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It’s a loss to musicians to have a monopoly like Spotify (who likes to recreate popular songs with their own artists and label) be the gatekeeper to what is goo

It’s a loss to musicians to have a monopoly like Spotify (who likes to recreate popular songs with their own artists and label) be the gatekeeper to what is good music. From a service perspective, it’s great. I have the worlds music at my fingertips. From a music perspective it’s horrible. I have one company dictating streaming payments and terms on an entire industry and you’re f&$ked if you don’t play nice. Ask Taylor Swift.

winternett 3y ago
Agreed. Spotify is a terrible alternative for the musicians. Myspace and Mp3.Com used to be the road map to how sites should be run, but venture capitalism and publicly traded companies ruined the entire ecosystem.
- reactordev 3y ago
  I had high hopes for SoundCloud but in the end, VC’s always win.
  - dzhiurgis 3y ago
    They still pretty much same. I don't get any audio ads, some ads in my stream, but never seem to be playing. Premium offering is stuck somewhere in 2009 when offline playback was a thing. Lack of integrations with Homepod & Tesla is somewhat becoming a problem. Still no way to filter your stream or get know what bitrate you are streaming.
  - whizzter 3y ago
    (I studied with one of the founders) Soundclouds problem was always that they started out as basically a free service for a particular niche(artist to label contacts), starting to charge(pissing off people who expected free forever) and then moving out of the niche made it so they never really had a footing for something people would pay for. The problem with so many "internet unicorns" from the 2000-2010 era is that they handwaved per-customer costs as hardware/network costs and assumed that as long as they scaled then salaries would be a minor part, we as an industry are now trying to dig ourselves out of that hole with a even shittier AD experiences just as that AD market is crashing down.
    - waveBidder 3y ago
      free money for VC via low interest rates was a terrible strategy for creating innovation that would last.
  - justatdotin 3y ago
    yes, I was very hopeful for sc: such a waste.
- nomel 3y ago
  > Spotify is a terrible alternative for the musicians. I'm not a musician. I'm a listener trying to find music that I like to listen to. Do you have a recommendation for us on the other end of the speaker wire?
  - waveBidder 3y ago
    there's this neat website/app called bandcamp, you may have heard of it somewhere. it asks you to occasionally buy albums, rather than pay a fixed fee.
    - nomel 3y ago
      > trying to find music that I like to listen to As mentioned, my problem, as a listener, is discovery, which bandcamp doesn't address.
      - mattkevan 3y ago
        As a listener, Bandcamp is my favourite place for discovery bar none. Find a genre or label and start exploring the catalogue. Find other users with similar tastes and explore their lists. Follow artists, labels and users to see their activity stream. It's not as passive as just hitting play on a playlist, but I've discovered so many incredible artists and labels this way. I'd be genuinely devastated if Bandcamp goes away.
        nomel 3y ago
        This is, effectively, what the recommendation systems do. They suggest songs/artists that users with similar tastes liked, and songs with similar styles (there's deep analysis/categorization of the sound of the song). I prefer an automated process, rather than clicking about, navigating lists. It's ok that this is my preference.
      - thirdsun 3y ago
        NTS Radio, Rate Your Music or Discogs should be great, deep rabbit holes that lead to new and interesting discoveries.
code_runner 3y ago
can you follow up on the recreating popular songs and how spotify wronged taylor swift?
- reactordev 3y ago
  Sure, quick google searches… there’s definitely more but this gives you enough info. https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/spotify-denies-its-playlisting-fake-artists-so-why-are-all-these-fake-artists-on-its-playlists/ https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/spotify-denies-its-pl... https://kotaku.com/spotify-music-streaming-fake-artist-ai-apple-music-1850363407 https://kotaku.com/spotify-music-streaming-fake-artist-ai-ap... https://www.rollingstone.com/pro/features/fake-artists-have-billions-of-streams-on-spotify-is-sony-now-playing-the-service-at-its-own-game-834746 https://www.rollingstone.com/pro/features/fake-artists-have-... https://www.pon.harvard.edu/daily/dispute-resolution/dispute-resolution-with-spotify-taylor-swift-shakes-it-off/ https://www.pon.harvard.edu/daily/dispute-resolution/dispute... https://www.theverge.com/2017/6/9/15767986/taylor-swift-apple-music-spotify-statements-timeline https://www.theverge.com/2017/6/9/15767986/taylor-swift-appl... And honestly, for some of this stuff, I understand Spotify’s position. At the same time, their willingness to promote fake artists with copy cat songs to circumvent paying royalties to BMG or such is why musicians are eating ramen and only a handful of musicians are eating steak.
- jlarocco 3y ago
  There's a ton of stuff like this, where the original artist isn't on Spotify, but these "covers" are: https://open.spotify.com/track/6t6VE10ixs4wyyIgAbJzvz https://open.spotify.com/track/6t6VE10ixs4wyyIgAbJzvz https://open.spotify.com/artist/6RuIbUAQK9fmBq08AbY6XE https://open.spotify.com/artist/6RuIbUAQK9fmBq08AbY6XE Honestly, I wish Spotify would stop "improving" their client and use that money to get more artists on their service.
  - reactordev 3y ago
    Ugh… that last one. 65m listens followed by 40m and so on. This is exactly my point. Who the hell is this?

