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Comment by batiudrami | Hacker News Reader

Well they are supporting the artist. $500,000 paid to Taylor Swift is better than what she would have received if people listend to her albums on Grooveshark, or torrented the album, or whatever. Sure, half a cent per stream is not much, but it is something. It's not on the same level as buying a CD, but it's better than piracy, where revenue for the artist is zero.

The other thing is, it's not like Spotify is making bank off their service either - last I checked they still haven't posted a profit. They can only charge so much because people will only pay so much for a monthly music subscription, and 70% of revenue paid directly to artists/labels doesn't sound unreasonable to me.

I guess fundamentally the problem is "people don't want to pay much for music" not "Spotify is allowing people to not pay much for music". Artists seem to be placing the blame at Spotify's feet, when it is less people being willing to pay for music any more.

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I think the thing people are missing here is that the $500,000 paid to Taylor Swift doesn't go directly to her, that is the gross royalty which presumably the publishers and label take the majority of. The artist themselves will receive a fraction of that. The situation is different for indie artists who are effectively the publisher and label too, but they have the opposite problem of lack of scale, and the per-play royalty is far more important for the long tail than for the hits, so the negative impact is greater. Taylor Swift could survive on magazine photoshoot revenue alone, an option not open to The Amazing Snakeheads or whoever.

Spotify may not be "making a profit" as a corporation but they still presumably have hundreds of salaried staff and their business model is basically jam tomorrow - their fixed costs are mostly the same whether anyone has signed up to paid subscriptions or not, so they all definitely get paid and the artists may or may not, but Spotify will sell their product in the meantime regardless. That isn't ethical. "Exposure" and "discovery" still work to the advantage of the large labels - Spotify is a new gatekeeper and being playlisted on the right Spotify list can make or break careers. There doesn't seem to be much transparency around how level the playing field is and how much influence the shareholders have.

For an artist, the contrast with iTunes is stark. Apple didn't turn round and say "we'll pay you if this is a success" - they paid the full royalty from day one. Spotify should have been regulated in the same way that radio is, and royalties should have been on a par with that, as a minimum, with a premium for the on-demand aspect.

To be honest, YouTube's history is far more ethically dubious but they don't seem to get the same heat from artists I guess because they are seen as too big/powerful to be criticised.

While your point is true in general, in the case of Taylor Swift she has a bit more sway. Not only is she, by far, the biggest act on a small indie label, she was the first artist signed by that label and her father was one of the initial investors. So while she doesn't own her own label, she is on a small indie label and no doubt has quite a bit of influence.

But like I said - that's the deal with signing to a major label - you agree that they will take a lot of the profits for your album in return for shouldering the costs of recording and promoting it. Artists can always remain independent and just pay a unit cost for distribution, but that means taking the risk of spending their own money on recording, and doesn't necessesarily come with the marketing opportunities that come with being signed to a major label.

I don't see Spotify as ethically dubious at all - they've had agreements with major labels from day one, and have only ever streamed music which they had a license for (unlike, say Grooveshark). Spotify only pays you if people lsiten to your music, in the same way that iTunes only pays you if people buy the music. It's the same deal, just on a 'per listen' not a 'per purchase' basis. The only issue with Spotify as I see it is that they don't pay artists (or their representative labels, which again, the artists signed up for) all that much, but like I said, they're not actually earning that much money either.

You are right that Spotify is lose/lose/lose. It's helping crush the industry, they're losing money hand over fist, and artists aren't being supported. Awesome.

Like I said, I'm totally cool if people want to not pay for music. That's fine. Great. Continue to not pay for music! I won't even blame you. Just don't falsely believe that Spotify supports artists you enjoy. If you want to support an artist you gotta do it yourself.

the issue is that you only make $500k if you are a name like taylor swift who ironically doesn't really need that money since she can make much more from touring. if you are an indie artist, you are making basically $0.

I happen to know a few indie artists in my area and I can tell you that after equipment, travel costs for gigs, printing media, hosting a website, etc, almost all of them are losing money.

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