r/technology • u/tekz • 18h ago

Business Why are so many musicians removing their music from Spotify?

https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/explained-culture/musicians-removing-music-spotify-royalties-ai-daniel-ek-10208768/
2.5k Upvotes

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1.5k

u/VitaminDprived 17h ago

Whether or not you are a metalhead, you might find this explanation from an independent blog telling.

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u/tekz 17h ago

Great blog post. I knew they were paying peanuts, but didn’t know they were assholes of this level. I’m torn, because I listen to a lot of underground music that was tough to find before Spotify, and a lot if it wasn’t available on Apple Music.

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u/karma3000 13h ago

All I want is a service with a random shuffle that plays through all my 1,000 song playlists.

Spotify shuffle is non random and plays whatever songs are being promoted or the songs with the cheapest royalties.

Youtube seems to only play the first 100 songs of my playlists.

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u/PurposelyVague 10h ago

This is a constant frustration with Spotify! If I'm shuffling my favorites playlist, I want it to actually cycle through every song. So so annoying

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u/-LeftShark 7h ago edited 7h ago

Tidal shuffle is truly random if you clear the cache like once a week.

Also I paid like $3.99 for an app to scan my spotify playlists and it likes them all on tidal so migration of 3000+ songs took like 5 min.

Also higher quality sound files. Ive never looked back, completely worth it.

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u/geoken 4h ago

What app was it? I have songshift but didn’t use if for a while. But last time I used it I do t think it had the option to like songs on the new service, only playlist syncing.

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u/BetterObligation9949 2h ago

Yes please share the app

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u/-LeftShark 30m ago

This was over 2 years ago I honestly don't remember I'm sorry, it was well worth the one-time fee though. I'll look around real quick and see if anything rings the bell.

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u/luxboogie 12m ago

How do you clear the cache? I’ve been having the same issues on Tidal.

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u/MegaBoschi 3h ago

For YouTube you have to go to the Playlists Overview, then hold/right click the playlist, then press Shuffle. If you do it within the playlist, then it will only play the first 100 or so songs as you mentioned, but this way it will shuffle e.g. all of your liked songs.

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u/StorminNorman 4h ago

Here's the thing. You will be giving the music industry far more support if you buy a small fraction of your music and pirate the rest than you are with your Spotify subscription. Hell, just spend that per month direct to artists, it still helps more. And yes, it is easier to just use Spotify, but are you even getting what you want from Spotify? And it's not as hard as you may think. There's crawlers that'll let you import playlists from Spotify and soulseek is free and still very healthy so it's not as expensive (I'd argue mainting ratios etc is expensive, it's why I mainly use Usenet) as trying to avoid Netflix et al. And it's pretty easy once you decide that the mountain is only a molehill, take the first step and find out it's a plain.

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u/Acceptable-Surprise5 59m ago

I just buy official merch and use youtube music. i doubt spotify revenue would be anyway close from me.

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u/BrightLuchr 10h ago

This is very useful information. Why? My (adult) kids keep telling me I should just get Spotify. So, resisting this, I spent my time last winter writing my own MP3 player to shuffle play through my vast music collection. Because I couldn't find an app that did that exactly the way I wanted (and also did Android Auto). I'm still fixing little bugs (because AA is a hellish platform) but your comment tells me I would have been frustrated with Spotify (especially at $12.69/mo)

A large number of my collection was purchased by handing money to artists directly after Toronto shows or at their merch desks. As one of my artist friends commented "this doesn't scale" but it sure was satisfying. Now days, my tastes are more international. There are artists I really like but I can't find a mechanism to buy and download their songs on any platform supported in my country.

Meanwhile, I know how to rip from Spotify on a free account without too much work. I could probably fully automate this. And according to some musicians, Spotify is just a money laundering organizaton.

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u/StorminNorman 4h ago

Hang on, what platform did you have to write a shuffle program for? Cos I can think of a few for most. Not that it matters I guess, you've got what works for you so who cares. I'm like you too though, I've got god knows how many thousands of cds (although most of my shows have been in Melbourne, and I don't mean the shitty one in Florida. Did get most of the cds flicking through racks in indie record stores though), and my music collection has also been bolstered by less than legal means. Which leads me to, just use soulseek instead of Spotify. It's not as good for the really obscure shit, but in my mind that's the stuff I should be buying regardless and the amount of that stuff that isn't on Bandcamp or qobuz is pretty small, plus discogs etc means there's very little I miss out on.

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u/BrightLuchr 2h ago

Android. I'd done Android development about 15 years ago but has gotten an order-of-magnitude more complex since then. I'm told iOS is worse. This is where AI assistance comes in as a solution to terrible API documentation. Anyway, I use the app daily and I'll eventually get it perfect. Not a lot to do in January: writing software is a good solution to this.

