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I'm guessing Apple just ran the math and decided "A $300 billion company should not damage its brand in a PR fight with a pop singer over a rounding error." Ser

by exelius 11y ago

I'm guessing Apple just ran the math and decided "A $300 billion company should not damage its brand in a PR fight with a pop singer over a rounding error." Seriously, the amount of money we're talking here is probably less than $10 million a year. Apple gets to look like the good guy, the difference is immaterial to most artists, and Taylor Swift gets to feel important. What upsets me about the whole thing is that Taylor Swift is absolutely not representative of most musicians. Unlike most young artists, she actually owns the recording rights to her albums. Typically you have to complete a 3-album deal where the studio owns the recording rights before you can negotiate terms (and even then only if you're a major musician by that point); but when your father buys a studio and signs you to a deal you get to keep your recording rights. Taylor Swift's situation is much more representative of an owner of a recording company than an artist. While she's worried about points on the distribution deal, most artists feel that they'll never make any real money off the albums as long as the studios own the rights and just want you to hear their music and start to engage with them in other ways (social media, live shows, YouTube, etc) that they CAN monetize. By paying artists so little for their recordings for so long, recording companies have caused artists to place very little value on the recordings themselves and look to monetize their careers in other ways.

Alupis 11y ago
> Seriously, the amount of money we're talking here is probably less than $10 million a year. Probably true, however remember Swift recently had the bout with Spotify, leading to the Spotify CEO revealing she was pulling in nearly $6 million a year from them.
- rst 11y ago
  FWIW, those figures are in dispute. Swift and her management publicly stated that she was getting a lot less from Spotify -- IIRC, under $1 million. http://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-taylor-swift-earned-from-spotify-2014-11 http://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-taylor-swift-earned-...
  - Alupis 11y ago
    If I recall, her dispute was in dispute by Spotify CEO. He asserted her final cut was probably what she was stating, but Spotify's checks to her label were in original $6 million range payouts, and that she should take the issue up with her management if they are taking that much out of her cut.
    - rst 11y ago
      There's more than one artist on her label (which, by he way, is not owned by her or her family, though they do have a minority stake).
      - Alupis 11y ago
        That would be irrelevant for her payouts as an artist. Spotify states that Taylor Swift, the artist (not the label), was pulling down $6 million a year from them alone. Swift stated she was only receiving around $1 million, to which the Spotify CEO referred her to speak with her management because they were clearly taking a massive/majority cut out of her payout. She's very young, and probably didn't pay much attention to her contracts and such. Even still, 80% is a lot for a label to consume in "management" fees.
001sky 11y ago
"Typically you have to complete a 3-album deal where the studio owns the recording rights" Taylor swift has made tons of product and has rights apparently because she does more work on her music than most artists. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taylor_Swift#2004.E2.80.9308:_Career_beginnings_and_Taylor_Swift https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taylor_Swift#2004.E2.80.9308:_...
- exelius 11y ago
  She didn't make any of these decisions on her own as a 14 year old. She had two parents with a lot of business savvy and the money to bankroll her career. That gives you the ability to push back against the record company. Ordinarily, if you say "no" to a record company's demands, they drop you and your career is over. Taylor just went out and bought a recording company after RCA wouldn't give her the creative control she wanted (aka "doing more work on her music than most artists") -- most artists don't have that option.
  - 001sky 11y ago
    This is not really on point tho is it? TS has put out way more than a standard recording contract. So she'd be like a first round draft pick who is now a free agent with a couple of super bowl mvp's. Its not like anbody cares that peyton and eli manning had their famous dad as there high school coach during contract negotiations. On the merits, she gets alot of credits because she writes alot of her material as well. You can compare somebody like whitney houston (pop star) or even norah jones (jazz) who got their entire career or major break on other people's songs. That givers her dual/multi royalty streams right off the bat and more leverage practically speaking because the label is doing less work production etc (all this well beyong capital $$ loans and stuff).
    - exelius 11y ago
      Right, and the fact that she had the leverage to be able to do that in the first place makes her unlike the vast majority of artists on these services. So for her to play the "I'm not doing this for me, I'm doing this for all the undiscovered artists" card is a bit disingenuous. That's not how the industry works for the majority of artists -- their payouts from Spotify/Apple Music/etc. are so low they aren't focused on that as a revenue stream. The only artists who really care about these streaming payments are already at the top of the food chain -- the vast majority of artists are just looking to get discovered. One could argue that the presence of big artists on these streaming services makes the platforms more valuable for artists at the bottom by drawing more users to them, but it definitely has created a situation where top artists' albums have value as a product themselves, while albums of lesser-known bands are essentially given away for free to try to build an audience.

