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> If you only listened to one song in a month, should that band get your full subscription cut? I don't understand why this hypothetical would be an argument a

> If you only listened to one song in a month, should that band get your full subscription cut? I don't understand why this hypothetical would be an argument against user-centric payments. If you only listened to one band in a month, what claim does any other band have on your (net of Spotify's cut) payment?

kazinator 6y ago
What if you didn't just listen to one band for a month? If you mostly listened to one band, but then also to another band just once, should it be 50:50? If not, then you're somehow going by number of plays. (Definitely though, only those two artists should get any of your money, no matter how it is sliced.)
- jonplackett 6y ago
  Yeah exactly. I’m just using the one band thing as an extreme example. My money would just get split between who I listen to.
  - nefitty 6y ago
    There’s some evidence that current streaming habits are actually affecting how music is produced. For example, it seems most listeners will spend a few seconds listening to a second before deciding whether to skip it, so intro sections in pop music are disappearing. If your money was split between what you listened to, wouldn’t it make sense to split by time listened or length of the tracks? That might start incentivizing musicians to create inordinately longer songs to try to get a bigger slice of your money... hmm...
    - piva00 6y ago
      Listening habits has always shaped how music is made. David Byrne explains that quite well in "How Music Works", his take on the history of how music is made and how it sounds being correlated how it was usually played is quite interesting. Tribal music could be more beat/drum focused as those are played in open air, where the bass sounds can propagate without room interference. Going from there to the point where he talks about concert halls and how different architectures (from cathedrals to halls designed for orchestras) shaped how music was made to sound in that kind of room. And later on how recordings have changed all of that. So music has been shaped and will continuously be shaped by how people listen to it. Nowadays music is a very personal experience, listening at home, on our headphones, we experience it outside of the context it's existed for millenia before good recordings were possible. Where the experience of listening live music was always attached to the place it was played. Now we listen to it completely devoid of space, this shapes the kind of music made, how it sounds and so on.
- coldtea 6y ago
  >What if you didn't just listen to one band for a month? If you mostly listened to one band, but then also to another band just once, should it be 50:50? If not, then you're somehow going by number of plays. Going by ratio of plays of bands I listened to makes total sense. That being difficult, even a 50:50 between my 100 streams band and one I listed for 1 stream is still better that sending those money to third bands...
  - srg0 6y ago
    Would you count total time or total plays? In one case you give too much to ambient noise recordings and similar genres, in the other bands like Ramones would get an unfair advantage.
    - coldtea 6y ago
      A composite count metric that smooths play count for larger tunes vs more plays for shorter tunes would solve most of that. E.g. 10 plays of Ramones 2.5 minute songs == 10 unit's worth == 2 plays of an hour-long ambient piece. The equivalency could be adjustable to something that most accept as fair.

kazinator 6y ago

What if you didn't just listen to one band for a month? If you mostly listened to one band, but then also to another band just once, should it be 50:50? If not, then you're somehow going by number of plays. (Definitely though, only those two artists should get any of your money, no matter how it is sliced.)

jonplackett 6y ago
Yeah exactly. I’m just using the one band thing as an extreme example. My money would just get split between who I listen to.
- nefitty 6y ago
  There’s some evidence that current streaming habits are actually affecting how music is produced. For example, it seems most listeners will spend a few seconds listening to a second before deciding whether to skip it, so intro sections in pop music are disappearing. If your money was split between what you listened to, wouldn’t it make sense to split by time listened or length of the tracks? That might start incentivizing musicians to create inordinately longer songs to try to get a bigger slice of your money... hmm...
  - piva00 6y ago
    Listening habits has always shaped how music is made. David Byrne explains that quite well in "How Music Works", his take on the history of how music is made and how it sounds being correlated how it was usually played is quite interesting. Tribal music could be more beat/drum focused as those are played in open air, where the bass sounds can propagate without room interference. Going from there to the point where he talks about concert halls and how different architectures (from cathedrals to halls designed for orchestras) shaped how music was made to sound in that kind of room. And later on how recordings have changed all of that. So music has been shaped and will continuously be shaped by how people listen to it. Nowadays music is a very personal experience, listening at home, on our headphones, we experience it outside of the context it's existed for millenia before good recordings were possible. Where the experience of listening live music was always attached to the place it was played. Now we listen to it completely devoid of space, this shapes the kind of music made, how it sounds and so on.
coldtea 6y ago
>What if you didn't just listen to one band for a month? If you mostly listened to one band, but then also to another band just once, should it be 50:50? If not, then you're somehow going by number of plays. Going by ratio of plays of bands I listened to makes total sense. That being difficult, even a 50:50 between my 100 streams band and one I listed for 1 stream is still better that sending those money to third bands...
- srg0 6y ago
  Would you count total time or total plays? In one case you give too much to ambient noise recordings and similar genres, in the other bands like Ramones would get an unfair advantage.
  - coldtea 6y ago
    A composite count metric that smooths play count for larger tunes vs more plays for shorter tunes would solve most of that. E.g. 10 plays of Ramones 2.5 minute songs == 10 unit's worth == 2 plays of an hour-long ambient piece. The equivalency could be adjustable to something that most accept as fair.