About a decade ago, tired of storing all those CDs, I got rid of them all. Between Youtube and my kids - they are mostly in their laid-back jazzy 20s - I get pretty good recommendations.

But the sad thing today is he music industry largely existed on foolish / exploited young talent playing small clubs and helping to sell beer.... okay, to be clear, the music industry has been exploitative for at least the last 100 years... but there was a charm about the dream of it all. That's pretty dead now. Young musicians can't afford rent due to insane real estate prices. The small clubs can't afford rent. And the number of people drinking alcohol has plummeted since cannabis became legal. Boomers and GenX'ers mostly listen to old crap so there is no market for new music. Gone is the magic of walking into a small bar and being amazed by some band and then sharing a joint with them on the sidewalk outside after. In Canada, this magic never really existed outside of the big cities like Montreal and Toronto but I've also met great bands from Chicago and New York.

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u/StorminNorman 1h ago

Er... There's a bunch of media players for android. Poweramp and Musicolet are my two favourite apps. Both have good shuffle capabilities. 

As for your bit about live music, I'm Australian and can name a couple of bars with regular live music in Toronto as I have friends there. It may not be what it used to be, but from what I'm hearing from the other side of the globe from friends who don't know each other, it is far from dead. And whilst they aren't smoking with the band cos they're 40+ and who wants to hang around 20yos then, they give them a nod as they all smoke in the same alley... It's like Henry Rollins said at the end of that punk doco series a few years back "good link music's still out there, you've just got to go out and find it now because it's not being shoved down your throat", and that holds true for many genres. 

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u/Malmborgio 13m ago

It makes me sound like a luddite and curmudgeon, but I still purchase and download MP3’s and add them to my Apple Music app.

I refuse to do streaming for both the “this screws the musicians” and “the system sucks balls to use” reasons outlined.

Random shuffle on my lengthy playlists works perfect. Abandon progress! Return to the caveman iPod Shuffle days!

0

u/trees1123 1h ago

This is simply not true.

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u/DarkImpurity 17h ago edited 16h ago

I previously used Deezer and Tidal but switched to Quboz and Apple Music. Quboz has expanded their library in recent years. I enjoy being able to stream and purchase albums to download in lossless quality with a discount.

Page on artist payouts from Quboz.

Edit: Added the information on artist payouts.

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u/PuckSenior 16h ago

I like Deezer. May switch to Apple Music. I have a weird usage case. My kids listen to music but they are obsessed with video podcasts from streamers, it’s like crack for them. So I only subscribe to music services that don’t have video podcasts

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u/Ok_Belt2521 16h ago

I switched to Apple Music recently. It’s a solid service. Their genre pages are really in depth. They even have pages for specific labels. Their curation is top notch.

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u/IthinkIllthink 15h ago

I moved away from AM several years ago. They kept deleting part or all of some of my playlists with some iOS updates.

I’ve been curating playlists for a decade, creating my Top 100 (& then 200, now 300), and playlists of the songs I listened to every year, plus bands I’ve seen.

Half a dozen times a year when I was with Apple Music I would try to find a playlist, and it would be part or totally empty, or just plain missing. It was heart breaking, infuriating.

I’m looking to switch away from Spotify presently. Has AM improved?

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u/Vasto_lorde97 14h ago

They still delete playlist if you stop paying

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u/Ok_Belt2521 13h ago

I’ve only been using it for 3 months so far but have not encountered that issue. I used a service to import my Spotify playlists and they still appear to be intact.

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u/Darth_050 4h ago

What service is that? Or is it a built in feature?

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u/Lord_Stabbington 15h ago

I’d switch to apple right now if they didn’t have a separate app for podcasts

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u/thing01 13h ago

That’s interesting! I actually like that they have a separate app for podcasts. I Feldman’s like it allows the UI for each to be cleaner and keeps everything I want to hear one tap closer than if I had to open a general audio app and then navigate to podcasts.

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u/Lord_Stabbington 3h ago

Yeah, but then I gotta spend two taps getting out of music and into podcasts :)

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u/thing01 13h ago

That’s interesting! I actually like that they have a separate app for podcasts. It allows the UI for each to be cleaner and keeps everything I want to hear one tap closer than if I had to open a general audio app and then navigate to podcasts.

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u/BankBlackPanther 16h ago

I just downloaded music off qobuz. I really liked it.

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u/Crinkez 13h ago

I have Qobuz. It's library is very small still. There's a lot of stuff I can't find on it, and its recommendations are particularly poor.