winternett 3y ago

Agreed. Spotify is a terrible alternative for the musicians. Myspace and Mp3.Com used to be the road map to how sites should be run, but venture capitalism and publicly traded companies ruined the entire ecosystem.

reactordev 3y ago
I had high hopes for SoundCloud but in the end, VC’s always win.
- dzhiurgis 3y ago
  They still pretty much same. I don't get any audio ads, some ads in my stream, but never seem to be playing. Premium offering is stuck somewhere in 2009 when offline playback was a thing. Lack of integrations with Homepod & Tesla is somewhat becoming a problem. Still no way to filter your stream or get know what bitrate you are streaming.
- whizzter 3y ago
  (I studied with one of the founders) Soundclouds problem was always that they started out as basically a free service for a particular niche(artist to label contacts), starting to charge(pissing off people who expected free forever) and then moving out of the niche made it so they never really had a footing for something people would pay for. The problem with so many "internet unicorns" from the 2000-2010 era is that they handwaved per-customer costs as hardware/network costs and assumed that as long as they scaled then salaries would be a minor part, we as an industry are now trying to dig ourselves out of that hole with a even shittier AD experiences just as that AD market is crashing down.
  - waveBidder 3y ago
    free money for VC via low interest rates was a terrible strategy for creating innovation that would last.
- justatdotin 3y ago
  yes, I was very hopeful for sc: such a waste.
nomel 3y ago
> Spotify is a terrible alternative for the musicians. I'm not a musician. I'm a listener trying to find music that I like to listen to. Do you have a recommendation for us on the other end of the speaker wire?
- waveBidder 3y ago
  there's this neat website/app called bandcamp, you may have heard of it somewhere. it asks you to occasionally buy albums, rather than pay a fixed fee.
  - nomel 3y ago
    > trying to find music that I like to listen to As mentioned, my problem, as a listener, is discovery, which bandcamp doesn't address.
    - mattkevan 3y ago
      As a listener, Bandcamp is my favourite place for discovery bar none. Find a genre or label and start exploring the catalogue. Find other users with similar tastes and explore their lists. Follow artists, labels and users to see their activity stream. It's not as passive as just hitting play on a playlist, but I've discovered so many incredible artists and labels this way. I'd be genuinely devastated if Bandcamp goes away.
      - nomel 3y ago
        This is, effectively, what the recommendation systems do. They suggest songs/artists that users with similar tastes liked, and songs with similar styles (there's deep analysis/categorization of the sound of the song). I prefer an automated process, rather than clicking about, navigating lists. It's ok that this is my preference.
    - thirdsun 3y ago
      NTS Radio, Rate Your Music or Discogs should be great, deep rabbit holes that lead to new and interesting discoveries.

code_runner 3y ago

can you follow up on the recreating popular songs and how spotify wronged taylor swift?

reactordev 3y ago
Sure, quick google searches… there’s definitely more but this gives you enough info. https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/spotify-denies-its-playlisting-fake-artists-so-why-are-all-these-fake-artists-on-its-playlists/ https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/spotify-denies-its-pl... https://kotaku.com/spotify-music-streaming-fake-artist-ai-apple-music-1850363407 https://kotaku.com/spotify-music-streaming-fake-artist-ai-ap... https://www.rollingstone.com/pro/features/fake-artists-have-billions-of-streams-on-spotify-is-sony-now-playing-the-service-at-its-own-game-834746 https://www.rollingstone.com/pro/features/fake-artists-have-... https://www.pon.harvard.edu/daily/dispute-resolution/dispute-resolution-with-spotify-taylor-swift-shakes-it-off/ https://www.pon.harvard.edu/daily/dispute-resolution/dispute... https://www.theverge.com/2017/6/9/15767986/taylor-swift-apple-music-spotify-statements-timeline https://www.theverge.com/2017/6/9/15767986/taylor-swift-appl... And honestly, for some of this stuff, I understand Spotify’s position. At the same time, their willingness to promote fake artists with copy cat songs to circumvent paying royalties to BMG or such is why musicians are eating ramen and only a handful of musicians are eating steak.
jlarocco 3y ago
There's a ton of stuff like this, where the original artist isn't on Spotify, but these "covers" are: https://open.spotify.com/track/6t6VE10ixs4wyyIgAbJzvz https://open.spotify.com/track/6t6VE10ixs4wyyIgAbJzvz https://open.spotify.com/artist/6RuIbUAQK9fmBq08AbY6XE https://open.spotify.com/artist/6RuIbUAQK9fmBq08AbY6XE Honestly, I wish Spotify would stop "improving" their client and use that money to get more artists on their service.
- reactordev 3y ago
  Ugh… that last one. 65m listens followed by 40m and so on. This is exactly my point. Who the hell is this?