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Off topic but it reminds of the book by Jack Stratton called "How I made $290,000 selling books" priced at $290,000. Couldn’t find the original listing. The a

Off topic but it reminds of the book by Jack Stratton called "How I made $290,000 selling books" priced at $290,000. Couldn’t find the original listing. The author is a member of Vulfpeck, pretty fun band. https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/6ofdt6/how_i_made_290000_selling_books/ https://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/6ofdt6/how_i_made_29...

ehnto 6y ago
Vulpeck also made some noise with their album Sleepify, which was an album of silent tracks they used to game Spotify's pay for plays model. It made them ~$20,000 before Spotify took it down. https://www.theverge.com/2014/5/7/5690590/spotify-removes-silent-album-that-earned-indie-band-20000 https://www.theverge.com/2014/5/7/5690590/spotify-removes-si...
- Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago
  Epic. I love malicious compliance in the face of dictatorial companies.
  - srtjstjsj 6y ago
    That's a funny way of saying fraud. Do you also love companies that send boxes of sawdust or online store customers ?
    - staticautomatic 6y ago
      I think this is more in the vein of Cards Against Humanity shenanigans.
      - bombastry 6y ago
        It's a lot more like the fraud attempted in Office Space (... and Superman 3). Spotify artist payments are not based on play counts directly. They are actually based on Spotify's total revenue and the proportion of global Spotify streams that the artist received. As a result of these extra plays, Vulpeck's stream rate increases, but Spotify gets virtually no extra revenue (especially since a user would have to be a premium subscriber to get a fully quiet experience listening to the album). Vulpeck gets paid a bit more, and everyone else gets paid a minuscule amount less. For reference, here's one article that mentions this model of how Spotify pays its artists: https://qz.com/1660465/the-way-spotify-and-apple-music-pays-artists-isnt-fair/ https://qz.com/1660465/the-way-spotify-and-apple-music-pays-...
    - aidenn0 6y ago
      It's not fraud unless they said that the tracks are not silence. If I buy sawdust from someone and they send me sawdust, and it's structured so that Amazon pays them some money for it, that's gaming the system, not fraud. Amazon can stop allowing them to do it (just like spotify did).
      - barumi 6y ago
        > If I buy sawdust from someone and they send me sawdust The validity of your point depends on whether you can demonstrate that people do pay spotify to listen to silence.
        sarakayakomzin 6y ago
        No, it doesn't. Spotify has a premium model but even for premium users, there was no way to insert any kind of delay or temporary pause in a playlist. These tracks were frequently inserted into playlists to make up for Spotify's lack of a basic feature -- that's why it got so many streams in the first place. There wasn't any kind of fraud from the Artist, Spotify just got salty because they realized a an album like this would mean they have to pay for a feature in their own software.
        aidenn0 6y ago
        My understanding is that people would intentionally put these tracks in their playlist to get periods of silence scheduled ahead of time. If that's not the case, then my original comment was wrong.
      - WalterBright 6y ago
        > It's not fraud unless they said that the tracks are not silence. It is fraud, and although IANAL you'd lose in court.
        8note 6y ago
        I'd lean copyright infringement? Probably has no audible difference from a John Cage song
    - Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago
      What precedent can you cite to justify your claim?
    - DaniloDias 6y ago
      Maybe go learn Esperanto so you can bring joy to the lives of others.
  - fastball 6y ago
    All this ends up doing is decreasing the amount of money going to the artists that people are actually listening to.
- selimthegrim 6y ago
  Did they not also sell their 10th track as an ad on some album? (not the first with that idea though)
WalterBright 6y ago
A pre-internet joke on the same topic. An ad in the classifieds advertised "How to make money with classified ads. Send $10 to xxxxxx". Sending $10 got you a letter that said: "Place a classified ad with the text `How to make money with classified ads. Send $10 to xxxxx`"
- abnry 6y ago
  If you think that's great, you'd love this website: [How Many People Paid 1 Dollar To See How Many People Paid 1 Dollar](http://www.howmanypeoplepaid1dollartoseehowmanypeoplepaid1dollar.com/ http://www.howmanypeoplepaid1dollartoseehowmanypeoplepaid1do...)

