Depends on how much you listen to as whether you're contributing more or less. I listen to spotify all day while I work, cycling through songs that I like often

Depends on how much you listen to as whether you're contributing more or less. I listen to spotify all day while I work, cycling through songs that I like often once every day or two. An artist that I like enough to have purchased a cd in the past will get multiple plays a day. That means less than a year to generate one cd's worth of revenue from me, and it's going to keep paying out after that because I'll keep listening to it years down the road if I really like it. Also worth noting that 238 streams is ~20 playthroughs of your average 12 song album, for those who frequently listen to entire albums. Add to that the fact that streaming services have made discovery a much bigger thing. The less mainstream artists are now getting the benefit of appearing on streaming radio and such, making their growth that much easier (after they've passed a certain threshold of course).