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> Underneath the rhetoric, Spotify’s aim is to make more money off others’ work. And it’s not just the App Store that they’re trying to squeeze — it’s also arti

> Underneath the rhetoric, Spotify’s aim is to make more money off others’ work. And it’s not just the App Store that they’re trying to squeeze — it’s also artists, musicians and songwriters. Uh, I seem to recall Apple being forced to reverse some brazenly greedy policies for their music service when a high-profile artist called them out and withheld content in protest. For Apple to characterize itself as a champion of exploited artists is pretty disingenuous.

chrischen 8y ago
I think they may be specifically referring to the most recent royalties hike that was opposed by Amazon, Spotify, but supported by Apple. Was most likely a PR move to make Apple look like a supporter of artists.
- epai 8y ago
  According to this infographic (linked below), it seems like Apple Music does give more average revenue per play than Spotify, $0.0060 for vs $0.0044. But in general, Apple Music isn’t _that_ much better than the rest where paying artists goes. It lags far below tidal, for example, which doles out $0.0125 per play on average. https://informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/spotify-apple-music-tidal-music-streaming-services-royalty-rates-compared/ https://informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/spotify-ap...
  - mehrdadn 8y ago
    Holy cow. So you have to play a song 227 times for the artist to make a dollar off the song? Any idea what it's like for just buying the song on Amazon?
    - dannyw 8y ago
      Artists or record labels get about 30 cents of a $0.99 song purchase I believe.
      - mehrdadn 8y ago
        Wow interesting... thank you!
    - newdoctrine 8y ago
      Long time reader, first post. It’s actually more plays than that because Spotify also takes 30% of each stream payout, so it’s odd they would also complain about a 30% mechanical. The premium accounts payout more per stream than freemium accounts. This is also assuming the artist owns the master recording outright, wrote the entire song, and administers their own publishing and mechanical royalties. The latter being almost impossible. More than likely if signed to a label, they will get 10% of sales, the label will get the rest. This is based on traditional album deals where you get 1 point per song. If they are also published, the publisher takes half of their performance royalties, a mere 6-7 percent of stream payout. Also the PRO(ASCAP, BMI, etc) recieves half of the mechanicals, another measly 6-7 percent. To be clear if you don’t speak music payment terms. The people that own the publishing AKA the people that actually write the song, and administer that published writing only get 12-16% per stream payout(not fair). When labels receive around 48%-58% per stream payout, this is for a specialized business loan that pays for the recording + marketing and distribution(way too much). Not to mention this loan has to be totally recouped before the artist sees any of that 10 percent, if they ever do. To sell anything on Amazon, you are charged $40/month for a professional account, or they have an under 40 item plan with a listing fee of $.99 per item. An additional 15% is taken by them on music sales. So if you have less than 40 songs you pay $.99 a month to list them each.
      - mehrdadn 8y ago
        Damn, this sounds so brutal. Thank you for explaining.
  - reading-at-work 8y ago
    However, it's worth noting that Tidal has been accused of inflating its streaming numbers: https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/did-tidal-falsify-streams-to-bulk-up-kanye-west-and-beyonce-numbers/ https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/did-tidal-falsify-str... Tidal's model is supposedly more literally like the proverbial "pie", where the most popular artists get the biggest cut. So if it's true that they inflate numbers for Jay Z and Beyonce, then other artists are being deprived of revenue.
- threeseed 8y ago
  So Apple does actually pay artists more but that's irrelevant because something, something "it's a PR move". I would imagine that the artists probably care even if you don't.
  - dmitriid 8y ago
    It's a big problem that artists don't care. Artists are the ones who know the actual deals they have with publishers/labels. So instead of demanding their fair share from the labels, they go after streaming services who don't even pay them directly: all money goes through labels.
cialowicz 8y ago
> Spotify’s aim is to make more money off others’ work Moreover, that's the pot calling the kettle black. That's the app store in a nutshell -- Apple supplies the marketplace, but is also making a substantial chunk of money off of others’ work.
- eridius 8y ago
  Spotify is essentially a middleman. Apple is much more, they’re building the entire platform.
  - justinjlynn 8y ago
    Spotify build distribution, recommendation infrastructure,and more. They are far more than a warehouse middleman which adds no additional value beyond providing a retail outlet.
    - eridius 8y ago
      There’s a word for what you’re describing here: middleman.
      - B0btheBuilder 8y ago
        I'm struggling to see a distinctive difference between a middleman and a platform...
        itsOnlyLinguist 8y ago
        Aye. Everything is connected. We are all one essentially
        eridius 8y ago
