4 ms·

“ 70% of their revenue goes to the copyright holders (if those aren't the artists, that is a different problem Spotify can't really address)”

Marazan 5y ago
Absolute lols. It is a problem they can address. Their deal with the labels sends the money to the labels rather than the artists as a stream is counted like pressing a record rather than a radio play. If a stream was considered a radio play the far, far more money would go to the artists.
- jeroenhd 5y ago
  > If a stream was considered a radio play the far, far more money would go to the artists. Doesn't that still imply that the problem is really just the labels negotiating contracts that are exceedingly in their favor? Artists are getting screwed over because they signed away their distribution rights but there's not a lot Spotify can do about that. Spotify doesn't know where the money goes when they send it to the only place that can legally sell the rights to the content, and it probably shouldn't. Artists across the board need to stand up for themselves and make better deals. More and more big names are standing up against the industry and causing a ruckus, so we may see a revolution in that space in a few short years. Until then, the music labels will continue to profit from their artists as they always have.
  - Marazan 5y ago
    Spotify absolutely knew what they where doing when they "negotiated" the deal. They knew they would be funelling money to the labels over the artists by adopting the ludicrous notion that they were making the equivalent of a mechanical reproduction over the equivalent of a radio play when a user streamed a song. The major labels are big share holders in Spotify. It was a complete stitch up of the artists. Spotify were not a neutral party.
    - elzbardico 5y ago
      The artist sold their distribution rights to the labels. What do you think could be done differently from Spotify side that was still legal?
      - thenthenthen 5y ago
        Fun side note, spotify (from sweden) started of with a collection of pirated (scene) releases, prolly from thepiratebay(sweden): https://torrentfreak.com/spotifys-beta-used-pirate-mp3-files-some-from-pirate-bay-170509/ https://torrentfreak.com/spotifys-beta-used-pirate-mp3-files...
      - Marazan 5y ago
        They could have said streaming a song was equivalent to a Radio play and not pressing a vinyl record. Boom, instantly performers and writers get more money and the labels less.
        topranks 5y ago
        It’s moronic to keep asserting that Spotify had all the power here, or made the decision on how the labels should distribute revenues.
        Marazan 5y ago
        Some other streaming services (e.g. Pandora) pay out on streams as if they are radio plays.
    - topranks 5y ago
      You say it like Spotify has loads of bargaining power in this negotiation. When Spotify started whether the big labels would even licence anything to such a service was far from a given. Many digital music platforms had failed in the previous 10+ years cos the labels wouldn’t work with them. The way I see it a Spotify subscription is about the price of a CD per month. So the spend is probably similar for most people as the amount they would have spent on music previously. The difference now is that people listen to a much much larger number of songs in total in any month. They don’t listen to one album over and over and over again like before. So that same spend gets spread way more thinly than previously. Lastly on the label issue the labels power is significantly undermined. You don’t need a million dollars to build a recording studio and make a record any more. There is much more scope to put out your own shit and get 100% of the streaming revenue. New times, new reality. The labels treating streams revenue like they did CD revenue shouldn’t surprise anyone, and is not Spotify’s fault.

Marazan 5y ago

Absolute lols. It is a problem they can address. Their deal with the labels sends the money to the labels rather than the artists as a stream is counted like pressing a record rather than a radio play. If a stream was considered a radio play the far, far more money would go to the artists.

jeroenhd 5y ago
> If a stream was considered a radio play the far, far more money would go to the artists. Doesn't that still imply that the problem is really just the labels negotiating contracts that are exceedingly in their favor? Artists are getting screwed over because they signed away their distribution rights but there's not a lot Spotify can do about that. Spotify doesn't know where the money goes when they send it to the only place that can legally sell the rights to the content, and it probably shouldn't. Artists across the board need to stand up for themselves and make better deals. More and more big names are standing up against the industry and causing a ruckus, so we may see a revolution in that space in a few short years. Until then, the music labels will continue to profit from their artists as they always have.
- Marazan 5y ago
  Spotify absolutely knew what they where doing when they "negotiated" the deal. They knew they would be funelling money to the labels over the artists by adopting the ludicrous notion that they were making the equivalent of a mechanical reproduction over the equivalent of a radio play when a user streamed a song. The major labels are big share holders in Spotify. It was a complete stitch up of the artists. Spotify were not a neutral party.
  - elzbardico 5y ago
    The artist sold their distribution rights to the labels. What do you think could be done differently from Spotify side that was still legal?
    - thenthenthen 5y ago
      Fun side note, spotify (from sweden) started of with a collection of pirated (scene) releases, prolly from thepiratebay(sweden): https://torrentfreak.com/spotifys-beta-used-pirate-mp3-files-some-from-pirate-bay-170509/ https://torrentfreak.com/spotifys-beta-used-pirate-mp3-files...
    - Marazan 5y ago
      They could have said streaming a song was equivalent to a Radio play and not pressing a vinyl record. Boom, instantly performers and writers get more money and the labels less.
      - topranks 5y ago
        It’s moronic to keep asserting that Spotify had all the power here, or made the decision on how the labels should distribute revenues.
        Marazan 5y ago
        Some other streaming services (e.g. Pandora) pay out on streams as if they are radio plays.
  - topranks 5y ago
    You say it like Spotify has loads of bargaining power in this negotiation. When Spotify started whether the big labels would even licence anything to such a service was far from a given. Many digital music platforms had failed in the previous 10+ years cos the labels wouldn’t work with them. The way I see it a Spotify subscription is about the price of a CD per month. So the spend is probably similar for most people as the amount they would have spent on music previously. The difference now is that people listen to a much much larger number of songs in total in any month. They don’t listen to one album over and over and over again like before. So that same spend gets spread way more thinly than previously. Lastly on the label issue the labels power is significantly undermined. You don’t need a million dollars to build a recording studio and make a record any more. There is much more scope to put out your own shit and get 100% of the streaming revenue. New times, new reality. The labels treating streams revenue like they did CD revenue shouldn’t surprise anyone, and is not Spotify’s fault.