7 ms·

How much of an issue is this? Does it work like ad revenue on youtube? If something has under 1k streams I have to assume that was only a few dollars hobbyists

by VS1999 3y ago

How much of an issue is this? Does it work like ad revenue on youtube? If something has under 1k streams I have to assume that was only a few dollars hobbyists get occasionally, if even that.

ojosilva 3y ago
As a side-gig musician and composer - my wife and I as a matter of fact - this is a non-issue. It's a few bucks a year, maybe $5 to $15, depending if we release some new album. It's symbolic, not even a tip, and we can't cash it until it reaches I think $60 or more iirc. Spotify is not (or barely) making money out of our work, but we otoh are "making money" by using its platform and visibility as means to reaching to our small fan base that will finance our work through concerts. For Spotify otoh, these few bucks add up to a long-tail loss of an increasing and disturbing magnitude. Additionally, bad actors are in fact exploiting it, ruining the experience for me as a musician and as a user. The issue, if any, is that in all fairness we should all be making money, proportionally, from the platform. But under 1000 streams, as an artist, you are probably getting more value from having your work uploaded and streamable.
- basisword 3y ago
  >> we can't cash it until it reaches I think $60 or more iirc This is highly dependent on your distributor. It can be as little as $10. >> Spotify is not (or barely) making money out of our work, but we otoh are "making money" by using its platform and visibility as means to reaching to our small fan base that will finance our work through concerts. This is an odd way to look at it. Without music, Spotify doesn’t exist. People subscribe to Spotify and listen to their ads in exchange for unlimited music access. So Spotify is making money from your music.
  - ojosilva 3y ago
    > This is an odd way to look at it. Without music, Spotify doesn’t exist. People subscribe to Spotify and listen to their ads in exchange for unlimited music access. So Spotify is making money from your music. Spotify has expenses too and is hosting and streaming our music, distributing and maintaining an app and api for access, all basically for free for the musician. So "making money from your music" from my 800 streams a year is a very optimistic view of how the whole thing works out, I'd say we are cooperating fairly.
  - kmlx 3y ago
    > So Spotify is making money from your music. not really: https://www.statista.com/chart/26773/profitability-development-of-spotify/ https://www.statista.com/chart/26773/profitability-developme... > Since the beginning of 2017, the streaming service has generated a positive net balance in eight quarters, two of them in 2021.
    - basisword 3y ago
      I would guess the huge sums they've blown on exclusive podcast deals and the repeated awful unnecessary redesigns go a long way towards that.
quitit 3y ago
I think that’s a too-narrow way of looking at it. For an individual artist it’s not much. For Spotify it’s huge, all of those nickels and dimes add up quickly. It also doesn’t matter if their current plan is to redistribute 100% of the gains to other artists, since this becomes profit they didn’t need to sacrifice to appease big acts. I.e. small artists pay so Spotify doesn’t have to. Most importantly the artists didn’t sign up for this arrangement when they first joined Spotify, but now due to Spotify’s size they may feel compelled to give away their work for free for the chance at being successful or keeping fans happy.

by VS1999 3y ago

How much of an issue is this? Does it work like ad revenue on youtube? If something has under 1k streams I have to assume that was only a few dollars hobbyists get occasionally, if even that.

ojosilva 3y ago

As a side-gig musician and composer - my wife and I as a matter of fact - this is a non-issue. It's a few bucks a year, maybe $5 to $15, depending if we release some new album. It's symbolic, not even a tip, and we can't cash it until it reaches I think $60 or more iirc. Spotify is not (or barely) making money out of our work, but we otoh are "making money" by using its platform and visibility as means to reaching to our small fan base that will finance our work through concerts. For Spotify otoh, these few bucks add up to a long-tail loss of an increasing and disturbing magnitude. Additionally, bad actors are in fact exploiting it, ruining the experience for me as a musician and as a user. The issue, if any, is that in all fairness we should all be making money, proportionally, from the platform. But under 1000 streams, as an artist, you are probably getting more value from having your work uploaded and streamable.

basisword 3y ago
>> we can't cash it until it reaches I think $60 or more iirc This is highly dependent on your distributor. It can be as little as $10. >> Spotify is not (or barely) making money out of our work, but we otoh are "making money" by using its platform and visibility as means to reaching to our small fan base that will finance our work through concerts. This is an odd way to look at it. Without music, Spotify doesn’t exist. People subscribe to Spotify and listen to their ads in exchange for unlimited music access. So Spotify is making money from your music.
- ojosilva 3y ago
  > This is an odd way to look at it. Without music, Spotify doesn’t exist. People subscribe to Spotify and listen to their ads in exchange for unlimited music access. So Spotify is making money from your music. Spotify has expenses too and is hosting and streaming our music, distributing and maintaining an app and api for access, all basically for free for the musician. So "making money from your music" from my 800 streams a year is a very optimistic view of how the whole thing works out, I'd say we are cooperating fairly.
- kmlx 3y ago
  > So Spotify is making money from your music. not really: https://www.statista.com/chart/26773/profitability-development-of-spotify/ https://www.statista.com/chart/26773/profitability-developme... > Since the beginning of 2017, the streaming service has generated a positive net balance in eight quarters, two of them in 2021.
  - basisword 3y ago
    I would guess the huge sums they've blown on exclusive podcast deals and the repeated awful unnecessary redesigns go a long way towards that.

quitit 3y ago

I think that’s a too-narrow way of looking at it. For an individual artist it’s not much. For Spotify it’s huge, all of those nickels and dimes add up quickly. It also doesn’t matter if their current plan is to redistribute 100% of the gains to other artists, since this becomes profit they didn’t need to sacrifice to appease big acts. I.e. small artists pay so Spotify doesn’t have to. Most importantly the artists didn’t sign up for this arrangement when they first joined Spotify, but now due to Spotify’s size they may feel compelled to give away their work for free for the chance at being successful or keeping fans happy.