        A car dealership is a middleman. A auto manufacturer is a platform. The car dealership sits between you and the manufacturer, making it easier for you to buy the car, but taking a cut. But you don't need the dealership in order to use your car. Spotify makes it easier for you to find music, but once you've found music, you don't need Spotify anymore (not a perfect analogy since you need to pay to purchase the music from a real store if you're ditching Spotify, but close enough). The auto manufacturer actually builds the car, supplies the replacement parts and manuals for repair, provides software updates for the car's computerized systems, manages any kind of in-car network GPS systems, etc. This is Apple. They develop the whole OS, including all the frameworks that developers actually use to build their apps (and the developer tools too, for that matter), they keep it updated, adding new features and fixing bugs. Apple provides ongoing value to both the user and the developer over the entire lifetime of the app.
thegayngler 8y ago
Spotify literally sued artists and musicians because they didnt agree with a court ordered fee increase...but Apples hypocritical on this issue somehow. Spotify also uses Apples infrastructure and marketing tools for its app. I dont think Ive seen any app creator up on stage at Apple events more than Spotify. Its not like Spotify will use Apples tools and ecosystem one time then stop. Its ongoing and 15% is reasonable. Apple literally changed the app store rules to accomodate Spotify and everyone knows it. I will say that I think Spotify should be able to advertise payment outside the app.
- chj 8y ago
  Well, why don't Apple Music pay its "fair share" of 15%~30% to Google since it's hosted on Google Play? They are also using Google's tools and ecosystem.
  - xvector 8y ago
    Google also takes a 30% commission.
    - chj 8y ago
      Apple doesn't have to pay because Google is so generous as to allow them to link to their own payment method.
- Orphis 8y ago
  Don't forget that it is a symbiotic environment. Spotify needs to be on the Apple ecosystem as it is massive and Apple needs to have Spotify in its ecosystem because that's what the users want. As for payments, they all follow the same scheme more or less and redistribute about 70% of the revenue to the rightholders. If the services are priced the same, it's exactly the same for artists. The big difference is that Spotify has a permanent free tier, which admittedly makes less money short term, but it is driving acquisition of premium users faster than any other methods. The alternative being no revenue, it's just fine. Apple on the same topic doesn't care about razor thin margins on this product, or even losses. They are a hardware vendor, so as long as they still sell their devices, they will be fine.
bunnycorn 8y ago
Taylor Swift is an hypocrite. She called out Apple when she was at her high, now she bends to Spotify and launches exclusive content on the platform. The platform that doesn't want to pay the artists even when they have all the right.
- pbhjpbhj 8y ago
  What did she actually say about Apple? She mightn't be a hypocrite, just she may not care as long as she's paid??
rkachowski 8y ago
Since when have Apple's PR releases seemed so snarky? I haven't seen so many phrased like this, which underneath the layers of pseudo support for developers and artists, is basically a big "NO U".
- dkrich 8y ago
  I was thinking this too. I’m not a big fan of this “we’re champions of privacy and the little guy” bullshit Apple has been spewing lately. They have some good points and so does Spotify. But the way they address these issues comes across very condescendingly. Want to talk about exploiting others work to make money, how about we start with their factories which they use to exploit other countries’ cheap labor?
  - briandear 8y ago
    https://www.apple.com/supplier-responsibility/pdf/Apple_SR_2019_Progress_Report.pdf https://www.apple.com/supplier-responsibility/pdf/Apple_SR_2...
- madeofpalk 8y ago
  I feel the tone used here was an appropriate matching of what Spotify used against them.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
BlueToth 8y ago
That greedy policy was not paying artist for the free period, like Spotify is doing!
m-p-3 8y ago
> Spotify’s aim is to make more money off others’ work And taking 30% of each transactions is exactly what you're accusing Spotify from doing, Apple.
Gaelan 8y ago
For context: Apple's original plan was that artists would get no royalties from users using Apple Music's (3-month) trial. Taylor Swift threatened to (maybe actually did for a bit?) pull her music, and Apple backed down.
deminature 8y ago
Spotify also only recently became profitable [1]. I'm not endorsing their extremely low artist payout rates, but it's not because they're greedily hoarding money the way Apple is implying. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/6/18214331/spotify-earnings-financial-announcement-profits-music-streaming-podcast https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/6/18214331/spotify-earnings-...
mcphage 8y ago
> Uh, I seem to recall Apple being forced to reverse some brazenly greedy policies for their music service when a high-profile artist called them out and withheld content in protest. I think you may want to refresh your memory on that. The subject was Apple paying artists during the trial period—when Apple itself isn't being paid. Which isn't brazenly greedy, since (a) they're not making any money during that time, and (b) that was and is still the standard. What was different about Apple was that their trial period—the period where users could subscribe to Apple Music without paying Apple anything—was 3 months, instead of the industry standard 1 month. Swift had a legitimate complaint about not getting paid for 3 months of listening, but to describe "2 more months where listeners don't have to pay Apple a dime" as "some brazenly greedy policies" misses the mark by quite a bit.