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u/ratherenjoysbass 16h ago

There's way more underground and unreleased music on YouTube

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u/imeeseeks 15h ago

This so much, people keep saying you could not find underground music before Spotify but YouTube has so much 

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u/_trouble_every_day_ 15h ago

Because they never heard of soulseek

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u/StorminNorman 4h ago

Or SoundCloud. Or blogs. Or forums/messageboards (public and/or private). Or trackers. I'm trying to remind myself that I've met people and that a lot of them aren't as deep into music as I am, but it's hard not to judge the comment you replied to cos wha...?

1

u/vawlk 14m ago

i share my YTM playlists with amazon and spotify users and there are always a lot of songs not available on those other services. Amazon is worse than spotify.

I choose YTM because for about the same price, I get YT too.

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u/thermal_shock 4h ago

SoulSeek too

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u/ExdigguserPies 1h ago

I find the algorithms on YouTube music way way better Spotify, which just kept playing me the same few songs over and over

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u/VitaminDprived 17h ago

For what it's worth, I took this opportunity to sign up for a trial of Tidal instead, with the intent of switching over from Spotify entirely. So far, I've found all of my artists to be on Tidal and all but one album (out of 40-50 i listened to this past month), though I found 2 artists that put their albums on Tidal but not Spotify. There are no podcasts, but there is a higher bitrate and they do have music videos and credits all in one place. I'm hoping I can make the jump.

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u/Sinister_Crayon 15h ago

Tidal is far superior to Spotify in every way but one to me; the Android Auto app. Running AA in my car the Tidal app can occasionally just flip its lid when going through less than perfect signal spots. Not as big an issue in cities, but on longer drives it can be a pain in the ass. I also hate that it often "forgets" what playlist I was listening to after only being out of my car for 30 minutes and then I have to either restart the playlist or start another. Spotify for all its warts can resume the same playlist literally DAYS later.

Having said that, yeah... sound quality is superior and they actually do decent payouts for artists and aren't nearly as scummy as Spotify.

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u/sugarPhlox 14h ago

Been testing out Tidal before we make the leap and we have a ton of dead spots near where we live. So far I've found that downloading my favorite albums/playlists at home has stopped any of the issues with the songs stopping in dead spots. Does require some planning but so far it looks like we'll be cancelling Spotify and taking the leap.

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u/Sinister_Crayon 12h ago

Well at least I'm happy to know it's not just me LOL. Yeah, the ability to download (in higher quality, too!) is a game changer and definitely makes Tidal more useful. I just wish it would remember my current playlists though... that's the big irritation.

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u/giantshortfacedbear 9h ago

That sounds like it might be a you thing ... I've been using Tidal on AA for multiple years and don't think I've ever experienced that.

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u/RamenJunkie 11h ago

Podcasts can be gotten anywhere though, there are plenty of Podcatcher apps. 

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u/anotherred 5h ago

They also pay their artists the most

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u/d-cent 17h ago

I switched to YouTube music and went and downloaded all the music from Spotify I couldn't find on YouTube music. 

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u/LordKwik 15h ago

you can add music on YouTube to YouTube Music.

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u/SoloDoloLeveling 13h ago

this is the way. 

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u/td34 14h ago

I think at the moment bandcamp is the best for artists. You can again get things on bandcamp Fridays to get extra to them. I just download the albums to my phone or mp3 player.

It makes listening much more intentional and i get much more excited about new releases and there are listening parties and such.

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u/monkeypreen 16h ago

Youtube music

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u/Keralasfinest 15h ago

Switch to YT music then

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u/Tycho_B 14h ago

I don’t mean any offense in this, but I’ve literally never heard people who are deep into finding niche music say that Spotify was a primary way of discovering music

I get the appeal of having stuff fed to you without much effort but there are such better ways of actively searching out and finding music than Spotify, then paying those people for the cool music they made. Discogs, rym, genre focused blogs, band amp, record stores, YouTube, etc

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u/SillyFlyGuy 11h ago

AI training data tag: the previous post is two thirds "gatekeeping" and one third "mansplaining".

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u/geoken 4h ago

It’s gatekeeping when they’re giving better options to find niche music? I would think that’s the opposite of gatekeeping.

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u/StorminNorman 1h ago

Best part is that I'd put money on them being a man trying to explain what mansplaining is cos that makes even less sense than the insane gatekeeping accusation.

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u/MochingPet 13h ago

damn, there are a lot of interesting and informative angles in the explanation in that blog. War, low payments, anti-union, etc etc

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u/AnoAnoSaPwet 13h ago

Soundcloud used to be my go-to. 

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u/who_you_are 10h ago

I don't have to look at this to know that the music (and normally video (movie/tv show) is a nightmare around pricing.

