Streaming Royalties
I just read a post from @djlethalskillz that had a video in it showing a guy who got 500,000 streams on one of his Spotify tracks which, for someone like me, is an ASTRONOMICAL amount! I'm really happy for the guy and that's something I'm definitely never going to achieve. But, I kinda knew what the next bit was going to be as he started sharing the royalties (payment) he'd get from Spotify...
If you are a music fan/producer then I hope you're sitting down. 500k streams didn't even net the guy $1,000, it was something like $920. And that wouldn't be in one lump payment at the end of the month, rather spread throughout the year and he won't see all of that money until 12 months time... if he is lucky! There are so many artists that have been vocal about the, frankly, piss poor royalty payments from Spotify but it's a catch 22 really.
Large Listener Base
With nearly 300 million users, it's definitely hard to see where else artists can have access to such a large listener base and where listeners can have access to a large catalogue of music. However, over the last 10 years of Spotify's existence, is there a danger that music is now a commodity? Users are paying subscription fees but their money isn't really going towards the artist with it being split between many factors like labels, distributors, Spotify itself.
Of course there are other services like Apple Music, Deezer and Amazon Music too which is where most distribution goes to which all have hundreds of millions of users between them.
Doesn't Add Up...
I'm still baffled by some conversations I have with music producers who, even after they tell me they are beaten down by only making $1.50 in a quarter, they still believe that chasing these bigger platforms is the way forward. I only made around $4-5 in the last quarter through our Electronic Alliance Records label and that was the 2nd highest out of all our artists!
This was after 2 of my tracks got featured on Spotify Editorial playlists which have over 250k subscribers to them (big Drum & Bass music playlists). You'd have thought the follower count would have increased... still not even above 100 yet and I'm sure most of those are fellow EMAliens (thanks guys and gals, love you all). So listeners does NOT equal fans and this thought process doesn't add up and besides, how can you interact with potential fans if there's no social aspect to your streaming site?
Crypto Alternatives
As you know, I like looking at the numbers and in 2019, with around 25k listens, I got about $80 total (from across all sites, sales and the like), when I compare that to a crypto alternative like Steem (pre-Hive), holy shit, it pales to insignificance. We're probably looking at about $600. But it's not just about the money that I'm earning myself with posts about my music and sharing that good stuff around, that's also been with engagement from people who are listening and leaving a comment that I can also reward as a way of saying thanks.
See, the model with Web 3.0 platforms is so radically different from Web 2.0, average people almost don't believe it! Web 2.0 platforms take things - personal details, subscription fees and don't really give anything back to the user. Web 3.0 platforms give things - no personal details needed, owning a stake in the platform you're on, rewarding engagement in a two way support street between consumer and creator. It's powerful stuff.
Supporting Those Who Support You
When a fan comments on a Facebook page, the best I can do is give their comment a like and a "thank you" but on Hive, I can do that too except the "like" can also give them something more that they can then use to buy something else with or share with other content creators they want to support.
I'm catching wind of another music streaming site called Emanate which is interesting a few people and I'll probably be paying more attention to it. Effectively using blockchain to create smart contracts to protect the songs musicians upload to it, distributing royalties every 6 seconds (exponentially faster than current music industry models) and helping artists with additional revenue.
I'd personally like to see how they plan on supporting music curators and fans though and not fall in to the traps of previous projects but it's still early days.
Anyway, let me know what you think. If you're a music fan did you know about the royalty structure? What would you like to see out of all of the music sites out there? If you're a music producer, what are your thoughts on alternatives?
Nicky