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The "pool all streams" model doesn't necessarily favor big artists, it favors artists that are listened to by people that stream a lot of music. For example, c

The "pool all streams" model doesn't necessarily favor big artists, it favors artists that are listened to by people that stream a lot of music. For example, consider a bimodal population of 1000 people that listen 10 times to a popular artist (for a total of 10,000 streams) and 10 people that listen 1000 times to a small artist (for an identical total of 10,000 streams). In the "pool all streams" model, both artists get paid the same, while in a "split per user" model, the popular artist gets 100x the payout of the small artist. An interesting question then is whether big or small artists are disproportionaly listened to by people that stream a lot. I haven't seen any data on it, but intuitively it wouldn't surprise me if it's the latter case.

danpalmer 3y ago
You're right that it also favours artists that are listened to by people that stream a lot of music, but it does favour big artists too. Big artists can make up their numbers by lots of streams from few users, few streams from lots of users, or both. Small artists tend to get a lot of streams from very few users, and lose out, so this suggests that earnings are more correlated to unique listeners than to average listens per user.
- Denvercoder9 3y ago
  If with lose out you mean that it's not financially sustainable for them, then it's not at all clear to me that's caused by the way Spotify splits revenue, instead of Spotify just being too cheap for users to make streaming viable. Spotify takes in less than five bucks per Premium user per month, so after subtracting costs you need to quite a bit of listeners to make a living, even if Spotify shares it payout per user. If with lose out you mean that Spotify pays out less per stream to small artists as opposed to big artists, then that's not the claim made in the parent comment nor one I've been able to find any evidence for.
  - danpalmer 3y ago
    My understanding is that the amount of money spent on music by consumers has dramatically increased in the streaming age. It's not clear to me that Spotify only passing on ~half after fees is any different to a CD bought in a shop that pays rent and needs manufacturing, physical distribution, etc. I'm fairly sure this is not about Spotify being too cheap, it's that the revenue distribution skewed in the transition from CDs to streaming in favour of popular artists.

danpalmer 3y ago

You're right that it also favours artists that are listened to by people that stream a lot of music, but it does favour big artists too. Big artists can make up their numbers by lots of streams from few users, few streams from lots of users, or both. Small artists tend to get a lot of streams from very few users, and lose out, so this suggests that earnings are more correlated to unique listeners than to average listens per user.

Denvercoder9 3y ago
If with lose out you mean that it's not financially sustainable for them, then it's not at all clear to me that's caused by the way Spotify splits revenue, instead of Spotify just being too cheap for users to make streaming viable. Spotify takes in less than five bucks per Premium user per month, so after subtracting costs you need to quite a bit of listeners to make a living, even if Spotify shares it payout per user. If with lose out you mean that Spotify pays out less per stream to small artists as opposed to big artists, then that's not the claim made in the parent comment nor one I've been able to find any evidence for.
- danpalmer 3y ago
  My understanding is that the amount of money spent on music by consumers has dramatically increased in the streaming age. It's not clear to me that Spotify only passing on ~half after fees is any different to a CD bought in a shop that pays rent and needs manufacturing, physical distribution, etc. I'm fairly sure this is not about Spotify being too cheap, it's that the revenue distribution skewed in the transition from CDs to streaming in favour of popular artists.