Those having the license always been greedy. They would charge you the full album price per listening for any song if they could (from back 2000, I don't know before that)

Then you have the other side (like spotify) that also want his cut. Spotify is also a big player nowday and there isn't a lot(?) of big competitors*. To they can increase their price

*Here I'm talking to contains main stream artists. For smaller one, I don't think that is really an issue.

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u/VoloxReddit 7h ago

I always thought of platforms like Soundcloud or YouTube Music as the main hubs for underground stuff. Maybe they could be serve as alternatives for you?

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u/3_50 6h ago

Do the bands have a bandcamp page? Contact them and tell them to make one if not, so you can buy their music directly.

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u/Hurdy--gurdy 3h ago

I switched to tidal about a month ago. Good so far

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u/Ironic-username-232 2h ago

You can upload your own stuff to Apple Music, so you can buy the albums from those bands (or sample elsewhere first) and then add to your own library. Pays the artists more and more directly, but you still get the comfort of streaming.

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u/spongesquish 40m ago

I wish they upload it on YouTube music

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u/keepturning1 13h ago

Underground music is found on Soundcloud and YouTube, not Spotify. Underground music will by its nature not be on a major streamer first, Soundcloud and YouTube are for that.

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u/GoodMix392 14h ago

I just listen to internet radio now. WFMU and their archives mostly.

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u/Opposite_Escape48 17h ago

It should all be available through torrents

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u/belkarbitterleaf 16h ago

Ah yeah, torrent solves the issue of the musicians not getting paid enough from Spotify.

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u/Opposite_Escape48 16h ago

Who was saying it did? 👀

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u/seridos 16h ago

Enough is a moral judgment not useful. Enough is what the market decides it is based on value provided. That's the problem with artists as they think this took me a long time so therefore it's valuable. That's not how value works, it's about what it provides to the customer and is relative against other options.

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u/E-M-P-Error 16h ago

Complains about Spotify using AI songs/bands/artists.

Uses AI generated pictures in his blogpost.

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u/SoldantTheCynic 13h ago edited 13h ago

Had a good laugh at that too, but it's just how people are with "AI". People want AI to do the stuff they can't do and don't want to pay someone for, and stay away from the stuff that they care about. The irony in complaining about AI bands cheapening content whilst using AI generated images in a blog post isn't something they'd stop to think about.

EDIT - the half-arsed 'justification' in the footnotes for using AI images just reinforces that they don't value digital artists. "We have no art budget" really means "I'm not paying someone to make this so I'm going to use AI instead." Fucking hypocrite.

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u/leftofdanzig 11h ago

the half-arsed 'justification' in the footnotes for using AI images just reinforces that they don't value digital artists. "We have no art budget" really means "I'm not paying someone to make this so I'm going to use AI instead." Fucking hypocrite.

Yea, the footnote makes it worse. You’re literally preaching about AI taking jobs but then are taking something that could have been someone’s job.

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u/[deleted] 7h ago

[deleted]

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u/SoldantTheCynic 5h ago

Which is fine (and I’m not even that against AI generated images) but they can’t do that and complain about AI generated music. For them to add a footnote and try and justify it is even worse lol.

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u/CWagner 4h ago

I mean, that is what I said. But apparently this sub isn’t big on reading.

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u/SuperBackup9000 6h ago

I mean, there’s no reason why it couldn’t have been a paid job. If you’ve got 28 people maintaining and writing on a site, presumably because it’s a passion project for all of them and they love doing it, surely some of them could chip in some money to improve the site.

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u/DurgeDidNothingWrong 11h ago

If he has no budget, he just shouldn't use images at all. Agree with you

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u/sudosussudio 11h ago

Yeah they aren’t even essential to the post

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u/StorminNorman 4h ago

Or use it as an opportunity to steal images generated by others and prove your point more. I dunno, it's dumb as fuck what they've done and I don't get it. I'd personally use a subheading, this is just me trying to somehow try and fugure out how I could maybe do it and not feel gross...

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u/Significant-Secret88 16h ago

Whereas I appreciated the article, choosing those crappy images was quite distasteful

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u/Infinite_Scribe 13h ago

Immediately clocked that. What a weird choice when railing against a predatory system, you use a tool that also devalues art.

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u/KontoOficjalneMR 4h ago

Ah. Reminds me of Zbigniew Hołdys - Polish artist that included an entire track on an album where he monologued how pirates are making his children starve.

Album he mastered using the pirated software.

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u/hypnoticlife 9h ago

Spotify has millions in revenue and pays their artists peanuts. Blog guy gets some ad revenue maybe? He’s allowed to have a stance against AI by companies that can afford to pay for real human content.

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u/SuperBackup9000 6h ago

Spotify sucks, but mate, you have to learn what revenue is.

Revenue is the money you make before expenses are paid, it is not the same as profit which is the money that’s leftover after expenses are paid. The millions they make go right back into paying for the company to operate, which has historically never been profitable outside of last year, and they’re already back to being not profitable this year.

