> how little money per stream artists make ... What is fair compensation for writing a song?
Those are two different things. Recording artist does not always equal songwriter. So how much should the songwriter make? The recording studio? The audio engineer? All the other people involved in creating the recorded song? Now that it's made, how do you get people to know the song exists and want to listen to it, much less purchase it?
The reason compensation isn't a settled thing is it's a very complex thing to answer.
The simplest possible answer is "the artist sets their own price" - assuming they just DIY'd the entire production, advertising, distribution, etc themselves. But that is so much work that they would need to already have an income stream to give them the time to do it all, not to mention all the non-music skills if they're not paying professionals to do the rest.
If they're not just going to play at the local coffee shop, or bus from city to city barely making enough for gas and beer, they need some way to professionally produce, mass-market, and mass-distribute their songs. It's not feasible for most musicians to do this themselves, so there exists a music industry to do it... which gives them all the cards... letting them set the price, and contract terms... which are often unfair. That's what happens when an industry is given the power to exploit people: they do.
> Those are two different things. Recording artist does not always equal songwriter. So how much should the songwriter make? The recording studio? The audio engineer? All the other people involved in creating the recorded song? Now that it's made, how do you get people to know the song exists and want to listen to it, much less purchase it?
Why are any of these the distribution medium's (or better, listener's) problem? The songwriter, recording studio, audio engineer, marketing firm, etc should be paid for their services at their standard rates at the time the service is performed. The artist is the one who should accept this risk. Just like.. basically everything else in the world. The plumber who installed an office sink is not entitled to some fraction of the occupying organization's revenue, right?
> But that is so much work that they would need to already have an income stream to give them the time to do it all
Which is why labels exist. They take the risk on, and pre-pay for (everything), in exchange for the lion's share of potential revenue. Artists are, of course, welcome to stay unsigned and handle all the risk and rewards themselves, but that typically isn't a good value prop.
IMO everything here is working as designed, including Spotify. The author just doesn't understand that "artists getting paid fractions of pennies per stream" is exactly what should happen.
> should be paid for their services at their standard rates at the time the service is performed
Because by and large they don't want that. They are creatives who would prefer to be invested in their work: Charge less now, putting more into their work in the hope and belief that it will pay off over time. Sometimes it does.
Part of what's wrong with the industry. Steve Albini had a flat fee and was one of the most sought after recording engineers (aka producer but he hated the term). And that was based on the quality of his work moreso than his modest, flat fee.
A producer is not remotely the same thing as a recording engineer?
He usually did the job of a producer but he didn't like the term, as he wanted the artist to get all of the credit for creating the art, even through the producer often plays a big role in the final product.
Producers also often contribute singing, instrument playing, and songwriting, so the distinction between them and the "artist" is pretty flimsy. In ways, artist is as much defined as "the person that gets all of the credit for creating the art" as anything else.
This is still rent seeking behavior in an industry that pivoted from a live services and paid ownership model.
Nothing wrong with rent-seeking when you actually offer something people want, it's optional, and you don't force them with bait-and-switch (all of which are cases of the bad rent-seeking).
Renting a house is rent-seeking too, for example.
Switching Adobe to a subscription service, on the other hand...
I don't think you can call it rent seeking when it's both completely nonessential and 100% the fruit of their labors. If anything, Spotify is rent-seeking.
how is that rent-seeking?
they actually contribute to the song.
People don't actually care about answering this question, they just want to steal music and keep a 'clean' conscience.
I think the opposite is actually true - people want to pay for music, but in a way that compensates the artists they like without enriching someone who 'only' provides the mechanism that they use to listen. People rail against Spotify, music labels, and TicketMaster for extracting so much money from the music industry that there's very little left for people who actually make the music.
The music industry has made millionaires out of people who would otherwise just be playing or singing in a room.
The software industry has made millionaires out of people that would otherwise just be hacking or debugging in a room.
Nope! I just think the business model is rotten. I worked at Amazon MP3 back in the day, mostly because I adored the concept of people paying to download DRM-free files. Same reason I use GOG for my games: I have a lot of money waiting for people that want to sell me files that I have control over.
But the industry moved another direction, and they want ultimate control over everything: not just the songs themselves, but the clients to play them and everything in between. And the tragedy is they screw the artists just as much as customers. Copyright has been captured by the middlemen at the expense of the artists and audiences: that's the real reason people have no respect for the industry, and why copyright is so reviled.