chrischen 8y ago

I think they may be specifically referring to the most recent royalties hike that was opposed by Amazon, Spotify, but supported by Apple. Was most likely a PR move to make Apple look like a supporter of artists.

epai 8y ago
According to this infographic (linked below), it seems like Apple Music does give more average revenue per play than Spotify, $0.0060 for vs $0.0044. But in general, Apple Music isn’t _that_ much better than the rest where paying artists goes. It lags far below tidal, for example, which doles out $0.0125 per play on average. https://informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/spotify-apple-music-tidal-music-streaming-services-royalty-rates-compared/ https://informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/spotify-ap...
- mehrdadn 8y ago
  Holy cow. So you have to play a song 227 times for the artist to make a dollar off the song? Any idea what it's like for just buying the song on Amazon?
  - dannyw 8y ago
    Artists or record labels get about 30 cents of a $0.99 song purchase I believe.
    - mehrdadn 8y ago
      Wow interesting... thank you!
  - newdoctrine 8y ago
    Long time reader, first post. It’s actually more plays than that because Spotify also takes 30% of each stream payout, so it’s odd they would also complain about a 30% mechanical. The premium accounts payout more per stream than freemium accounts. This is also assuming the artist owns the master recording outright, wrote the entire song, and administers their own publishing and mechanical royalties. The latter being almost impossible. More than likely if signed to a label, they will get 10% of sales, the label will get the rest. This is based on traditional album deals where you get 1 point per song. If they are also published, the publisher takes half of their performance royalties, a mere 6-7 percent of stream payout. Also the PRO(ASCAP, BMI, etc) recieves half of the mechanicals, another measly 6-7 percent. To be clear if you don’t speak music payment terms. The people that own the publishing AKA the people that actually write the song, and administer that published writing only get 12-16% per stream payout(not fair). When labels receive around 48%-58% per stream payout, this is for a specialized business loan that pays for the recording + marketing and distribution(way too much). Not to mention this loan has to be totally recouped before the artist sees any of that 10 percent, if they ever do. To sell anything on Amazon, you are charged $40/month for a professional account, or they have an under 40 item plan with a listing fee of $.99 per item. An additional 15% is taken by them on music sales. So if you have less than 40 songs you pay $.99 a month to list them each.
    - mehrdadn 8y ago
      Damn, this sounds so brutal. Thank you for explaining.
- reading-at-work 8y ago
  However, it's worth noting that Tidal has been accused of inflating its streaming numbers: https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/did-tidal-falsify-streams-to-bulk-up-kanye-west-and-beyonce-numbers/ https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/did-tidal-falsify-str... Tidal's model is supposedly more literally like the proverbial "pie", where the most popular artists get the biggest cut. So if it's true that they inflate numbers for Jay Z and Beyonce, then other artists are being deprived of revenue.
threeseed 8y ago
So Apple does actually pay artists more but that's irrelevant because something, something "it's a PR move". I would imagine that the artists probably care even if you don't.
- dmitriid 8y ago
  It's a big problem that artists don't care. Artists are the ones who know the actual deals they have with publishers/labels. So instead of demanding their fair share from the labels, they go after streaming services who don't even pay them directly: all money goes through labels.

cialowicz 8y ago

> Spotify’s aim is to make more money off others’ work Moreover, that's the pot calling the kettle black. That's the app store in a nutshell -- Apple supplies the marketplace, but is also making a substantial chunk of money off of others’ work.

eridius 8y ago
Spotify is essentially a middleman. Apple is much more, they’re building the entire platform.
- justinjlynn 8y ago
  Spotify build distribution, recommendation infrastructure,and more. They are far more than a warehouse middleman which adds no additional value beyond providing a retail outlet.
  - eridius 8y ago
    There’s a word for what you’re describing here: middleman.
    - B0btheBuilder 8y ago
      I'm struggling to see a distinctive difference between a middleman and a platform...
      - itsOnlyLinguist 8y ago
        Aye. Everything is connected. We are all one essentially
      - eridius 8y ago
        A car dealership is a middleman. A auto manufacturer is a platform. The car dealership sits between you and the manufacturer, making it easier for you to buy the car, but taking a cut. But you don't need the dealership in order to use your car. Spotify makes it easier for you to find music, but once you've found music, you don't need Spotify anymore (not a perfect analogy since you need to pay to purchase the music from a real store if you're ditching Spotify, but close enough). The auto manufacturer actually builds the car, supplies the replacement parts and manuals for repair, provides software updates for the car's computerized systems, manages any kind of in-car network GPS systems, etc. This is Apple. They develop the whole OS, including all the frameworks that developers actually use to build their apps (and the developer tools too, for that matter), they keep it updated, adding new features and fixing bugs. Apple provides ongoing value to both the user and the developer over the entire lifetime of the app.