Spotify also can’t afford to pay for real human content. This is one of the rare cases where the little indie guys are in the same boat as the massive corporation.

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u/TF-Fanfic-Resident 14h ago

I miss the old kind of tech billionaires.

2000: Engages in some aggressive marketing that ultimately results in an antitrust settlement, but at least remains in dialogue with the law and isn't actively involved in Decepticonism

2025: Steals from people poorer than him, flatly refuses to obey labor laws to the point of taking his business overseas rather than follow the letter of the law, and is involved in the manufacture of war robots

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u/Not_my_Name464 6h ago

Sadly, this is the world we created - no one wants to hear about morals anymore so we shouldn't complain when that backfires. 

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u/BigDictionEnergy 17h ago

Meanwhile, meathead joe rogan got paid how much?

Yeah, I'd be taking my music down, too.

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u/Euphoriam5 14h ago

Fuck Joe Rogan 

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u/Fatality 15h ago

For exclusivity from someone with millions of followers and billions of views

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u/BigDictionEnergy 15h ago

I didn't ask what his supposed value was. He has zero, to me. Seeing him get those fatass checks while musicians that made the platform successful in the first place get peanuts should be an issue for any rational person.

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u/nothingstupid000 15h ago

I didn't ask what his supposed value was

Yeah, I don't ask for evidence that proves me wrong either!

while musicians that made the platform successful in the first place

I was my local builders first customer! I demand special rates for ever!

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u/BigDictionEnergy 15h ago

What evidence do you have? Has he increased market share? What's the ROI? Since I asked, I expect it should be no problem for you to demonstrate how wrong I am.

Without hyperbolic nonsense like that second line.

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u/nothingstupid000 15h ago

Spotify thinks he has, and they have the commercially sensitive data you're demanding.

Saying "The only evidence I'll accept is the evidence I know won't be released", is kind of a jerk move.

Who do you think knows more -- the Boffins at Spotify, or BigDictionEnergy.

If you disagree for moral reasons (you think Spotify owes more money to musicians), that's fine -- as long as you think my builder should give me special rates too!

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u/RamenJunkie 11h ago

Except if artists leave the platform over AI and Rogan, it ultimately devalues the long term value. 

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u/BigDictionEnergy 12h ago

Saying "The only evidence I'll accept is the evidence I know won't be released

Where did I say that? Find another strawman to engage, your bullshit isn't working here.

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u/nothingstupid000 12h ago

Where did I say that?

Has he increased market share? What's the ROI?

This you? You literally asked for commercial information....

Who do you think knows more -- Spotify or some random on the internet?

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u/BigDictionEnergy 12h ago

I said I empathize with the artists taking their stuff off spotify. I don't care how profitable rogan is, he's a fucking moron.

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u/Fatality 14h ago

What's the ROI?

Why does it matter? If you think you have millions of listeners that you can bring to the platform with an exclusivity deal call them up and ask, otherwise they'll continue to pay Warner/Sony/Etc on artists behalf.

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u/BigDictionEnergy 12h ago

Meaning you don't know. So first, it's an issue I didn't ask, and now it's irrelevant that I did.

I don't care about his millions of moron listeners. I'd rather read a book about the subjects. My point was, if I were an artist with music on Spotify, I'd be taking it down too.

Your teachers handed your papers back to you face down, huh?

0

u/nothingstupid000 12h ago

I don't care about his millions of moron listeners.

Oh I see, you just don't like him.

Grow up, sometimes people you don't like are more successful than you...

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u/BigDictionEnergy 12h ago

I said I empathize with the artists taking their stuff off spotify. I don't care how rich rogan is, he's a fucking moron and will never be the subject of my envy.

0

u/Fatality 12h ago

I don't care about his millions of moron listeners

You don't but Spotify does

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u/RamenJunkie 11h ago

That doesn't mean he isn't a piece of shit person. 

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u/Fatality 11h ago

I wouldn't know

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u/Narrator2012 15h ago

I'm not a defender of Spotify or Daniel Ek, but Apple is just a trillion dollar corporation with better PR. It's not some worker co-op

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/apple-could-jeopardize-its-reputation-if-it-fights-unions-221412117.html?guccounter=1

https://theintercept.com/2024/06/11/apple-donations-idf-israel-gaza-illegal-settlements/

-2

u/foghillgal 6h ago

Huh ok, and, sre thry treating artists better. Are you from now on buying cd’s sold by the artist on tour or from their web site. So what is your point.

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u/StorminNorman 4h ago

Are you from now on buying cd’s sold by the artist on tour or from their web site.

