Spotify cannot be compared to iTunes and amazon, or traditional CD sales. It is more equivalent to royalties from FM radio play. Lots of people don't seem to get this.
The smart musicians realise they can do things like put their album on there for the month before the release, leave it on there for the month after its release, then yank it away and watch the MP3 sales climb. I see this quite a lot.
Planet Mu records in particular seem to have a subset of their extensive back catalogue on there that is constantly in rotation. This practice has basically forced me to buy music from them on more than one occasion. It's like the mythical practice of drug dealers giving kids free samples to get them hooked :)
> Spotify cannot be compared to iTunes and amazon, or traditional CD sales. It is more equivalent to royalties from FM radio play.
Well, that sounds like a strange simile to me. When listening to FM radio you do not chose what tracks you listen to. Spotify isn't Pandora. With Spotify, you can chose whatever track you like (as long they have it and there's no commercial queued). Lady Gaga got $167 for 1 million plays. Imagine what the small artists receives.
Spotify is controlled by the four major record companies: Universal, EMI, Sony and Warner. Even if they just own 18% of the shares, Spotify's entire existence rests on the trust that these record companies continue to license "their" music. The four record companies are using the power of Spotify to further strengthen its domination over other record companies and penalize artists outside their own team.
To me, listening to Spotify and actually believing you are doing something better for the artist than those who pirate is no less than delusion.
listening to Spotify and actually believing you are doing something better for the artist than those who pirate is no less than delusion.
That’s sad to hear, and I hope it gets fixed, but
But
I didn't sign up for Spotify in order to "do something for teh starving artists" I, and the people I know who signed up for it, did so because
1) it's legal
2) it's cheap
3) It gives instant access to a wealth of music beyond what I could ever listen to in my whole life. It’s not every song ever (for instance there’s no Frank Zappa, no Coil, and the cusswords in Cake’s songs are blipped out) but it's close.
The artists were starving when the major labels were ripping them off, the artists are starving now their songs get copied and torented. It’s sad that Spotify doesn’t solve that problem, and that it doesn’t cure cancer either, but hey, at least Spotify didn’t make things worse.
Spotify’s competition is yes, illegal downloads. Illegal downloads have the advantage in price - they’re free, but they lose out to Spotify in not being legal and being less searchable.
The "instant music" really is a distinguishing feature. e.g. Gary Moore dies -> Play some of his music on Spotify. Friend says he’s been digging a band called "Aesthetic perfection" -> Listen to them all afternoon on Spotify. As ever, casual listening, if the artist gets paid or not is a gateway to finding new music that you really like, leading to being a fan and buying CDs/MP3s, gig tickets and merchandise.
I use Spotify too. I'm a user from back in the days when they shared their friends music libraries. I kind of like Spotify, but I think it is important not to see any of these services as the be-all and end-all of digital music distribution solutions.
That is exactly how Spotify is presented here in Sweden. While Spotify is losing money, the politicians brag and tell us how they suddenly found the "cure" for illegal filesharing.
We have to be realistic and not place all our bets on one horse. There is no single solution to media on internet and Spotify is no different. The internets = multitude. And, therein lies the beauty.
The Lady Gaga figure is not relevant. It was for the first months of public Spotify, before they had any real revenue. Since the payout is revenue based and not fixed (at least as far as I've heard), the level of revenue impacts the payouts a lot. Also, AFAIK, no official figures are released for how much any artist gets from Spotify currently.
I've seen this happen on occasion and it's the one thing that really pisses me off about Spotify. I expect music that's in my playlists to actually be there when I want to play it. I pay for it, it's legal and it earns the labels more than the thousands of people who use Pirate Bay. When they yank the music I listen to, away from Spotify it makes me want to fire up my BitTorrent-client again.
Of course it can! The fact that it is on-demand practically negates the need to buy the music else where. On radio you have to sit around waiting for your song to come on. I've seen royalty reports from Spotify's largest artists, and it was indeed microscopically small.
The smart musicians realise they can do things like put their album on there for the month before the release, leave it on there for the month after its release, then yank it away and watch the MP3 sales climb. I see this quite a lot.
Planet Mu records in particular seem to have a subset of their extensive back catalogue on there that is constantly in rotation. This practice has basically forced me to buy music from them on more than one occasion. It's like the mythical practice of drug dealers giving kids free samples to get them hooked :)