwing over the little guy.

With the model of selling physical media or downloads there is no further data supplied regarding how often a title is being actually played, just that it sold a copy. I'm a champion of privacy, what I do or listen to is my business only and should not be shared with either big brother or big business!

 

[humprof]

I guess this is already sort of a "vanity" thread, so let me add links to a few related posts (#31-33) in a thread about the acquisition of the Yes catalog, while I still remember where they are.

And on a related note: here's an Op-Ed by music writer Marc Hogan in today's Times on the economic logic of the current music business, "Same Old Song: Private Equity Is Destroying Our Music Ecosystem." (Gift link for non-subscribers who have used up their allotment of free articles; it's good for 30 days.)

 

[pat bateman]

No musician I know expects to make a living from streaming royalties. (For that matter, no touring musician I know expects to making a living from touring, either--it's a losing proposition.) The point isn't about making a living from streaming, but about fairness and equity. The streaming services are making tons of money, but the vast majority of musicians aren't.

I don't necessarily agree with picking on the streaming services. I don't have a rock hard opinion on this, but hear me out. I think it's the modern day version of picking on Tower Records because they needed to sell CD's at $20.00 ($31.00 inflation adjusted from 2000 - wow) to make a profit and made basically nothing on the $13.99 new releases. We all knew and heard anecdotally that 95% of the money went to the record company, and it's no different than today with streamers.

1. Spotify - took in 12 BILLION in revenue in 2023, but they are not profitable. They hope to be this year finally with 236M paid subscribers and something like another 450M ad supported users. Think about that - 600M people can subscribe/use a service and the retailer (Spotify) cannot be profitable - incredible. So, we can deduce the the lions share is going to the record label, as it should IMO, however how the label distributes to the Artists - that is a whole other conversation, and we all know its peanuts.

2. Apple Music - impossible to know if they're profitable, since Apple Music - and all of their services - are more about keeping the customer in their ecosystem, and quite possibly (probably) operates at a loss if looked at independently.

3. Tidal - made 7M in gross profit, which is a worthless # to know. Who knows what the bottom line is after expenses, but they are failing.

4. Quboz - who knows, the company is private.