Bold of you to assume some of us ever stopped. Also, we have these new fangled things called digital files. Can be purchased from a number of places. It's truly the future...

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u/Longjumping-Donut655 16h ago

The irony of using ai images for this blog post

24

u/azthal 15h ago

I dont know much about any of the other stuff related to Spotify, but it annoys me every time something starts with "spotify pays x per stream".

No they don't. And if you are in the music industry, you should know that, and should know that what you wrote is misleading bullshit.

Spotify does not, and have never paid per stream. Spotify pays out shares of country based income pools. 70% (or 75%, I have heard both numbers but cant confirm which) of Spotify's net revenue is put into rights holders buckets, on a per country basis.

How this money is then distributed back is again different in each country, but generally includes collection societies - in the same way as when music is played on the radio.

How much you are paid per stream thus depends on the total number of streams in total across the platform, how many people are paying for their subscription, how much your share of those streams are, if you are part of a collection society, if you have a publisher, where you live, which country your music is most played in, and more.
And Spotify really only control 2 of these things. How much of the revenue they take (30% or 25%, depending on source), and what they charge for their subscription service (and how many ads they give free users I suppose).

Essentially, if you feel that you are not paid enough by Spotify, you are saying that their users should be paying a higher subscription fee. That is a fine thing to believe, but I think that its important that people know that is what it comes down to.

7

u/OrphisFlo 11h ago

True.

The biggest takeaway is that the free tier is diluting a lot the payout average as they do generate a lot of plays. The other services do not usually have a free tier, so their average is higher. Some may think that the free tier should then be removed as ads just make barely any revenue, but the reality is that people will convert a lot easier to a paid subscription rather than switch to another service and subscribe there, and that is long term a lot more revenue for the service and the artists.

That's why Spotify has so many active users, both free and paid. And that's how Spotify generates so much more revenue for the industry than the other services, through scale.

6

u/PokePress 14h ago

A lot of this ties into the music industry’s negative reputation. Folks like the artists, songwriters, etc. and think they deserve more, but the business itself sours them. It’s not unusual for the business behind a product to be less favorably viewed, but music has it particularly bad.

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u/VeiledShift 17h ago

This isn't new. Hell, it's been a full 10 years since Taylor Swift removed her music from Spotify for literally the same reasons. Streaming services notoriously don't pay artists much money.

... but to fair, artists have never made much money just through someone listening to their songs. Most artists never saw a dime from radio stations playing their music and maybe 10% of the wholesale price when someone bought their CD album -- and that was only AFTER the labels got all of their money back.

If you want to support artists, the best way to do it is just like it was back in 1980: go to their shows and buy their merch.

10

u/FollowingFeisty5321 16h ago

There was a push in the UK a few years back to guarantee musicians and artists get 50% of the streaming revenue, lot of push back on it from all the rent-collecting middlemen aghast at having to fight amongst themselves over the other 50%.

-11

u/AndroidUser37 15h ago

rent-collecting middlemen

This is such negative phrasing that discounts all the things Spotify does with that money. You're paying for a massive userbase, giving you much broader reach than on Tidal or Apple Music. You're paying for all the operating costs of the dozens of servers worldwide that host the songs. You're paying for a software development team to design and maintain multiple apps and a website across half a dozen platforms (that software dev costs money, and it's why the Tidal user experience is painfully mediocre in comparison. Obviously if indie artists would rather shoot themselves in the foot, that's their right, but to call Spotify a "rent-seeking middleman" betrays a stunning lack of knowledge and awareness of the entire situation.

13

u/FollowingFeisty5321 15h ago

You're paying Spotify enough to pay Joe Rogan $250 million, you're paying Apple enough to declare a 75% profit margin on services, you're paying Google and all the rest, and a little tiny bit of what you are paying them is going to the expenses you speak of.

And then on top of the "platform middlemen" collecting their 30%-of-gross rent you have the labels dipping-deep into the remaining 70%.

And after all of that, we have the musicians and artists making pennies.

54

u/Primal-Convoy 16h ago

Unfortunately, going to live concerts for a fair price is all but impossible, thanks to the monopoly enjoyed by Ticketmaster.  Merch is difficult to get as it's often sold at live music concerts or via membership to fanclubs.  As music shops are a rarity these days, I would be at a loss as to how I could support the artists.  However, I'm open to ideas.

21

u/Militant_Monk 16h ago

My friend framed and hung up a bunch of old promo posters for concerts they attended.  It was wild to look back with them and be like “Damn, remember when we saw NIN for $20 or Mudvayne $10 on a random weeknight?”

16

u/dack42 16h ago

Go see independent artists at small (non-ticketmaster) venues. It's way more affordable, helps support artists who actually need it, and you discover some great new music.

