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I pay GBP10 a month for Spotify. I've never listened to Justin Bieber on Spotify, but lots of other people (who don't pay) do. As a percentage of my cash, how

I pay GBP10 a month for Spotify. I've never listened to Justin Bieber on Spotify, but lots of other people (who don't pay) do. As a percentage of my cash, how much goes to Justin Bieber vs how much to the bands I've actually listened to who have many less total plays? Or - do neither of them get anything?

mfoy_ 9y ago
A fair chunk would go to Bieber, almost nothing would go to the band you listened to exclusively. It's because Spotify pools all the subscription money earmarked for artists into one great pool then divvies it up based on number of plays or play-time or some weird proxy measurement.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
alehul 9y ago
The other comment was correct that most of the pooled money will go to Bieber, however I feel there's a better way to frame it. Economically speaking, you can imagine if Spotify had 100 users paying 10 GBP each; 99 listened exclusively to Justin Bieber, and 1 to 'Band.' All users listen to music in equal frequency. Though 99% of the pooled money — and if divvied up equally, 99% of 'Band' fan's money — goes to Justin Bieber, 'Band' fan's listening weight results in ~10 GBP of the total pool being pulled towards 'Band.' So, in effect, all of 'Band' fan's money could be classified as going towards 'Band.' Also, as a couple side notes in Spotify's revenue structure: 1. 70% goes to artists, 30% goes to Spotify. 2. Over 70% of Spotify users become paying subscribers iirc, so there's not much of a problem with listening weight being pulled by free users.
- mikeash 9y ago
  Isn't the whole problem that users don't listen to music with equal frequency? If I use Spotify more than you do, then in effect some of your subscription money goes to the bands I like instead of the bands you like, which is weird and kind of destructive.
- benjaminjackman 9y ago
  >Economically speaking, you can imagine if Spotify had 100 users paying 10 GBP each; 99 listened exclusively to Justin Bieber, and 1 to 'Band.' _All users listen to music in equal frequency._ [emphasis mine] Well obviously not all users listen to music at the same frequency (which i know you are likely well aware). What is the reason that they don't just take each users $10 then dole that out only according to the songs that person listened to. So if the user listened to one artist the entire month, then that one artist get's the full portion of the $10 that is given to artists. That will help with the situation where: 1. Someone else listens to bieber on repeat 24/7 (why should that affect where another's $10 goes) skewing the sample massively towards that artist. 2. In terms of free users, segment them off and pool the ad revenue again boxed on a per user basis.
  - alehul 9y ago
    I completely agree with this solution being ideal, but I think it's a matter of engineering effort and memory. It's not worth the time investment to build a system more complex, and it's a lot easier memory-wise to just pool it all together for allocation.
- saaaaaam 9y ago
  Very minor correction - 70% goes to rights holders, 30% goes to Spotify. A rights holder may or may not be an artist - quite often, the rights holder for the recording royalty is a record label, and the artist is getting a percentage of what the label takes. There is also the publishing (songwriter) royalty - and the songwriter may or may not be the recording artist.
saaaaaam 9y ago
Pulling numbers out of thin air: Let's assume that Justin Bieber gets 100m streams this month, and that's 5% of all streams on Spotify. That means there are 2bn streams across all artists. If your 10 favourite bands between them get 2,000,000 streams, then they represent 0.1% of streaming activity. Out of your £10, spotify gets £8.33 (taking off the VAT). Spotify pays out 70% of revenues in royalties - so there's £5.83 going out the door. Bieber gets 5% of this - £0.29 - and your bands get £0.0058 - so about 0.6 pence. If there are ten bands, then they are each getting 0.06 pence of your £10. Assuming those bands are self releasing, and there are four people in a band, each band member is making 0.0015 pence out of your initial £10. Whether that money actually goes to Bieber personally, and whether the 0.06p actually goes to the members of the band is another thing entirely, and is dictated the deal that they have (or don't have) with an intermediary such as a record label.

mfoy_ 9y ago

A fair chunk would go to Bieber, almost nothing would go to the band you listened to exclusively. It's because Spotify pools all the subscription money earmarked for artists into one great pool then divvies it up based on number of plays or play-time or some weird proxy measurement.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

alehul 9y ago

The other comment was correct that most of the pooled money will go to Bieber, however I feel there's a better way to frame it. Economically speaking, you can imagine if Spotify had 100 users paying 10 GBP each; 99 listened exclusively to Justin Bieber, and 1 to 'Band.' All users listen to music in equal frequency. Though 99% of the pooled money — and if divvied up equally, 99% of 'Band' fan's money — goes to Justin Bieber, 'Band' fan's listening weight results in ~10 GBP of the total pool being pulled towards 'Band.' So, in effect, all of 'Band' fan's money could be classified as going towards 'Band.' Also, as a couple side notes in Spotify's revenue structure: 1. 70% goes to artists, 30% goes to Spotify. 2. Over 70% of Spotify users become paying subscribers iirc, so there's not much of a problem with listening weight being pulled by free users.

mikeash 9y ago
Isn't the whole problem that users don't listen to music with equal frequency? If I use Spotify more than you do, then in effect some of your subscription money goes to the bands I like instead of the bands you like, which is weird and kind of destructive.
benjaminjackman 9y ago
>Economically speaking, you can imagine if Spotify had 100 users paying 10 GBP each; 99 listened exclusively to Justin Bieber, and 1 to 'Band.' _All users listen to music in equal frequency._ [emphasis mine] Well obviously not all users listen to music at the same frequency (which i know you are likely well aware). What is the reason that they don't just take each users $10 then dole that out only according to the songs that person listened to. So if the user listened to one artist the entire month, then that one artist get's the full portion of the $10 that is given to artists. That will help with the situation where: 1. Someone else listens to bieber on repeat 24/7 (why should that affect where another's $10 goes) skewing the sample massively towards that artist. 2. In terms of free users, segment them off and pool the ad revenue again boxed on a per user basis.
- alehul 9y ago
  I completely agree with this solution being ideal, but I think it's a matter of engineering effort and memory. It's not worth the time investment to build a system more complex, and it's a lot easier memory-wise to just pool it all together for allocation.
saaaaaam 9y ago
Very minor correction - 70% goes to rights holders, 30% goes to Spotify. A rights holder may or may not be an artist - quite often, the rights holder for the recording royalty is a record label, and the artist is getting a percentage of what the label takes. There is also the publishing (songwriter) royalty - and the songwriter may or may not be the recording artist.

saaaaaam 9y ago

Pulling numbers out of thin air: Let's assume that Justin Bieber gets 100m streams this month, and that's 5% of all streams on Spotify. That means there are 2bn streams across all artists. If your 10 favourite bands between them get 2,000,000 streams, then they represent 0.1% of streaming activity. Out of your £10, spotify gets £8.33 (taking off the VAT). Spotify pays out 70% of revenues in royalties - so there's £5.83 going out the door. Bieber gets 5% of this - £0.29 - and your bands get £0.0058 - so about 0.6 pence. If there are ten bands, then they are each getting 0.06 pence of your £10. Assuming those bands are self releasing, and there are four people in a band, each band member is making 0.0015 pence out of your initial £10. Whether that money actually goes to Bieber personally, and whether the 0.06p actually goes to the members of the band is another thing entirely, and is dictated the deal that they have (or don't have) with an intermediary such as a record label.