In my experience, while Spotify pays little outright, it is one of the few services that genuinely provides exposure in a beneficial way, one that may actually

In my experience, while Spotify pays little outright, it is one of the few services that genuinely provides exposure in a beneficial way, one that may actually correlate to iTunes sales. That mentioned, Spotify deserves credit for paying anything, rather than sitting around and saying that exposure itself is a tangible payment form (e.g. McDonalds & SXSW). As Spotify expands, I can genuinely see new nations discovering my music, and that's quite interesting and appreciated. I think it's important to remember that I'm speaking as an "unsigned" and independent artist. My income is not noteworthy from digital sales, and frankly does not even recoup the amount that I spend on distribution. However, unlike the majority of "signed" artists, I have extensive rights management avenues, very little overhead, and if I ever do make a lot of money through digital channels, it will not subsidize a system that I utterly dislike on practical and ethical grounds (ex: no health insurance for signed artists). YMMV.