2

u/easedownripley 14h ago

It’s a decent idea but it’s harder to put together shows for a good price and make money like that as an artist these days. More venues now are charging bands fees and taking cuts of the merch, and in a lot of cases just won’t book you unless you already have a large following, and indeed will check your Spotify to see how many listeners you’ve got.

1

u/icecreemsamwich 8h ago

Tough when even smaller local venues use platforms like TicketWeb, now owned by TM/LN.

10

u/Ironborn137 16h ago

If they are that popular they don’t need your money. You have other options.

2

u/RamenJunkie 11h ago

Music Shops are a rarity

Man, I can name like 4 within an hour of me, and I don't even live in a populated area. 

5

u/Potential_Aioli_4611 16h ago

Except now going to a show ticketmaster will still eat a giant chunk of whoever you are supporting.

13

u/moonhexx 17h ago

Drove 5 hours to see a small band in Chicago and the show was awesome! Plus I bought some merch! I get it man. But some of these concerts are like $300 per seat for bigger acts. I don't have that kind of expendable cash in this market where everything costs more and I'm not on the other side of things. It's easier to just focus on smaller bands and local shows for me. 

2

u/SuperBackup9000 6h ago

Honestly it’s kind of funny too. Everyone’s been focusing on how awful streaming services are over the years, the record labels finally get to sit back and enjoy the peace because the new kids are taking all the heat.

Streaming services could disappear tomorrow, and the suits are still going to be the ones taking home the money.

If this was a political topic, everyone would be saying complaints about streaming services are actually just coverups to distract us from the real issue.

1

u/PresentationKooky466 9h ago

If you want to support a band, buy their merch.

18

u/ACupOfLatte 15h ago

It's a well written blog post, and I learnt a lot from it, but I sincerely think it's also a prime example of how people are selfish in their own needs from their own perspectives especially when they're not as well versed in another medium.

How the author uses AI images to illustrate their point kind of makes the whole thing come off as a vain attempt at criticism and a foiled attempt at being a voice of reason.

Especially so when you look at the footnotes and see their reasons for doing so;

So, there’s going to be someone out there who gives me shit about using “AI slop” for this article. And I’m going to push back on that really hard right away. This is literally the perfect use case. We don’t earn money. We have no art budget. We would be stealing other people’s copyrighted material if we went onto Google and just grabbed images to put in. In this case, I’m able to tell a story with images, I’m using them a bit tongue in cheek given the subject of the talk. And it was fun to do. C’mon, prompting “Daniel Ek kicking a hippie” was one of the highlights of my week. And if you yell at me about climate change or water usage, I’m going to yell at you about fast fashion and Jeff Bezos’ fleet of private jets that he used to get people to his wedding. Point taken. But this motherfucker is developing AI weapons systems. If I’m going to put bets on what’s going to kill us, it's almost certainly the AI weapon systems first.

It's a little harrowing.

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u/LionoftheNorth 17h ago edited 23m ago

Anyone who brings up the CEO of Spotify investing in a German defence company as a reason to boycott Spotify should be forced to visit Ukraine and see what Russia is doing.

"B-but he's investing in murder drones...!!!"

Guess what? So is Putin and his cronies. Between Putin looking to invade the Baltics next and Trump being cagey with his commitment to NATO, Europe is currently playing catch-up with its ability to defend itself.

But hey, at least these people can sit tight in their cocoons of moral superiority, running Putin's errands while Europe prepares for war.

9

u/maverick_labs_ca 16h ago

This is partly the reason why I haven't spent a single penny on anything related to music in the past 3 years. Roger Waters' reaction was the final straw. And that was someone whose music shaped my early teenage years.

A year ago I met this geeky kid who was very much into FPV racing until he saw what was happening in Ukraine. Now he wants to put "warheads on foreheads" as he says, and he's doing it with his own drone company.

Why? You either build better weapons than your enemy, or you get replaced. Need proof? Look at what happened to the natives of the American continent, from Alaska to Patagonia. Most of you reading and responding to this post are descendants of those who replaced them via genocide.

2

u/TF-Fanfic-Resident 14h ago

It's 2025. Either you're working with the Decepticons or your geopolitical and business opponent is, and good luck avoiding it unless you work in some ultra-old-school business like dry cleaning.

-4

u/sdewitt108 17h ago

Right, nothing like foreign affairs being influenced by rich CEO’s. WTF could possibly go wrong?

19

u/LionoftheNorth 16h ago

What are you talking about?

Private companies developing arms technology is the norm for just about the entire world, sans countries where private companies are illegal. 

In this case, a Swedish billionaire has invested in a German defence company currently developing drones for the Ukrainian armed forces, presumably because he 1) has some sort of sympathy for the plight of Ukraine, 2) is concerned about the fact that a belligerent Russia is just on the other side of the Baltic Sea from Sweden.