by exelius 11y ago

Alupis 11y ago

> Seriously, the amount of money we're talking here is probably less than $10 million a year. Probably true, however remember Swift recently had the bout with Spotify, leading to the Spotify CEO revealing she was pulling in nearly $6 million a year from them.

rst 11y ago
FWIW, those figures are in dispute. Swift and her management publicly stated that she was getting a lot less from Spotify -- IIRC, under $1 million. http://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-taylor-swift-earned-from-spotify-2014-11 http://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-taylor-swift-earned-...
- Alupis 11y ago
  If I recall, her dispute was in dispute by Spotify CEO. He asserted her final cut was probably what she was stating, but Spotify's checks to her label were in original $6 million range payouts, and that she should take the issue up with her management if they are taking that much out of her cut.
  - rst 11y ago
    There's more than one artist on her label (which, by he way, is not owned by her or her family, though they do have a minority stake).
    - Alupis 11y ago
      That would be irrelevant for her payouts as an artist. Spotify states that Taylor Swift, the artist (not the label), was pulling down $6 million a year from them alone. Swift stated she was only receiving around $1 million, to which the Spotify CEO referred her to speak with her management because they were clearly taking a massive/majority cut out of her payout. She's very young, and probably didn't pay much attention to her contracts and such. Even still, 80% is a lot for a label to consume in "management" fees.

001sky 11y ago

"Typically you have to complete a 3-album deal where the studio owns the recording rights" Taylor swift has made tons of product and has rights apparently because she does more work on her music than most artists. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taylor_Swift#2004.E2.80.9308:_Career_beginnings_and_Taylor_Swift https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taylor_Swift#2004.E2.80.9308:_...

exelius 11y ago
She didn't make any of these decisions on her own as a 14 year old. She had two parents with a lot of business savvy and the money to bankroll her career. That gives you the ability to push back against the record company. Ordinarily, if you say "no" to a record company's demands, they drop you and your career is over. Taylor just went out and bought a recording company after RCA wouldn't give her the creative control she wanted (aka "doing more work on her music than most artists") -- most artists don't have that option.
- 001sky 11y ago
  This is not really on point tho is it? TS has put out way more than a standard recording contract. So she'd be like a first round draft pick who is now a free agent with a couple of super bowl mvp's. Its not like anbody cares that peyton and eli manning had their famous dad as there high school coach during contract negotiations. On the merits, she gets alot of credits because she writes alot of her material as well. You can compare somebody like whitney houston (pop star) or even norah jones (jazz) who got their entire career or major break on other people's songs. That givers her dual/multi royalty streams right off the bat and more leverage practically speaking because the label is doing less work production etc (all this well beyong capital $$ loans and stuff).
  - exelius 11y ago
    Right, and the fact that she had the leverage to be able to do that in the first place makes her unlike the vast majority of artists on these services. So for her to play the "I'm not doing this for me, I'm doing this for all the undiscovered artists" card is a bit disingenuous. That's not how the industry works for the majority of artists -- their payouts from Spotify/Apple Music/etc. are so low they aren't focused on that as a revenue stream. The only artists who really care about these streaming payments are already at the top of the food chain -- the vast majority of artists are just looking to get discovered. One could argue that the presence of big artists on these streaming services makes the platforms more valuable for artists at the bottom by drawing more users to them, but it definitely has created a situation where top artists' albums have value as a product themselves, while albums of lesser-known bands are essentially given away for free to try to build an audience.