ehnto 6y ago

Vulpeck also made some noise with their album Sleepify, which was an album of silent tracks they used to game Spotify's pay for plays model. It made them ~$20,000 before Spotify took it down. https://www.theverge.com/2014/5/7/5690590/spotify-removes-silent-album-that-earned-indie-band-20000 https://www.theverge.com/2014/5/7/5690590/spotify-removes-si...

Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago
Epic. I love malicious compliance in the face of dictatorial companies.
- srtjstjsj 6y ago
  That's a funny way of saying fraud. Do you also love companies that send boxes of sawdust or online store customers ?
  - staticautomatic 6y ago
    I think this is more in the vein of Cards Against Humanity shenanigans.
    - bombastry 6y ago
      It's a lot more like the fraud attempted in Office Space (... and Superman 3). Spotify artist payments are not based on play counts directly. They are actually based on Spotify's total revenue and the proportion of global Spotify streams that the artist received. As a result of these extra plays, Vulpeck's stream rate increases, but Spotify gets virtually no extra revenue (especially since a user would have to be a premium subscriber to get a fully quiet experience listening to the album). Vulpeck gets paid a bit more, and everyone else gets paid a minuscule amount less. For reference, here's one article that mentions this model of how Spotify pays its artists: https://qz.com/1660465/the-way-spotify-and-apple-music-pays-artists-isnt-fair/ https://qz.com/1660465/the-way-spotify-and-apple-music-pays-...
  - aidenn0 6y ago
    It's not fraud unless they said that the tracks are not silence. If I buy sawdust from someone and they send me sawdust, and it's structured so that Amazon pays them some money for it, that's gaming the system, not fraud. Amazon can stop allowing them to do it (just like spotify did).
    - barumi 6y ago
      > If I buy sawdust from someone and they send me sawdust The validity of your point depends on whether you can demonstrate that people do pay spotify to listen to silence.
      - sarakayakomzin 6y ago
        No, it doesn't. Spotify has a premium model but even for premium users, there was no way to insert any kind of delay or temporary pause in a playlist. These tracks were frequently inserted into playlists to make up for Spotify's lack of a basic feature -- that's why it got so many streams in the first place. There wasn't any kind of fraud from the Artist, Spotify just got salty because they realized a an album like this would mean they have to pay for a feature in their own software.
      - aidenn0 6y ago
        My understanding is that people would intentionally put these tracks in their playlist to get periods of silence scheduled ahead of time. If that's not the case, then my original comment was wrong.
    - WalterBright 6y ago
      > It's not fraud unless they said that the tracks are not silence. It is fraud, and although IANAL you'd lose in court.
      - 8note 6y ago
        I'd lean copyright infringement? Probably has no audible difference from a John Cage song
  - Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago
    What precedent can you cite to justify your claim?
  - DaniloDias 6y ago
    Maybe go learn Esperanto so you can bring joy to the lives of others.
- fastball 6y ago
  All this ends up doing is decreasing the amount of money going to the artists that people are actually listening to.
selimthegrim 6y ago
Did they not also sell their 10th track as an ad on some album? (not the first with that idea though)

WalterBright 6y ago

A pre-internet joke on the same topic. An ad in the classifieds advertised "How to make money with classified ads. Send $10 to xxxxxx". Sending $10 got you a letter that said: "Place a classified ad with the text `How to make money with classified ads. Send $10 to xxxxx`"

abnry 6y ago
If you think that's great, you'd love this website: [How Many People Paid 1 Dollar To See How Many People Paid 1 Dollar](http://www.howmanypeoplepaid1dollartoseehowmanypeoplepaid1dollar.com/ http://www.howmanypeoplepaid1dollartoseehowmanypeoplepaid1do...)