I think it’s a bit disingenuous to say that Spotify “cut” the revenue per stream. Spotify doesn’t have a fixed revenue per stream, payouts are dynamic and based on how much revenue it made and how many streams there are in total. Also Spotify gives something like 80% of its revenue to the music industry.
It’s essentially a pie that gets divided up amongst all artists by steam count. If your friend’s garage band are angry that they only get 0.001 cents per stream then they should be angry at Spotify listeners for streaming too much Taylor Swift!!!
Furthermore to pay the artists Spotify has to pay the labels and of course they take a giant cut. This trope of Spotify being an evil corporation is unfair
I don't think Spotify is evil, but I do think their business model doesn't make sense.
I mean, it sounds great. Pay 10-15 bucks a month and listen to all the music you want, whenever you want. What an amazing business idea!
But has anyone stepped back and asked if this is actually possible? Because when your artists are getting paid crumbs I don't see how this system continues.
100% agree. I think the subscription should be more like $30/$40 per month based on the value you get but of course users would never pay that!
So I wonder if there would ever be a middle ground between what artists would accept and what users would pay?