thegayngler 8y ago

Spotify literally sued artists and musicians because they didnt agree with a court ordered fee increase...but Apples hypocritical on this issue somehow. Spotify also uses Apples infrastructure and marketing tools for its app. I dont think Ive seen any app creator up on stage at Apple events more than Spotify. Its not like Spotify will use Apples tools and ecosystem one time then stop. Its ongoing and 15% is reasonable. Apple literally changed the app store rules to accomodate Spotify and everyone knows it. I will say that I think Spotify should be able to advertise payment outside the app.

chj 8y ago
Well, why don't Apple Music pay its "fair share" of 15%~30% to Google since it's hosted on Google Play? They are also using Google's tools and ecosystem.
- xvector 8y ago
  Google also takes a 30% commission.
  - chj 8y ago
    Apple doesn't have to pay because Google is so generous as to allow them to link to their own payment method.
Orphis 8y ago
Don't forget that it is a symbiotic environment. Spotify needs to be on the Apple ecosystem as it is massive and Apple needs to have Spotify in its ecosystem because that's what the users want. As for payments, they all follow the same scheme more or less and redistribute about 70% of the revenue to the rightholders. If the services are priced the same, it's exactly the same for artists. The big difference is that Spotify has a permanent free tier, which admittedly makes less money short term, but it is driving acquisition of premium users faster than any other methods. The alternative being no revenue, it's just fine. Apple on the same topic doesn't care about razor thin margins on this product, or even losses. They are a hardware vendor, so as long as they still sell their devices, they will be fine.

bunnycorn 8y ago

Taylor Swift is an hypocrite. She called out Apple when she was at her high, now she bends to Spotify and launches exclusive content on the platform. The platform that doesn't want to pay the artists even when they have all the right.

pbhjpbhj 8y ago
What did she actually say about Apple? She mightn't be a hypocrite, just she may not care as long as she's paid??

rkachowski 8y ago

Since when have Apple's PR releases seemed so snarky? I haven't seen so many phrased like this, which underneath the layers of pseudo support for developers and artists, is basically a big "NO U".

dkrich 8y ago
I was thinking this too. I’m not a big fan of this “we’re champions of privacy and the little guy” bullshit Apple has been spewing lately. They have some good points and so does Spotify. But the way they address these issues comes across very condescendingly. Want to talk about exploiting others work to make money, how about we start with their factories which they use to exploit other countries’ cheap labor?
- briandear 8y ago
  https://www.apple.com/supplier-responsibility/pdf/Apple_SR_2019_Progress_Report.pdf https://www.apple.com/supplier-responsibility/pdf/Apple_SR_2...
madeofpalk 8y ago
I feel the tone used here was an appropriate matching of what Spotify used against them.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

BlueToth 8y ago

That greedy policy was not paying artist for the free period, like Spotify is doing!

m-p-3 8y ago

> Spotify’s aim is to make more money off others’ work And taking 30% of each transactions is exactly what you're accusing Spotify from doing, Apple.

Gaelan 8y ago

For context: Apple's original plan was that artists would get no royalties from users using Apple Music's (3-month) trial. Taylor Swift threatened to (maybe actually did for a bit?) pull her music, and Apple backed down.

deminature 8y ago

Spotify also only recently became profitable [1]. I'm not endorsing their extremely low artist payout rates, but it's not because they're greedily hoarding money the way Apple is implying. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/6/18214331/spotify-earnings-financial-announcement-profits-music-streaming-podcast https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/6/18214331/spotify-earnings-...

mcphage 8y ago

> Uh, I seem to recall Apple being forced to reverse some brazenly greedy policies for their music service when a high-profile artist called them out and withheld content in protest. I think you may want to refresh your memory on that. The subject was Apple paying artists during the trial period—when Apple itself isn't being paid. Which isn't brazenly greedy, since (a) they're not making any money during that time, and (b) that was and is still the standard. What was different about Apple was that their trial period—the period where users could subscribe to Apple Music without paying Apple anything—was 3 months, instead of the industry standard 1 month. Swift had a legitimate complaint about not getting paid for 3 months of listening, but to describe "2 more months where listeners don't have to pay Apple a dime" as "some brazenly greedy policies" misses the mark by quite a bit.