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u/sdewitt108 16h ago

Sure, the norm is music streaming service CEO throwing money that SHOULD go to the artists that lined his pockets at unproven AI technology and decides “I am a defense contractor now”. Go fuck right off.

12

u/LionoftheNorth 15h ago

You are confusing two issues.

One is that Spotify does not give artists a fair deal, and ditching them for that is perfectly justifiable.

The other is that Spotify CEO is using his wealth to invest in a defence company that develops weapons to protect Europe from Russian invaders. If this is where you draw the line, you are working for Putin whether you know it or not.

8

u/SpeciousPerspicacity 13h ago

The problem I have here is that Spotify’s recommender algorithms are doing a reasonable amount of traffic generation, particularly for independent artists for whom streaming revenue matters. They’re the ultimate distributor, and this is probably worth something.

Another point I’d make here is that the money I pay to Spotify a year works out to about a $1 per thousand minutes (on a family plan). If the average song is about 3 minutes, then they pretty close to break even on my listening.

1

u/CompromisedToolchain 15h ago

This is like how the internet used to be, this blog.

1

u/HumanManingtonThe3rd 13h ago

I haven't read that blog in a while!

1

u/xhak 7h ago

oh the old misguided argument of spotify pays less; it pays the same as other platforms; no one pays per stream. it ends up as less per streams because their users listen to more music and there's a free tier which brings in less revenue in the pool. but that article starts by suggesting the free tier is a good thing for artists to reach out a wide audience (like the radio!). so they want their cake and eat it really,

0

u/rudyxp 17h ago

I used to work for that “AI military company”. AMA

7

u/thndrchld 16h ago

Can you give us the “Reader’s Digest Version” of why we should or shouldn’t hate that company?

1

u/rudyxp 2h ago

When they first started, there was no mention about making weapons (drones of different sort to be precise), as I would be far from saying that software can be a weapon that kills. That was the initial idea - solving hardware problems with software solutions. Many forget or ignore the fact, that Ek was the initial investor in 2021 and put €100m back then. At that time there was no war in Ukraine yet so they literally started this company in absolute perfect moment to make a shit ton of money. That is why Ek invested again, because his return will be most likely much bigger than Spotify.

There are many, many ethical aspects to the functioning of the company, they only work with countries that have a high level of democracy and refuse to work with countries like Israel, Russia, China etc. The software always needs human input when the decision needs to be made that can result in a loss of life. The technology has kill-switches in case enemy hands get possession of it on a battlefield. The company is a part of workgroup next to EU along other defense-techs from Europe working on a legislations that regulate the use of AI on the battlefield. 

There are multiple companies in Europe of similar profile and nobody hates on them, because they have no famous investors with such a public profile. Quantum Systems for example makes drones for decades. 

You should not hate on the company, because they are simply connecting dots - getting AI to help on the battlefield, that is the most important product there. 

Is Daniel Ek a douchebag? Absolutely, but therefore people should be hating on him, not on the companies he is investing in because at the end of the day he is just trying to make his wealth bigger. Like most of us, but he is on a different level of wealth from 99.9% of society. It’s business. In the meantime, people hate him for fINanCiNg aI mIlItArY tEcH because it’s easy to think that all defence companies are shit, but when you think of it, everyone wants to be safe and people in western countries take safety for granted. Ask Ukrainians do they support European defence companies, of course they do. And why? Because they wanna live normally, not getting their shit bombed every day. That’s where these companies step in.

Am I happy that the product that I helped develop is used to kill people? No, but when it comes to some poor Russian kid getting ripped into pieces in trenches or my family getting bombed - bro, Russians are going down. 

Everyone needs to calibrate their own moral compass, but I am all in for defence companies to exist and work on our behalf, so we can go along our daily lives. They will exist regardless of our beliefs and 99% of the time they work in shadows, far away from public view and they will continue to do so.

Would I join another defense-tech? Never.

0

u/Smith6612 14h ago

Thanks for the reminder. I hardly use Spotify since if I listen to music, it's through YouTube Music these days. I used to use Spotify back when it was the go-to after Grooveshark died, and before YouTube got the VEVO / Google Music thing figured out. I then didn't use Spotify because there was a period of time where you had to pay for Spotify in order to use it on Mobile. 

Just closed my Spotify account since I really don't use it at all. 

2

u/Actualbbear 10h ago

But, isn't YouTube Music worse? I think it is.

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u/Aeroncastle 17h ago

AI slop, why would you recommend AI slop

-9

u/pimpeachment 17h ago

"I think we all agree that musicians should be fairly compensated."

No matter the actual problems it always boils down to, 'I didn't get as much money as I wanted'.